The Behaviourist Approach Flashcards
What is the difference between nature and nurture?
- Nature: due to biological causes such as inherited characteristics/innate drives.
- Nurture: due to environmental influences and learning.
Do behaviourist psychologists belive in nature or nurture?
Nurture
What is the first assumption of behaviourism?
- All behaviour is learnt.
- We have no genetic pre-programming (tabula rasa - blank slate).
- We must learn from our environment (i.e. the people and events in it).
Define learning
“A relatively permanent change in behaviour that results from experience.”
What is the second assumption of behaviorism?
Scientific methods should be used to study only observable behaviour.
How does behaviourism differ from introspection?
Behaviourists thought that mental behaviour could not be objectively measured.
Introspection, which preceded behaviourism, was seen to be subjective and difficult to measure.
What is classical conditioning?
Where an animal or a human learns to associate something new with something which naturally causes a response. That ‘new thing’ then causes the same response by itself.
Define stimulus
Any change in the environment that an organism registers.
What is an unconditioned stimulus (UCS)?
An event that produces an innate, unlearned reflex response.
What is a conditioned stimulus?
An event that produces a learned response.
What is a neutral stimulus?
An event that does not produce a response.
Define response.
Any behaviour that an organism emits as a consequence of a stimulus.
What is an unconditioned response (UCR)?
An innate, unlearned reflex behaviour that an organism produces when exposed to a UCS.
What is a conditioned response?
A learned physical reflex behaviour that an organism produces when exposed to a conditioned stimulus.
Define reflex
A consistent connection between a stimulus and a response.
What happens before classical conditioning?
The unconditioned stimulus naturally produces a response. No conditioning has taken place yet.
What happens during classical conditioning?
The neutral stimulus is paired and presented together with an unconditioned stimulus. The natural response of the UCS occurs. The pairing of stimuli is presented repeatedly.
What happens after classical conditioning?
Learning has taken place and the stimulus that was originally neutral, causing no response beforehand, now produces the same response as the UCS. The response is subsequently named a conditioned response.
What is the before classical conditioning phase of Pavlov’s experiment?
Food (UCS) = Salivation (UCR)
What is the during classical conditioning phase of Pavlov’s experiment?
Bell (NS) + Food (UCS) = Salivation (UCR)
What is the after classical conditioning phase of Pavlov’s experiment?
Bell (CS) = Salivation (CR)
What is operant conditioning?
Where an animal or human learns to consistently perform a behaviour based on whether they have previously received a reward (or punishment) for that behaviour.
Define reinforcement
A consequence of behaviour that increases the likelihood of that behaviour being repeated.
What is positive reinforcement?
Rewarding a behaviour with something desirable in order to increase the frequency of the target behaviour.
