Explain The Behaviourist Perspective

A behaviourist perspective suggests that all behaviour is observable, objective and learnt from experience. It is believed that behaviour can be learnt and reinforced through operant conditioning and unconscious physical response can be learnt through classical conditioning.

The Behaviourist approach believe that human beings are able to learn all types of behaviours through the environment they grow up in, its believes that we learn these behaviours through using theories, such as, Ivan Pavlov’s Classical Conditioning and Burrhus Frederic Skinner’s Operant Conditioning.

Behaviourist approach has may strengths to its findings, there has a been a vast amount of experiments from other theorists that support the theory. However, many weaknesses can be highlighted. One is how using rewards or other means to shape behaviour can be argued that the individual is only motivated for these rewards which can encourage a shallow and materialistic style. Another limitation that can be mentioned is that that behaviourist research was widely carried out on animals, for instance Skinner’s rats, Watson’s cats and Pavlov’s dogs. We cannot compare human behaviour to that of an animal. We cannot be 100% certain that humans would act the same way as the animals experimented on (McLeod,2017). As well as this, another criticism states how even though you can change someone’s behaviour in one environment, what happens when the individual goes to a different environment where positive behaviour isn’t reinforced. O’Brien gives an example of if a teacher changed a challenging child’s behaviour at school but then the child went home to the same environment as before, the child would find it increasingly hard to stick to the changed behaviour (O’Brien 2016). I feel that I can relate to this with a child I have in my class. I have managed through positive reinforcement to change his behaviour that he showed in previous classes, however when communicating with his carer it is noted that his previous behaviour is still present in his home environment.

The basic assumption of the behaviourist approach is that all behaviour is learned through experiences a person has in their environment. From this we know that behaviourists are on the side of nature in the “nature vs. nurture” debate. In comparison bio psychologists will be firmly on the side of nurture.

Classical conditioning is defined as “a type of learning in which one learns to link two or more stimuli and anticipate events” (Myers 2011). At first, it was his creative mind that set off on an incidental observation. He noticed by putting food in a dogs mouth causes the animal to salivate. Not only did that cause salivation, but the sight of food, smell of food, the food dish, and even the person bringing the food did as well. This sparked his thoughts into trying to imagine

The behaviourist theory focuses on the study of observed behaviours and learning theories the three theories are; classical conditioning, operant conditioning and the social learning theory. Within the behaviourist approach there are three different theorists these are; Skinner, Bandura and Pavlov.

Classical conditioning is a type of associative learning which occurs when two stimuli are paired together repetitively and therefore become associated with each other eventually producing the same response. Classical conditioning was developed from the findings of Ivan Pavlov to account for associations between neutral stimuli and reflexive behavior such as salivation. Pavlov (1927) accidently discovered that dogs began to salivate before they had tasted their food. To support his theory, he carried out experiments using dogs which involved measuring the amount of saliva they produced. In his experiments, food started off as an unconditioned stimulus (UCS) which produced salivation, an unconditioned response (UCR). They are both unconditioned as they occur naturally without being learned. The dogs were presented with a bell (NS), this provided no salivation. The bell and food were presented together and after many trails an

The behaviourist perspective is an idea that we can understand any type of behaviour by looking at what the person has learner. This includes personality traits such as shyness, confidence, optimism or pessimism. Behaviourist psychologists explain all human behaviour as resulting from experience. Two key psychologists are Pavlov and Skinner, although these two theorists believed that different processes were involved, they both explained all types of behaviour as being the result of learning. This is everything from shyness to aggression and happiness to depression.

Behaviourism is a psychological approach that emphasis on environmental factors influencing observable human behaviour. This approach consists of two main processes: Classical conditioning which means learning things by associating them with something e.g. if you ate Chinese food before and it made you feel queasy and unwell then the next time you see Chinese food you will associate it to that experience you had before. Operant conditioning which means learning things by positive and negative reinforcement and association e.g. when you do well in school and your parents buy you the game you’ve always wanted (positive reinforcement).

Learning is a fascinating concept. Everyone does it and everyone always has, but not everyone explores its eclectic process. That being said, through the course of history, it has been studied vehemently. Ivan Pavlov, a behaviorist, had some groundbreaking research on subclass of learning called classical conditioning. Coming across it incidentally, he discovered that dogs would salivate not only from eating food, but anything associated with them getting fed. Anything unnatural in their feeding process, he termed as the conditioned stimulus, which would result in the conditioned response of them salivating (Daniels). Though classical conditioning seems rather simple and commonsensible, the information psychologists have gathered from it has been revolutionary. It has shown psychologists the very basics of how we learn and adapt as organisms and opened the door for other studies (Myers 268). According to psychologists, learning is the process of acquiring new and relatively enduring information or behaviors (Myers 268).

In 1903 a Russian physiologist by the name of Ivan Pavlov first developed an experiential model of learning called Classical Conditioning (Lautenheiser 1999). An example if Classical Conditioning would be ringing a bell when it is time for your pet to eat. The pet hears the bell and over time is conditioned that when the bell rings its dinner time thus begins to salivate, and eventually learns to be conditioned to responding to the bell in a specific manner. The bases was that neutral stimulus would be put together with an excitatory one and over time the neutral stimulus would, at some point down the line elicit the response that was associated with the original unlearned response. Pavlov later added an element known as the nonexcitatory, conditioned stimulus which is but together with an unconditioned stimulus (Lautenheiser 1999).

“Behaviorism is predominantly concerned with evident and measurable aspects of human behavior. In defining behaviour, behaviourist-learning theories emphasise changes in behavior that result from stimulus-response links made by the learner. Behaviour is directed by stimuli. An individual selects one response instead

Behaviourism is a theory of learning based upon the idea that all behaviours are attained through conditioning. Behaviourists believe conditioning occurs when we interact with the environment and that the environment we are in determines the way we respond to a stimulus. The behaviourist approach believes we learn behaviours through association between response and consequence. For instance, by touching a hot iron you will feel pain. Therefore, we learn from this, and know not to touch a hot iron as we associate feeling pain as a consequence of this action. There are two forms of conditioning within the behaviourist approach; classical conditioning and operant conditioning. Behaviourists believe that individuals are born without built-in mental content, known as a ‘blank slate’ and that all behaviours arise from experience or perception.

The Behavioural approach (also called the learning theory) focuses on the belief that our environment, e.g. people, experiences and learning, influences the development and behaviour of an individual whilst thinking the internal functions, such as thoughts and cognition, are impossible to observe, so they are not apart of the scientific approach to psychology. This theory is also based on the concept of ‘explaining behaviour through observation. Behaviourists assume individuals are born as a blank state (tabula rasa), meaning they do not think biology and cognitive functions influence our behaviour, only our environment does. A large idea that the theory hold is that behaviour can be broken down into stimulus-response units. Stimuli are anything environmental that triggers an individuals’ senses, for example, a student being asked to complete an assignment (stimulus) would respond by completing the assignment. Stimulus-response theories form the basis of classical or operant conditioning, which suggests animals and humans can learn through the relation of a response to any certain stimuli.

     Classical conditioning is a process of learning associations between stimuli used by Ivan Pavlov, a Russian physiologist. In