Introduction to Behaviourism (Psychology)

What is behaviourism?

Behaviourism is a fancy word for behaviour. Behaviourism is a type of theory involved with the idea that all behaviours come from conditioning and/or conditioning that comes from interacting with one's environment.

Explaining The Meaning of Conditioning

There are two main types of conditioning. The first one is classical conditioning and the second one is operant conditioning.

Conditioning is something that occurs within a person through an internal or external stimulus. It is commonly an external stimulus.

A stimulus is another way of saying that your senses are reacting to a specific event, object, or situation. A stimulus is something that is already in your environment or is purposely shown/presented to you. It can be a bell, food, a certain smell, etc. It has to do with our senses.

When a specific stimulus affects you then you will react a certain way and the term for that would be "response." Your reaction from the stimulus elicits (receiving/giving) a bodily or non-bodily response. Bodily, is referred to as a physical reaction in and outside of your body. An example of this would be when a mosquito bites you in the summertime. After the mosquito bites you, your body becomes itchy and you receive a bump from the bite. This example is not related to conditioning exactly but I wanted to explain what a bodily response is for those that would not understand the term. A second example of a bodily response in dogs would be salivation. Dogs salivate when they want food, are hot in the summer, or when they are stressed. Salivation is a bodily response.

5 Other Terms to Keep in Mind

Unconditioned Stimulus

The unconditioned stimulus is the natural and non-manipulated factor in an environment. It is something that has not been changed. It is naturally the way that is supposed to be and allows someone or an animal to respond naturally to the stimulus. It does not cause a learned reaction. An example of this would be, becoming sick from food poisoning or being hungry. It comes automatically to you. When you are hungry you do not have to learn that you are hungry. Another example is being attracted to someone else. It is natural, not learned.

Unconditioned Response

The unconditioned response is then the natural response from the unconditioned stimulus. It is not controlled, changed, or manipulated by any other factors.

Neutral Stimulus

A neutral stimulus is something that does not typically produce a response. An example of this would be when someone hears a random sound that is commonly heard on a daily basis. It is not necessarily something that occurs on a daily basis but it is a stimulus that has no response. An example would be a bell, tree, chair, table, lamp, and ect.

Conditioned Response

It is the response to the conditioned stimulus. It becomes a learned response instead of a natural one.

Conditioned Stimulus

The conditioned stimulus is a controlled and manipulated factor. The conditioned stimulus is combined with the unconditioned stimulus to create a conditioned response.

(It sounds confusing, doesn't it?? Trust me, I still become confused when I have to re-learn this information. It can be confusing at times but keep the terms in mind and I will help you understand it better.)

Okay! Now that we covered the terms let us dive into classical conditioning.

Classical Conditioning

Classic conditioning is when you use two different stimuli together in order to produce a specific kind of behaviour. Classical conditioning is a more instant occurrence whereas operant conditioning is done over time. A famous example of this type of conditioning comes from Pavlov and his salivating dog experiment. Pavlov was a scientist and psychologist. In his experiment he showed dogs a piece of meat and in a normal situation the dogs would salivate at the meat or drool because of the meat. The meat is the unconditioned stimulus (a natural, non-manipulated stimulus).

The second situation Pavlov created was to place a bell (neutral stimulus) in front of the dogs to elicit a neutral response. The meat was not presented in this situation. The dogs did not react to the bell. The dogs did not salivate when they heard the bell. Pavlov then rang the bell and brought the meat out at the same time to create a conditioned response (manipulated and controlled). The dogs are associating the meat with the sound of the bell. The neutral stimulus (the bell) now becomes a conditioned stimulus (controlled). Pavlov then took the meat away and just rang the bell alone. The dogs salivated at the sound of the bell. Pavlov created a situation that made the dogs believe that they were about to receive meat when the bell rang. This is the best way to explain classical conditioning.

An example of classical conditioning that relates to a sport could be when the whistle is being blown by the coach. The whistle is the unconditioned stimulus because the coach uses it through sports games. It is a naturally available stimulus. The players have an unconditioned response when the coach blows the whistle because it cues the players to either stop, play, or perform a specific action regarding the sport. The whistle can become a conditioned response if the players hear the sound outside of the sport itself.

I hope that this example is helpful but if I missed something or confused the terms then let me know and I will fix it. As I have mentioned earlier in this piece, even I become confused with the terms and in which scenarios they should be used.

Another detail I forgot to mention is that fear plays a part in classical conditioning too. In other words, if you had a traumatic accident or something negatively impacted your life then the brain has trained itself to associate anything with that event in a negative way. The unconditioned stimulus and unconditioned response create a fear response whenever there is any interaction with the person, object, smell, or whatever else was involved in the negative event/experience.

An example of this would be if someone was involved in a car accident. That person may stop driving after the accident and no longer be interested in being in or near vehicles. The vehicle is associated with the unconditioned stimuli that occur and it creates an instant fear response in future driving situations. Car accidents can be a common example of conditioning in response to fear. It is an instant occurrence that happens, not over a long period of time.

Terms to Keep in Mind for Operant Conditioning

Positive Reinforcement

Positive reinforcement is when a reward is added to reinforce a specific positive behaviour. When an award is added, it increases the probability of the positive behaviour recurring in the future.

Examples of positive reinforcement are giving rewards such as candy, praise, medals, money for completed chores, etc.

Positive Punishment

Positive punishment means to give someone an unpleasant consequence for the result of the person's negative behaviour. This will reduce the chances of the behaviour from happening again.

An example of this would be instructing someone to do push-ups, run extra laps, be reprimanded for an activity or object, etc.

Negative Reinforcement

A negative reinforcement is when an object, pain, or something negative is removed from the person in order to create a positive outcome.

An example would be a painkiller taking away a headache or other related pain in the body.

Negative Punishment

Negative punishment is the removal of something pleasant to create an unpleasant consequence. An example of this would be giving soccer players a "red" card, placing someone in a timeout, taking away a sport's players' game time, etc. The enjoyment of the activity is being reduced because of the punishment.

Now, keep in mind that these terms are only explanations of what they mean but they will vary from situation. I have shared some examples for each but it will vary on the situation once again. I will now continue explaining what operant conditioning is.

Operant Conditioning

Operant conditioning is a little more complicated because it is mainly associated with punishments and rewards for certain behaviours. The point of operant conditioning is to increase or decrease a desired behaviour. Typically one should decrease bad behaviour and increase good behaviour. Operant conditioning has the same starting terms and principles as classical conditioning but it is more complicated because of the punishment and reward aspect. Operant conditioning does not happen fast. The conditioning occurs over time. There are four ways to increase or decrease an animal or human being's behaviour. There are two types of rewards listed above and two types of punishments listed above to help increase or decrease a behaviour. Some consequences are more severe than others. It can depend from situation to situation.

If a dog is being a "good boy" or a "good girl" then positive reinforcement can be applied by giving the dog a treat. The other option is to remove the dog's leash to reduce the negative punishment of feeling constricted within the leash. This option is negative reinforcement. If the dog is being disobedient, positive punishment could be added to decrease the behaviour. In this case, some people would yell at their dog or hit their dog but I DO NOT RECOMMEND THIS. Pets must be loved and taught in a healthy way. Not in an abusive way. These are just examples that I am using to explain the use of operant conditioning. Negative punishment would involve removing something pleasant from the dog such as their favourite toy or blanket. I do not recommend this either but that's because I am a big softie for animals (everyone should be caring for animals because they are ten times better than we are.....aha. Sometimes we need to humble ourselves. They are also God's creations and we must respect them and love them.) Moving on.....

A popular experiment in the psychology of operant conditioning is when B.F. Skinner created an experiment concerning rats and mice. In the experiment, there was a lever that the mice/rats had to pull to receive food from the other side of the box. When the rat pulled or pushed on the lever accidentally he realized that food came out of the shoot. The more the rat pushed the lever the more times he received food from the shoot. B.F. Skinner then added a shock to the experiment, Every time the rat was not supposed to push the lever he got shocked. If you want to learn more about this experiment then feel free to look it up in more detail. There is a lot more to this experiment than what I have explained. I am using it as an example.

An example of operant conditioning in sports is to be demonstrated when players receive penalties in soccer, football, basketball, hockey, tennis, and multiple other sports. Penalties are there for players so that they will not continue to do that same action or behaviour on the field of a game. Soccer players and hockey players often receive a time-out if they have performed in a certain way that was not appropriate for the game. If the players do well and succeed in their game, then the coach can decide to take them all out for pizza. This would be an example of a reward for good behaviour.

Swimming is another example of operant conditioning because a swimmer is typically rewarded with praise every time they reach a new level in their swimming. When they receive the praise of their coach the swimmer's performance typically increases. Praise is a positive reinforcement that leads to positive behaviour. It is adding positive reinforcement to someone. The punishments for soccer would then be a negative reinforcement because the coach is taking away the player’s opportunity for “field time” or “play time” in the game.