behaviourist perspective

Question 1

behaviourist principles

Answer 1

• all people are born tabula rasa (blank slates)
• all behaviours are learned from the environment

Question 2

behaviourist concepts

Answer 2

the way in which people learn behaviour from the environment can happen through 3 main processes:

1. Classical conditioning
2. Operant conditioning
3. Social Learning Theory

Question 3

Classical conditioning

Answer 3

• learning by association
• Pavlovs dogs experiment: Dogs would salivate everytime they saw food so he began to ring a bell everytime they were given food, so the dogs would then salivate. He did this over again so the dogs associated the sound of the bell with the presentation of food. soon the dogs would salivate at the sound of the bell even when the food wasnt presented

Question 4

applications of classical conditioning

Answer 4

-** Aversion therapy**: Causes patients to reduce/avoid undersirable behaviour atterns by conditioning the person to associate the behaviour with an undesirable stimulus. So everytime someone drinks alcohol, they will smell something gross.

• parents rewarding children for behaving
  positively at home
• flooding to treat phobias.

Question 5

Operant conditioning

Answer 5

• Positive reinforcement
• Negative reinforcement
• Positive punishment
• Negative Punishment

Question 6

positive reinforcement

Answer 6

behaviour is encouraged through rewards

• e.g.parents rewarding children for behaving
  positively at home, stickers

Question 7

negative reinforcement

Answer 7

Behaviour is encouraged by removing an unpleasant stimulus

• e.g. use of black boxes in cars to encourage
  safer driving. Drivers can get cheaper car
  insurance when they can show through the black
  boxes that they are keeping to the speed limit,
  and generally driving safely [therefore apply
  NEGATIVE reinforcement]
• medicine for headaches remove the headache which is an unpleasant stimulus and the medicine will reduce/remove the headache to make you feel better

Question 8

Positive punishment

Answer 8

Discouraging behaviour by adding a negative consequence

• e.g. adding more chores to the list when your child neglects their responsibilities

Question 9

Negative punishment

Answer 9

• discouraging behaviour by removing something desirable away
• e.g. taking away childrens phones when they dont perform a task

Question 10

social learning theory

Answer 10

• learning through observation and imitation

e.g. social learning theory can explain a persons fear towards spiders: when you watch someone react fearfully towards a spider through observation, you then reproduce the same response when next exposed to a spider through imitation

e.g. social learning theory can explain how a child learns to speak and use language as when the child is constantly exposed to their parents talking, they will start to imitate it by using sounds and mouth movement

Question 11

strengths of behaviourist perspective

Answer 11

• Scientific credibility: Behaviourism was able to bring the language and methods of the natural sciences into psychology by focusing on the measurement of observable behaviour within highly controlled lab settings. By emphasising the importance of scientific processes such as objectivity and replication, behaviourism was influential in the development of psychology as a scientific discipline, giving it greater credibility and status.
• Real-life application: The principles of conditioning have been applied to a broad range of real-world behaviours and problems. For instance, operant conditioning is the basis of token economy systems that have been used successfully in institutions, such as prisons and psychiatric wards. These work by rewarding appropriate behaviour with tokens that can then be exchanged for privileges. Classical conditioning has also been applied to the treatment of phobias. Treatments such as these have the advantages of requiring less effort from a patient because the patient doesn’t have to think about their problem (as they do in ‘talking therapies’). Such therapies are also suitable for patients who lack insight.

Question 12

weakness of behaviourist perspective

Answer 12

• Focuses too much on the ‘nurture’ side of the nature/nurture debate. It suggests that all behaviour is learned but cognitive and biological elements have been proved to affect behaviour.
• Ethical issues raised by using animals in experiments. This is because animals can not consent to take part and are unable to withdraw. An example of a behaviourist animal study is Pavlov’s dogs which led to classical conditioning principles being developed.