Behaviourist Approach Flashcards
What does the behaviourist approach claim is all we have at birth?
The capacity to learn
What is the focus of this approach?
Observable behaviour
Where is all behaviour learned from in this approach?
The environment
How does psychology influence how the behaviourist approach is tested?
As psychology is a science, behaviour must be measured in highly controlled environments to establish cause and effect
Why can research be carried out on animals and humans in this approach?
There is little difference between the learning that takes place in humans and animals
What does this approach claim behaviour is primarily concerned with?
Your observable behaviour
What is your behaviour the result of?
A stimulus-response mechanism
What is a stimulus?
Anything, internal/external, that brings about a response
What is a response?
Any reaction in the presence of a stimulus
What is reinforcement?
The process by which a response is strengthened
What are all the abbreviations in this approach?
Unconditional stimulus = US/UCS
Unconditioned response = UR/UCR
Neutral stimulus = NS
Conditioned stimulus = CS
Reflex = automatic response (uncontrolled)
Describe Thorndike’s experiment
Made cats escape a box through trial and error like a puzzle. A reward was on the other side once the cats got out. As the cat continuously claimed the reward, it became more able to solve the puzzle each time
What does Thorndike’s experiment show?
Behaviour is learned by your environment. If we manipulate the environment, we can shape and manipulate behaviour
Who discovered the process of classical conditioning?
Ivan Pavlov
Outline Pavlov’s research (Pavlov’s dogs)?
. Was investigating salivary reflexes of his dogs when he realised that the dogs were salivating when presented with stimuli that were associated with food
. He used a neutral stimulus of a bell (doesn’t usually provide a response) and paired it with the unconditioned (natural) stimulus of food.
. When these two stimuli were repeatedly paired together, a conditioned response of salivation was created simply when the bell was rung, even if the food wasn’t present
. The new conditioned stimulus was the bell
How is timing important in classical conditioning?
If the neutral stimulus cannot be used to predict the presence of the unconditioned stimulus e.g the Neutral stimulus occurs after the UCS, then conditioning won’t take place
What did Pavlov find out about the permanence of classical conditioning?
He proposed the idea of extinction: if the conditioned stimulus is presented without the unconditioned stimulus too many times, the conditioned response will be lost as the CS isn’t a natural stimulus like the UCS
Although extinction occurs in classical conditioning, what did Pavlov find about the ease of getting the conditioning back?
Spontaneous recovery: after extinction occurs, if the UCS and CS are paired together, there are less pairings needed for the conditioned response to return
What is the idea behind Skinner’s theory of operant conditioning?
Organisms make spontaneous behavioural decisions and face consequences for their behaviour which can be positive or negative. Whether or not the organism repeats this behaviour heavily depends on the nature of the consequence (learning through consequences)
What is reinforcement in operant conditioning and what are the two types?
Something in the environment that strengthens a behaviour, making it more likely to happen again
- Positive and negative reinforcement
What is positive reinforcement?
When an individual is rewarded as a consequence of their behaviour, creating a pleasurable response for the individual that encourages them to repeat that same behaviour
How does negative reinforcement work?
When an individual has an aversive (unpleasant) stimulus and response removed that puts them back to a pleasant state, and the behaviour that caused the removal of the aversiveness is repeated
What are schedules of reinforcement in operant conditioning?
After establishing a response and training a behaviour through continuous reinforcement, a partial reinforcement schedule is more effective in maintaining that response as continuous reinforcement once a behaviour has been taught is at risk of extinction
What is the idea of punishment in operant conditioning?
When an individual experiences an unpleasant consequence as a result of their behaviour, decreasing the chance of that behaviour reoccurring.
