Operant Vs Classical Conditioning Essay

961 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Compare and contrast operant and classical conditioning theories

“One believes things because one has been conditioned to believe them” (Adlous Houxley). Psychology has made incredible advances for the human brain. Many experiences have given answers for a variety of questions, such as, if the human or animals can be conditioned. To be conditioned means that responses to objects or stimulus can be reshaped by learning. There are two types of conditioning in the world of psychology, which are, classical and operant conditioning. Classical conditioning relates to unconscious acts or processes. Operant conditioning refers to conscious processes or acts. Both classical and operant conditioning have been tested and understood by the scientific community by breaking down the factors that affect the specimens. …show more content…

Operant conditioning states that specimen learn to associate behaviors and consequences(Riolearn,2017). There are four factors that make up operant conditioning; positive reinforce, negative reinforce, positive punisher, and negative punisher. A positive reinforcement means an attracting stimulus is added to the conditioning to increase behavior. A negative reinforcement is defined as unpleasant stimulus being taken away to increase wanted behavior. The positive punisher is the factor when unwanted stimulus is increased to decrease actions. Lastly, the negative punishment describes when a desired stimulus is taken away to cease a behavior. To better clarify operant conditioning, we will use personal examples. A positive reinforcement in my life is when I go to work because I receive payment for the work I complete. Negative reinforcement could have been when I had the motivation to keep an A in my Spanish course so that I would not have to take the final. An example of positive punishment can be when I yell at my dog to not pee in the house. By doing this, it registers to my dog so she will not pee in the house anymore. Finally, negative punishment to me is when I received a speeding ticket and fine for breaking the law. I had to give away my money for something that could have been prevented. This punishment taught me to watch my speed on the road. Classical and operant conditioning are very important to the scientific

Show More
Related

  • Discussion Board #2: Behaviorism and Tantrums

    622 Words  | 2 Pages

    The two main forms of conditioning, are classical conditioning (learning by association), and operant condition (learning from consequences).Classical conditioning, is the learning process in which one is conditioned (learns) to respond to a neutral stimulus as if it were a meaningful stimulus. In operant conditioning, learning occurs through associations made between a behavior and the consequence that follows.

    Read More

  • Kincaid And Hemingway's Hills Like White Elephants

    1141 Words  | 3 Pages

    “Operant conditioning is a method of learning that occurs through rewards and punishments for behavior. Through operant conditioning, an association is made between a behavior and a consequence for that behavior” (Cherry). Positive reinforcement which is praising a person for doing something good verses negative reinforcement which is an unpleasant remark a punishment. B.F. Skinner did an experiment on a rat, the rat was taught to push two buttons, one to receive food and the other was a light electric shock. The rat tried both buttons and realized which button was good and which one was bad. This experiment goes to show that upon the rewards and punishment system one can learn their rights from their wrongs through a series of lessons. Kincaid and Hemingway both use operant conditioning to show human behavior under stimulus control.

    Read More

  • Classical Therapy And Operant Conditioning

    1593 Words  | 4 Pages

    According to Jeffery, (1965), the classical conditioning or known as Pavlovian conditioning is the changes of behaviour that was elicited by the stimulus and involuntary response, while the operant conditioning is the behaviour changes due to the consequences got. The consequences can be in term of reinforcement and punishment.

    Read More

  • Positive Exerforcement And The Philosophy Of Operant Conditioning

    988 Words  | 2 Pages

    Operant conditioning is a type of learning where a person is taught that specific actions are related to specific consequences. The main goal of using this type of conditioning is to encourage the individual to change his or her behavior in some way. Specifically, the individual can be encouraged to perform a desired behavior more often through use of positive reinforcement and negative reinforcement, and he or she can also be encouraged to perform an undesired behavior less often through use of positive punishment and negative punishment. Positive reinforcement is basically a type of operant conditioning in which an addition or reward is given to the individual when he or she has displayed the desired behavior, and as a result, the behavior

    Read More

  • An Operant Conditioning In Antonio's Case

    554 Words  | 2 Pages

    In second grade I was apart of a wild classroom. Their was a lot of chaos from all the young children. My teacher struggled to get everyone on task and to complete our work. After some time my teacher decided to make up a reward system (positive reinforcement). The children in the classroom were able to earn tickets for doing their homework, being respectful, and many other things. We were able to save these tickets and cash them in on fridays for treats, toys, or even sometimes extra recess. The teacher had a separate system for when we misbehaved. There were 3 colors you could earn everyday. If you weren’t on task, out of your seat, or just being disruptive she would change your color from green to yellow. If it happened again you got a red card and lost your tickets you earned for that day. This is a perfect example of positive punishment. It gave each child an opportunity to earn tickets for good behavior, and a warning system with the cards that possibly would lead to losing your earned tickets. Our teacher was using operant conditioning to produce a change in our

    Read More

  • Examples Of Operant Conditioning

    719 Words  | 2 Pages

    Operant conditioning is a kind of conditioning, which examines how often a behavior will or occur depending on the effects of the behavior (King, 2016, pg. ). The words positive and negative are used to apply more significance to the words reinforcement or punishment. Positive is adding to the stimulus, while negative is removing from the stimulus (King, 2016). For instance, with positive reinforcement, there is the addition of a factor to increase the number of times that the behavior occurs (King, 2016). An example of positive reinforcement is when a child is given an allowance for completing their household chores. The positive reinforcement is the allowance which helps to increase the behavior of doing chores at home. In contrast with negative

    Read More

  • Operant Conditioning And Operant Behavior

    1352 Words  | 3 Pages

    Learning can be quantified through observable behaviour and is adaptive to a creature’s specific environment at an individual level rather than species level. Behaviour can be broken down into two main categories, respondent behaviour, which is impacted by events that preceded it and operant behaviour, which is behaviour that is influenced by events that follow it. Behaviour can be analysed using a three term contingency of ABC. A is the antecedent, which can increase or decrease a behaviour depending on what is desired, B is the observed behaviour and C is the consequence of that behaviour, certain consequences increase behaviour whilst some decrease it. There are many different ways we learn behaviour and many different types of conditioning. Operant conditioning influences operant behaviour and uses the principles of positive and negative reinforcement and punishment to strengthen desired behaviours whereas instrumental conditioning involves making a response that is instrumental, it is an activity that is voluntary which elicits a consequence. A third type of conditioning is classical conditioning, which can be defined as an association being made between one stimulus and another, resulting in a relationship. For the purpose of this essay, classical conditioning will be the focus.

    Read More

  • A Closer Look At Classical Conditioning

    1563 Words  | 4 Pages

    Classical conditioning is a type of conditioning that links two stimuli together to produce a new response. Classical conditioning has three stages. The first step, before conditioning, the unconditioned stimulus (UCS) makes an unconditioned response (UCR). This means that there is a stimulus that produces a response, usually a natural response. One example of this would be is if someone blows into our eye, our eye would close, humans didn't have to learn this response it came by nature. Another example of an unconditioned response would be someone touching a stove and jerking the hand back, or salivation at the sight of food. Stage two, during the conditioning, a new response is presented, the conditioned stimulus (CS). The unconditioned stimulus is tied in ...

    Read More

  • Classical Conditioning Vs Operant Conditioning Essay

    787 Words  | 2 Pages

    Learning in its most basic form is our minds associating one thing with another. Digging deeper reveals that there are trends in how human beings and animals learn by association, usually this is done by a brain connecting one event to another. The two different ways a brain tends to learn is through either classical conditioning or operant conditioning. Classical conditioning is learning to associate one stimulus with another stimulus, and Operant Conditioning is learning by associating a response or behavior with a consequence. Knowing how people and animals learn is an important piece of knowledge if one is to help benefit the greater good.

    Read More

  • Classical Conditioning Theory

    1198 Words  | 3 Pages

    The strength of classical conditioning is that it can help to explain all aspects of human behavior. Any of behavior can broke down into stimulus-response association, so that according to the classical conditioning, conditioned stimulus will lead conditioned response to occur, then the scientist can observe and determine the behavior (McLeod, 2014). In the case of Pavlovian conditioning, he found that when the conditioned stimulus (bell) was paired with an unconditioned stimulus (food) was presented to the dog, it would start to salivate. After a number of repeated this procedures, Pavlov tried to ring his bell by its own...

    Read More

  • Classical and Operant Conditioning

    1360 Words  | 3 Pages

    Contrasting the two, operant was first described by an American psychologist while classical conditioning was described by a Russian psychologist. Another key dissimilarity involves the kinds of behaviors that are conditional (Weseley, McEntarffer, & McEntarffer, 2010). Whilst classical conditioning is based on automatic and involuntary behaviors, operant conditioning focuses on intentional behaviors. Operant conditioning focuses on strengthening or weakening voluntary behaviors while classical conditioning specializes on involuntary and automatic behaviors. Classical conditioning involves placing a conditional stimulus which is a impartial signal prior to a reflex whi...

    Read More

  • B. F. Skinner Theory Operant Conditioning

    1388 Words  | 3 Pages

    In my reaction paper I will discuss B.F. Skinners theory operant conditioning and the ways he tested it out on animals, how it relates to humans, and how I can relate operant conditioning to my own personal life.

    Read More

  • Compare And Contrast Classical Conditioning And Operant Conditioning

    1499 Words  | 3 Pages

    2011, p281). Regardless of their differences or similarities however, both have played an important part in the study of learning. With operant conditioning allowing to condition more complex behaviours that can be done with classical conditioning, and with classical conditioning being what helped discover operant conditioning in the first place, it can be argued here that the two are complementary. Indeed, one cannot speak of operant conditioning without mentioning classical conditioning, and vice

    Read More

  • Compare And Contrast Classical And Operant Conditioning

    1320 Words  | 3 Pages

    In contrast to classical conditioning, operant conditioning, discovered by B.F Skinner, is a learning process that involves either an increase or decrease in some behavior as a result of consequences (Amabile, 1985). Operant conditioning attempts to elicit new behavior through use of reinforcers and punishments.

    Read More

  • The Nervous System and Neurotransmitters, Questions and Answers

    735 Words  | 2 Pages

    In operant conditioning, there is an association between an individual’s behavior and its consequence. A consequence can either be reinforcement or punishment (233). Positive and negative reinforcements will increase the behavior. When an individual is reinforced, they will continue to repeat the behavior to receive the reinforcement again. Punishment, on the other hand, will decrease the behavior. If an individual is punished after a particular behavior, they will behave that way less often to avoid the punishment.

    Read More

More about Operant Vs Classical Conditioning Essay

Open Document