Behavioral therapy Flashcards
How did Pavlov discover classical conditioning?
He was experimenting with with dog’s digestion system and noticed that dogs were salivating before the food was offered to them. He started pairing the food with other stimuli such as flashing light to prove that he could condition the dogs to salivate with outside stimuli
What was John Watson’s belief about learned neuroses?
Watson was one of the foundering fathers of behaviorism and believed that everything can be taught. After starting experimenting with humans (Little Albert) he found out the phobias and possibly other psychological symptoms could be learned
What is operant conditioning?
It is the process of reinforcement of a certain behavior in which stimuli are used to increase or decrease that same behavior
How did B. F. Skinner discover operant conditioning?
He discovered that animals pressed a bar not based on a previous stimulus, but on what happened after the bar was pressed. For example, the animals would press on the bar that would produce food pellets and it did not matter if they produced them all the time.
What is reciprocal inhibition
A new stimulus is used to decrease an habitual response
What is stimulus generalization?
A child is trained to respond to a social clue and it is hoped they will respond to the same social clue when presented by others
What is stimulus discrimination?
Behavior only responding to a very specific stimulus
What did Bandura believed about social learning theory?
He believed that people can be reinforced through observation. That is, by watching other people being reinforced
What forces allowed behaviorism to come up as a second force?
- Age of Enlightenment and belief that humans are born as “blank slates”
- 1879 first psychological lab
- Pavlov and classical conditioning
- Watson and learned neuroses
- Skinner and operant conditioning
- Learning principles were applied to therapy
- Empirical methods applied to psychology
