Behaviourist Approach

• Key assumptions

  - we are born as a 'blank slate'/tabula rasa

  - fully on the nurture side

  - behaviour is learnt
• The behaviourist approach suggests that psychology should be ________

  Scientific
• The only truly objective measure is to record _______________

  What people do
• Tabula rasa

  Our behaviour and characteristics are constructed through our life experiences
• Classical conditioning


  Learning through association
• Operant conditioning

  Learning through reward and punishment
• Pavlov's study

  - interested in the salivation reflex

  - rang a bell as he fed his dogs

  - after repeated occasions the dogs learned to salivate to the bell alone

  - they also salivated to different types of bell - generalisation
• Unconditioned stimulus


  Produces a natural response
• Unconditioned response

  Natural response to the unconditioned stimulus
• Conditioned stimulus


  Produces a new learnt response
• Conditioned response

  The response that has been learnt
• Little Albert - aims (3)

  - to see if it was possible to induce a fear of an object through classical conditioning

  - to see if the fear would be transferred to other similar objects

  - to see what effect time would have on the fear response
• Little Albert - method


  Case study on one child, set in controlled conditions, lasted about 2 months
• Little Albert - participant

  9-11 months old orphan who was looked after by a wet nurse, described as 'stolid' —> showing little emotion or sensitivity
• Little Albert - baseline measures

  - showed no fear when presented with a rat, rabbit, dog, monkey, mask or cotton wool

  - a metal bar was hit with a hammer behind him which made him cry uncontrollably

  - he was then presented with a rat and the bar was struck again

  - after a number of paired presentations he reacted to the rat alone by crying and crawling away

  - the other objects he was initially presented with also produced a fear response
• Little Albert - 1 month later


  - he still showed fear of varying degrees to all of the stimuli

  - he seemed less nervous with the rabbit at first but showed the fear response when he touched it
• Little Albert - conclusions

  - it is possible to produce fear through classical conditioning

  - the fear was transferred to other similar objects

  - time had not removed the fear response
• Little Albert - negative evaluation


  - experienced distress

  - wasn't protected from harm

  - only one baby was used to can't be generalised

  - low ecological validity
• Little Albert - positive evaluation

  - high control over extraneous variables

  - tells us about how we can learn fears and how they can be reduced
• Skinner - aim

  To test operant conditioning
• Skinner box

  A small box where an animal would be kept which allowed Skinner to control reward and punishments that would shape the animals' behaviour
• Positive reinforcement example

  A rat presses a lever and gets a reward of food - behaviour is reinforced
• Punishment example

  A rat presses a lever and gets an electric shock - behaviour is less likely
• Negative reinforcement example

  A rat presses a lever and the electric shock is switched off - behaviour is reinforced
• Skinner - negative evaluation

  - may not be able to generalise animal behaviour to human behaviour
• Skinner - positive evaluation

  - using animals means we can control more variables so can be more objective and scientific
• Positive evaluation of the behaviourist approach

  - real world applications e.g. treatment of disorders

  - the research is controlled so good internal validity
• Negative evaluation of the behaviourist approach

  - research is controlled so low ecological validity

  - ignores the role of other factors in behaviour