issues and debates

Question 1

ethics

Answer 1

• issues involved in using animals in lab experiments
• issues with Watson and rayner
• children in bandura study

Question 2

practical issues

Answer 2

• generalising from animals to humans
• observations bring practical issues such as how to record data if the observation is overt.

Question 3

reductionism

Answer 3

• reducing animal behaviour to simple brain functioning
• oversimplification could ignore important interactions in phobia generation eg. the theory ignores the development of phobias through evolution.
• however, reductionist approach led to useful application in phobia treatments.

Question 4

comparisons using different themes

Answer 4

• SLT
• operant
• classical

Question 5

psych as a science

Answer 5

• conditioning theories come from experiments, and controls are used to isolate the IV and DV. this is a scientific method. observations can be less scientific, if for example, they are naturalistic.

Question 6

culture and gender

Answer 6

• operant theory would suggest that both cultural issues and gender behaviour are learned through reinforcement principles.
• social learning suggests both are learned through observing others.

Question 7

nature/ nurture

Answer 7

• behaviourists focus on observable and measurable, so look at nurture side of argument.
• behaviour such as gender role is learned rather than biologically determined.

Question 8

psych understanding over time

Answer 8

• changes in treatments for phobias from flooding to CBT whilst still using some SD techniques

Question 9

social control

Answer 9

• classical conditioning can be linked to social control in that advertising uses such principles to shape behaviour.
• operant has led to therapies such as token economy where someone is rewarded for required behaviour. society or its representatives decide what behaviour is required and this can be seen as a form of social control. if we copy what we see and what we see rewarded, then television and video games perhaps need to be monitored and any such monitoring can be seen as social control.

Question 10

use of psych knowledge within society

Answer 10

• using patterns of reward to shape desired behaviour in schools or prisons
• introduction to film censorship to protect children from imitating
• 9pm watershed

Question 11

socially sensitive research

Answer 11

• therapies all tend to have a therapist who has power in the situation. this is a socially sensitive area of research, because it implies that a client is less able to cope in society.
• skinners ideas about learning by reinforcement are socially sensitive if they are taken as explaining all learning- school learning using rewards could be seen as society using brain washing, for example.