Approaches - The behaviourist approach

Question 1

Why was the behaviourist approach developed?

Answer 1

The behaviourist approach aimed to make psychology more scientific by using highly controlled experiments

Question 2

What do behaviourists view the mind as?

Answer 2

• Behaviourists view the mind as a black box in the sense that response to stimulus can be observed quantitatively
• Behaviourists also criticise early attempts to study internal mental processing such as introspection

Question 3

What is classical conditioning?

Answer 3

Learning by association: When a neutral stimulus is consistently paired with an unconditioned stimulus so the neutral stimulus becomes a conditioned stimulus producing the original response caused by the unconditioned stimulus

Question 4

What is an example of classical conditioning?

Answer 4

Pavlov’s dogs: Dogs associate the sound of a bell or a metronome (NS→CS) with food (UCS) and salivating (UCR→CR to the bell/metronome)

• The neutral stimulus at the start is the bell
• The unconditioned stimulus at the start is the food
• They are paired to each other and associated
• The conditioned response is the salivating at the sound of the bell (The conditioned stimulus)

Question 5

What is operant conditioning? (learning by trial and error)

Answer 5

Operant conditioning is a type of associative learning process through which the strength of a behaviour is modified by reinforcement or punishment
(Learning from connection between behaviour and consequences)

Question 6

What is stimulus generalisation?

Answer 6

When the conditioned response happens with similar stimuli, for example: little Albert was classically conditioned to fear white rats but became scared of dogs, fur coats and a Santa mask as well due to stimulus generalisation

Question 7

What was Skinner’s experiment of operant conditioning?

Answer 7

• Skinner used rats to demonstrate operant conditioning
• The rats could pull a lever and be rewarded with a food pellet
• The lever pulling behaviour became more frequent and deliberate over time
• The rats were also able to be conditioned to pull a different lever in order to stop the floor of the cage from being electrocuted

Question 8

What is positive and negative reinforcement?

Answer 8

Positive reinforcement - Adding a stimulus in order to increase behaviour
Negative reinforcement - Removing/avoiding a stimulus in order increase behaviour
(Punishments decrease a behaviour)

Question 9

What is extinction?

Answer 9

Stopping reinforcement in order to stop the behaviour over time

Question 10

What is a strength of the behaviourist approach? (Little Albert)

Answer 10

• The little Albert study by Watson showed that fear could be a learnt response instead of it being regarded as instinctual
• This lead to the development of the behavioural explanation and counter conditioning treatments for phobias

Question 11

What is a strength of the behaviourist approach? (Token economy systems, practical applications)

Answer 11

• Behavioural theories have practical applications in institutions (token economies) this approach aims to teach those in institutions to improve their quality of life through behaviourist learning processes (Positive reinforcement)
• However this may be regarded as unethical as token economies could be seen as manipulative

Question 12

What is a weakness of the behaviourist approach?

Determinism, disregarding free will

Answer 12

• A weakness of the behaviourist approach is that it states that behaviour is as a result of learning from the environment
• This is hard determinism as the approach disregards the role of free will in human behaviour

Question 13

What is a strength of the behaviourist approach?

Validity

Answer 13

• A strength of the behaviourist approach is that it uses objective scientific experimental methods
• This allows behaviourists to systematically manipulate variables throughout their experiments
• Therefore they can focus on observable behaviour that demonstrates cause and effect

Question 14

What is a weakness of the behaviourist approach? (Reductionist)

Answer 14

• The behaviourist approach is seen as a reductionist approach due to it only focusing on lower levels of explanations
• Therefore it fails to explain human behaviour as complex and not just down to stimulus - response interactions

Question 15

What is a weakness of the behaviourist approach? (Lacks generalisability, use of animals in experiments)

Answer 15

• The research was mainly done on animals, such as rats or dogs
• Therefore generalisation to human behaviour is limited