Download An Advocate for Children 1 Conditioning

An Advocate for Children 1
Conditioning
The Book of Jonah is the 32nd book of the Bible. It has 4 chapters, 48 verses, 1,321
words, 8 commands, 12 questions, no promise, 1 verse of fulfilled prophecy, and 6
distinct messages from God.
Conditioning: According to behaviorism, the processes by which responses become
linked to particular stimuli and learning takes place. The word conditioning is used to
emphasize the importance of repeated practice, as when an athlete gets into physical
condition by training for a long time.
Classical Conditioning: The learning process that connects a meaningful stimulus, such
as the smell of food to a hungry animal, with a neutral stimulus, such as the sound of a
bell, which had no special meaning before conditioning. Also called respondent
conditioning.
Operant Conditioning: The learning process by which a particular action is followed by
something desired, which makes the person or animal more likely to repeat the action, or
by something unwanted, which makes the action less likely to be repeated. Also called
instrumental conditioning.
Reinforcement: A technique for conditioning behavior in which that behavior is followed
by something desired, such as food for a hungry animal or a welcoming smile for a lonely
person.
A Contemporary of Freud, Ivan Pavlov was a physiologist who received the Nobel Prize
in 1904 for his research on digestive processes. It was this line of study that led to his
discovery of classical conditioning.
An Early Behaviorist John Watson was an early proponent of learning theory. His ideas
are still influential and controversial today. John Watson argued that if psychology was to
be a science, psychologists should examine only what they could see and measure:
behavior, not thoughts and hidden urges.
Other psychologists, especially in the United States, thought that Watson’s emphasis on
learning was insightful. They found it difficult to use the scientific method to verify the
unconscious motives and drives that Freud described. Some developed behaviorism to
study actual behavior, objectively and scientifically.
(JES 2011)