The Theory Of Operant Conditioning

Negative reinforcement is removing an unpleasant consequence when a behavior is exhibited in order to encourage said behavior. This was shown when

I plan to establish discipline by warning those students who misbehave at first giving them two chances to act appropriately. If a student still misbehaves, I will cut their privilege to go outside down by five or ten minutes according to the severity of their inappropriate behavior. If a child still misbehaves, I will take the issue to

Behaviorist B.F. Skinner, which is why you may occasionally hear it referred to as Skinnerian conditioning coined operant conditioning. As a behaviorist, Skinner believed that internal thoughts and motivations could not be used to explain behavior. Instead, he suggested, we should look only at the external, observable causes of human behavior.

Operant Conditioning Theory by B.F. Skinner is a psychological manipulation using rewards and punishments to enforce positive behavior. It uses an individual person’s response to events or stimulus. When a particular Stimulus-Response pattern is rewarded, the individual is conditioned to respond. The distinctive characteristic of operant conditioning is related to previous forms of behaviorism. The Operant Conditioning theory comprises of neutral operants, positive/negative reinforcers, and positive/negative punishers. Through these factors, we get the desired behavior of our subject because they do not want to be punished for under performing so they do what they’re told to or do more of what they were assigned to to receive positive stimulus

Skinner’s reinforcement experiments conducted on rats showed the principles of operant conditioning. While working with rats, Skinner would place them in a Skinner box with a lever attached to a feeding tube. After multiple trials, rats learned the connection between the lever and food, and started to spend more time in the box procuring food than performing any other action. He used positive reinforcement, and negative reinforcement to produce or inhibit specific target behaviors. Therefore, if a specific behavior is reinforced then the probability of that behavior occurring again is increased. Based on Skinner’s view, this theory can be applied to learning because learning is nothing more than a change in behavior. Operant conditioning encourages positive reinforcement, which can be applied in the classroom environment to get the good behavior you want and need from students. One of the ways of reinforcing a student’s behavior is through praise. Also teachers can build operant conditioning techniques into their lesson plans to teach children possible skills as well as good behaviors. For example: to give a smiley face, or motivational stamps to encourage children to perform correctly and encourage them to repeat such action again.

B.F. Skinner’s theory of Operant Conditioning has at its foundation a desire to demonstrate a “cause and

Operant conditioning is a theory that was pioneered by Skinner, and it is a theory that is based on the type of consequence that is given following a particular behaviour. Skinner divided the consequences of actions into three groups, positive rein forcers, negative reinforcers and punishers. Skinner looked at what would happen to behaviour if giving positive reinforcers at different intervals. Most professionals and practitioners will use this theory in one way or another such as giving rewards for good behaviour or sanctions for bad behaviour so the theory is well used in today’s frameworks and practices.

Operant conditioning has made a significant contribution into the development of psychology. However, as with most psychological theories, this theory it has its strengths and weaknesses. Nevertheless, operant conditioning, with both its positive and negative aspects, is very important in promoting learning of desirable behaviors or removal of undesirable

Skinner and his colleagues (Gass & Larry, 2008), learning or a change of behaviour on the part of the learner, is brought about by a process known as 'operant conditioning' which is the result of repeated training. Operant means 'voluntary behaviour' which is the result of learner's own free-will and is not forced by any outsider or thing (Ortega, 2009). The learner will demonstrate the new behaviour first as a response to a system of a reward or punishment, and finally it will become an automatic response.

Operant conditioning developed by Skinner is one of the learning methods according to which the likelihood of behavior is increased or decreased by the use of reinforcement or punishment. In case of positive reinforcement a certain behavior becomes stronger by the effect of experiencing some positive condition. In case of negative reinforcement a certain behavior becomes stronger by the outcome of stopping or staying away from some negative condition. In case of extinction a certain behavior is becomes weaker by the outcome of avoiding to experiencing some positive condition or stopping some negative condition.

Learning theories are the structural foundation used to label how information is processed, stored and encoded during learning. Retention of knowledge is subjective and influenced by outside factors such as, an individual’s cognitive ability to process or retain information. Other influences are environmental, emotional or preexisting experiences or associations (Andreassi, 2000). To gain a better understanding of behaviorism in correlation to learning theories it is crucial to understand and grasp the meaning of associative learning. This process involves the association between two stimuli or a behavior and a learned stimulus. Associative learning is divided in to two central techniques, classical conditioning and operant condition. Classical and operant conditioning are basic methods of learning and conditioning is used to adapt a behavior or association through a stimuli or consequence (Ciccarelli, 2012). While classical conditioning and operant conditioning are key elements in associative learning, they have significant differences. A clear contrast between the two theories is whether the behavior or response produced is considered to be voluntary or involuntary.

In the field of child development, many psychologists, sociologists, and behaviorists contributed and came up with different theories that helped to form our current education system. One of those is B.F. Skinner’s theory of behaviorism, which had a great impact on many strategies we use today for teaching and training. In his theory, operant conditioning is the most famous and influential idea that helped people to understand the behaviors of children and even adults. Skinner focused on how the environments, in the form of reinforcement and punishments, influence behaviors. Thus, his theory cannot explain the higher cognitive functions such as problem solving and critical thinking. Despite his theory’s critiques, Skinner stood strong on his ideas and theories.

Learning theory can be summarized as behaviour which shows us how animals and people respond to a stimulus. This is incredibly important due to the direct impact it has on many features of daily life and how we implement this into our practices, from the way education systems are structured to the way we train dogs. The concepts of Classical Conditioning (a concept first established by Ivan Pavlov in the 1980’s) and Operant conditioning (founded by B.F Skinner around the 1920’s) can provide psychologists

not follow through on punishments, you will have to become a strict disciplinarian and a

Classroom management and classroom discipline share a correlation with one another yet; they are uniquely different issues and should remain a separate focus of the teacher. (Cantor, 2006) Behavior and misbehavior also share a connection but represent different degrees of infraction. (Charles, 2008) This essay focuses on the differences and similarities of these topics and their relation to the classroom.