Behaviourist Approach

Basic Assumptions
1. everyone is born as a blank slate
2. all behaviour is learnt from the environment
3. learn through association (classical conditioning)
4. learn through reinforcement and punishment (operant conditioning)
Researchers
1. Watson
2. Skinner
3. Pavlov
Methods
1. comapratiove methods using animals
  1. scientific and empirical
Application
1. Forensics
  1. behaviour modification (Ayllon & Azrin) - token economy
    1. desirable behaviour rewarded with a token (secondary reinforcer) which can be exchanged for material goods (primary reinforcers)
2. Friendship
  1. serbin et al - reinforce cross-sex play
    1. after reinforcement stops, children revert back to same-sex play
3. Attachment
  1. cupboard love theory - associate caregiver with the pleasure of food
Impact
1. Educational psychology and learning
2. Parenting
3. therapeutic techniques
4. driving force for psychology as a science
5. ideas in the cognitive approach are built from behaviourism
6. lead to neo-behaviourism (SLT)
Debates
1. Deterministic
  1. Environmental Determinism
    1. behaviour is caused by our environment; classical conditioning - we learn by responding to stimuli in our surroundings
    2. Positive and negative reinforcement = behaviour
      1. seligman learned helplessness goes against this
2. Reductionist
  1. complex behaviour is reduced to simplistic stimulus and response links
  2. focuses only on overt behaviour - thinking is just quiet speaking (radical behaviourism)
  3. ignores how the dogs in learned helplessness theory passively accept the shocks instead of doing the desired action
3. Nurture
  1. born as blank slates
  2. all behaviour is learnt from macro and micro environments
  3. sociocultural explanation of schizophrenia - developed through environment
4. Nomothetic
  1. establishes principles of behaviour which are generalised to everyone

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Behaviourist Approach

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	Created by CarrotSticks over 11 years ago