Reflection On Behaviourist Learning

1319 Words3 Pages

(i)
Behaviourist learning
Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I’ll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select – doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief and, yes even beggar man and thief (Watson, 2013) The thought behind behaviourist learning is that we are all a blank canvas. Our behaviour is a result of positive and negative reinforcement.
The behaviourist view is that the educators, elders etc are the people who transmit and reinforce learning and correct behaviour to the unlearned. Knowledge is given and received.
If a child does something wrong we scald them so that in future they will not do it again. In the work place …show more content…

However if they break the speed limit, drive dangerously etc they will get fines, or even arrested, negative reinforcement.
Nevid shows that Pavlov and Skinner believed behaviour must be observed, recorded and measured (Nevid, 2005). Pavlov used dogs and Skinner used rats to show this. They believed that humans and animals act much the same in these circumstances.
In Skinners experiments when a rat touched a lever it would receive food. This was the rat learning by positive reinforcement. However giving the rat an electric shock when he touched the lever showed the rat learning by negative reinforcement.
The seemingly basic case of stimulus-response conditioning - Pavlov’s dog who having had a ringing bell and a piece of meat presented in quick succession several times comes to salivate for the bell alone shows how common it is to integrate cause and effect (Fauconnier, 2000)
If the behaviourist view was correct all humans would act the same if thought in the same way.
If you are to believe this behaviourist view all people will act the same if thought the …show more content…

B., 2013. Behaviorism. In: Behaviorism. s.l.:Read Books Ltd, p. 20.

References
Bundless, 2016. Boundless.com. [Online]
Available at: https://www.boundless.com/psychology/textbooks/boundless-psychology-textbook/introduction-to-psychology-1/theoretical-perspectives-in-modern-psychology-23/cognitive-psychology-115-12652/
[Accessed Tuesday February 2016]. businessdictionary.com, 2016. businessdictionary. [Online]
Available at: http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/social-learning.html
[Accessed 22/2/2016 February 2016].
Fauconnier, G. a. T., 2000. Compression and global insight. [Online]
Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Mark_Turner10/publication/228300102_Compression_and_Global_Insight/links/00b4952b9be5e70f85000000.pdf
[Accessed 22/2/2016 February 2016].
Hurst, M., 2003. study.com. [Online]
Available at: https://study.com/academy/lesson/behavioral-cognitive-developmental-social-cognitive-constructivist-perspectives.html
[Accessed 22/2/2016 February 2016].
Nevid, J. S., 2005. Essentials of Psychology: Concepts and Applications. In: Essentials of Psychology: Concepts and Applications. s.l.:Wadsworth, pp. 6-7.
Watson, J. B., 2013. Behaviorism. In: Behaviorism. s.l.:Read Books Ltd, p.

Open Document