Behaviorism

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Behaviorism

• Chapter 11

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Three stages of behaviorism

• 1913-1930 Watsonian behaviorism
• 1930-1960 Neobehaviorism
• 1960-present Sociobehaviorism

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What is Operationism?

• The idea that the terminology in a science must
  be precise
• A concept must have a physical referent
• A concept is defined by how it is measured (the
  operation or process)
• pseudo-problems must be discarded

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Neobehaviorism
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• 2nd form of behaviorism
• Skinner (Tolman, Hull)
• The rat as an important research subject
• Assumption that one could generalize from rats to
  other animals and humans
• Simple, easy to study, readily available

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Clark Leonard Hull (1884-1952)

• Drives
• Motivation
• A state of bodily need
• Arises from a deviation from optimal biological
  conditions
• Drive reduction is the only basis of
  reinforcement

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• Primary drives
• Arise from a state of physical need
• Are vital to the organisms survival
• Secondary drives
• Are learned
• Are situations or environmental stimuli
  associated with the reduction of primary drives
• As a result of the association with primary
  drives, become drives themselves

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B.F. Skinner (1904-1990)

• One of the most influential psychologists in the
  20th century
• Originally wanted to be a writer
• Became depressed after deciding he had nothing
  to say
• Began graduate studies in psychology
• 1938 wrote book, initially not very successful

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B.F. Skinner (1904-1990)

• However, people began to realize Skinners ideas
  had applied uses
• Beginning in 1950s, he became the major
  embodiment of behaviorism
• Large and loyal group of followers
• 1972 Humanist of the Year Award

Principle Skinner From The Simpson
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Skinners behaviorism

• Dealt only with observable behavior
• No presumptions about internal entities
• The empty organism approach
• Internal physiological and mental events exist
  but not useful to science
• Skinner advocated a system with no theoretical
  framework
• Not averse to all theorizing
• Warned against premature theorizing
• Large numbers of subjects / statistics not
  necessary

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Operant conditioning

• Operant behavior
• Response occurs b/c of a reinforcement
• Occurs without an observable external stimulus
• Behavior is voluntary
• Contrasted with respondent (Pavlovian)
  conditioning, which is elicited by a specific
  stimulus

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Skinner box
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Operant conditioning

• Law of acquisition
• the strength of an operant behavior increases
  when it is followed by the presentation of a
  reinforcing stimulus
• Key variable reinforcement
• Differs from Thorndike's position
• Thorndike explanatory
• Skinner strictly descriptive

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Operant conditioning

• Schedules of reinforcement
• Original experiments
• Rat received reinforcement every time it
  performed certain behavior
• Later experiments manipulated
• When reinforcement occurred (how many responses
  required)
• How often reinforcement occurred (time period
  after responses before reinforcement given)

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Operant conditioning

• Successive approximation

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Applied Ideas

• 1945 aircrib
• Brought skinner public notoriety
• Mechanized environment invented to relieve menial
  labor
• Not commercially successful
• Daughter reared in it with no ill effects

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Applied Ideas

• Teaching machine
• Invented in the 1920s by Pressey
• Promoted by Skinner
• Not enthusiastically received
• Surplus of teachers
• No public pressure to improve learning

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Applied Ideas

• Resurgence of interest in 1950s when Skinner
  promoted similar device
• Excess of students
• Public pressure to improve education so U.S.
  could compete with Soviet Union space program
• After the 1960s, computer-assisted instructional
  methods became dominant

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Applied Ideas

• Pigeon-guided missiles
• Developed by Skinner during WWII
• Guidance system to steer bombs from warplanes to
  ground targets
• Pigeons housed in missile nose-cones
• Trained through prior conditioning to peck at
  target image
• Pecking affected angles of missiles fins
• Resultant adjustments kept missile on target
• Pigeons very accurate
• Military not impressed

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Operant conditioning

• Walden Two (1948)a behavioristic society
• Novel of a 1,000-member rural community
• Program of behavioral control through positive
  reinforcement
• Behavior modification
• Uses positive reinforcement
• Applied in a variety of settings
• Works with people in same manner as with animals,
  by reinforcing desired behavior and extinguishing
  undesired behavior
• Problem usually only effective within
  environment where training occurred

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Criticisms of Skinners behaviorism

• His extreme view that only observable behavior
  could be studied
• His opposition to theory
• His willingness to extrapolate beyond the data to
  possible real life solutions
• The narrow range of behavior studied
• His position that all behaviors are learned

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Criticisms of Skinners behaviorism

• Animal Training
• Circus acts
• Problem
• Innate behaviors stronger than learned behaviors
  (instinctive drift)
• Ex. pigs trained to pick up a coin and drop it
  into a bank
• Pigs would start burying coin

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Sociobehaviorism the cognitive challenge

• Sociobehaviorism
• Combination of behaviorism and cognitive theory
• Studies humans in social situations
• The third form of behaviorism

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Albert Bandura (1925-)

• Social cognitive theory
• Research focus observation of the behavior of
  humans in interaction
• Emphasizes the role of reinforcement in learning
  and behavior modification
• Reinforcer effective if
• Person is consciously aware of what is being
  reinforced
• Person anticipates the same reinforcer if the
  behavior is repeated

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• Observational Learning
• Bobo Doll study

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Albert Bandura (1925-)

• Vicarious reinforcement
• learning by watching other peoples behavior
• seeing the consequences of their behavior
• Assumption Humans anticipate outcomes
• Behavior can be regulated by
• Imagining consequences, and
• Making a conscious selection of the behavior to
  manifest

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Albert Bandura (1925-)

• Self-Efficacy
• Ones sense of self-esteem and competency
• Affects how a person approaches problems and
  difficulties

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Julian Rotter (1916-)

• Greater emphasis on cognitive processes than
  Bandura
• Four cognitive principles determine behaviors
• Expectation of amount and kind of reinforcement
• Estimation of probability the behavior will lead
  to a particular reinforcement
• Differential values of reinforcers and assessment
  of their relative worth
• Different people place different values on the
  same reinforcer

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Locus of control

• beliefs about the source of our reinforcers
• Internal locus of control belief that
  reinforcement depends on ones own behavior
• External locus of control belief that
  reinforcement depends on outside forces such as
  fate, luck, or the actions of other people
• Is learned in childhood from the ways one is
  treated

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The fate of behaviorism

• Cognitive challenge to behaviorism from within
  modified the behaviorist movement
• Sociobehaviorists still consider themselves
  behaviorists
• Are contrasted with radical behaviorists like
  Watson and skinner who do not deal with presumed
  internal states
• Skinnerian behaviorism peaked in the 1980s
• Declined after skinners death in 1990
• Todays behaviorism, particularly in applied
  psychology, is different from forms it took from
  1913 (Watson) to 1990 (Skinner)
• In an evolutionary sense, the spirit of
  behaviorism still lives