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Behavioralism
Psychological perspective that emphasizing
the role of learning and experience in
determining behavior. A strict behavioralist
believes that babies are tabula rasa and the
study of psychology should focus purely on
observable behaviors and not unobservable
thoughts.
Associative learning – learning that
certain events occur together
Classical conditioning – An
INVOLUNTARY behavior is determined by
what PRECEDES it
Operant conditioning – rewards and
punishment; A VOLUNTARY behavior is
determined by the anticipation of
something that FOLLOWS it.
Which is which?
1. A child is attacked by
a dog. The child
now fears all dogs.
2. You do your
homework every
night to get good
grades and avoid
punishment.
Classical – involuntary, stimulus
precedes behavior
Operant – voluntary, stimulus
follows behavior
Ivan Pavlov’s Experiments
Pavlov paired a
neutral stimulus (a
bell) with a meat
powder (which
made the dog
salivate).
Eventually, dog
salivates to bell
alone
Identifying Parts
Unconditioned Stimulus (UCS)
Meat powder
Unconditioned Response (UCR)
Salivation
Conditioned Stimulus (CS)
Bell
Conditioned Response (CR)
Salivation
* Hint: replace “conditioned” with “learned” to make
it more intuitive.
Little Albert
John Watson – famous
behavioralist
Little Albert – 11 month old
orphan
Showed him a white rat. No
fear.
Made a loud noise. Albert
cried.
Showed him a white rat and
made a loud noise. Albert
cried. Repeated several times.
Eventually Albert cried at
white rat alone.
Identify the parts
Unconditioned Stimulus (UCS)
Loud noise
Unconditioned Response (UCR)
Fear/crying
Conditioned Stimulus (CS)
White rat
Conditioned Response (CR)
Fear/crying
Watson on childcare
“ Give me a dozen healthy infants, wellformed, and my own specified world to
bring them up and I’ll guarantee to take
any one at random and train him to
become any type of specialist I might
select—doctor, lawyer, merchant-chief,
and yes, ever beggarman and thief,
regardless of his talents, penchants,
tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race
of his ancestors.” (1930)
Definitions
Acquisition – initial learning of the stimulus-response
relationship (learning that bell means meat powder)
Extinction – diminished response to the conditioned
stimulus when it is no longer coupled with UCS. (stop
giving meat powder with bell and dog will stop salivating
to bell)
Spontaneous recovery – reappearance of an
extinguished CR after a rest.
Generalization – the tendency to respond to any stimuli
similar to the CS (Dog salivates to other noises)
Discrimination – the ability to distinguish between the CS
and similar stimuli (Dog only salivates to specific tone)
Application to Little Albert
If Little Albert generalized, what would we expect to happen?
– He might cry at the sight of similar objects (he did – rabbit, dog, sealskin
coat, some rumors – Santa’s beard)
How could we teach Little Albert to discriminate?
– Continually expose him to stimuli similar to the rat, but only make the
loud noise when exposing him to the rat
How could Little Albert’s conditioning be extinguished?
– Continually expose him to a white rat without making the loud noise
(unfortunately, this was never done because Little Albert was adopted
soon after the original experiments (he would be 83 now if he is still
alive – probably scared of rats!)
If Little Albert is still alive, his fear of white rats is likely to have
been extinguished (no loud noise when he sees a rat).
However, occasionally, when he sees a rat, he may find that his
heart races for a second or two. What is this called?
– Spontaneous recovery
On your own
With your partner, practice with the terms
my completing the worksheet.
A friend has learned to associate the sound of a dentist’s
drill to a fearful reaction because of a painful experience
she had getting a root canal. In this example, what is the:
–
–
–
–
UCS?
UCR?
CS?
CR?
Pain from the drill
Fear
Sound of the drill
Fear
Using the example in question 4, give an example of how
each of the following may occur:
Extinction: if the pain does not result when the
drill is used, the CS (fear) will diminish.
Spontaneous recovery: the child returns for a
visit the next day and the sound of the drill elicits
fear again.
Generalization: the child becomes fearful of the
sound of any motor
Discrimination: the child learns that only the high
pitched dentist drill is associated with pain and
not a low pitch hum of the vacuum cleaner.
A BMW commercial has lots of pretty people in it. People
who watch the commercial find the people pleasing
to look at. With repeated viewing, they begin to
associate the car with the pleasant feeling.
UCS?
UCR?
CS?
CR?
Pretty people
Feeling good
Sight of BMW
Feeling good
You get in a car accident and find you are afraid to get in a
car.
UCS?
UCR?
CS?
CR?
Pain of the accident
Fear
Presence of car
Fear
You go to a fancy restaurant and decide to try an appetizer
you’ve never tried before – escargot. After dinner,
you go to a concert and get violently ill (from a
stomach virus that’s been going around). From then
on, you can’t even look at snails without feeling sick.
UCS?
UCR?
CS?
CR?
Stomach virus
Feeling sick
Sight of snails
Feeling sick
You are cruising on 440 at 75 mph when you see flashing
police lights behind you. You pull over and the
policeman gives you a ticket. You get in insane
amounts of trouble from your parents. The next
time you see flashing police lights, your heart rate
speeds up.
UCS?
Getting in trouble from
parents
UCR? Increased heart rate
CS? Flashing lights
CR? Increased heart rate
Name one practical application of
classical conditioning.
Stop drug or alcohol addiction by
pairing a nausea-producing drug
with the drug of addiction.
Extinguish a drug addiction by
administering a drug that blocks
the pleasant feeling normally
elicited by the drug.
If a child is afraid of rabbits
because one bit him when he was
young, you can expose the child to
rabbits in safe environments
repeatedly until the behavior is
extinguished
Cancer patients and
chemotherapy.
Cancer patients tend
to associate the
nausea produced by
chemotherapy with
the hospital setting.
– UCS – chemotherapy
– UCR – nausea
– CS – hospital
– CR – nausea
Cognitive Processes
It was once thought that
cognitive processes
weren’t involved in
classical conditioning.
Now we know better. For
example, therapists give
alcoholics drink
containing a nauseaproducing drug to
condition them to avoid
alcohol. Because clients
KNOW that the drug is
what is actually causing
the nausea, it doesn’t
work so well.
Biological Predispositions
It was once believed that conditioning occurred the same in all animals
(and therefore you could study human behavior by studying any
animal) and that you could associate any neutral stimulus with a
response. Not so. Animals have biological predispositions to
associating certain stimuli over others
Example – You eat a novel food and later get sick. You will be
conditioned to associate the taste of the FOOD with getting sick
(and thus avoid that food in the future), but NOT the music playing in
the restaurant, the plate it was served on, or the perfume your
neighbor was wearing.
It is much easier to condition someone to have a fear of snake than
of flowers.
Birds hunt by sight and will more quickly become conditioned to the
SIGHT of tainted food