Operant Conditioning
Classical conditioning only applies to reflexive responses. B.F. Skinner studied how animals can learn from the consequences of their actions. Consequences can be classified as follows:
Positive Reinforcement:
This is when something ‘desirable’ is obtained in response to doing something. E.g giving a chocolate bar to a well-behaved child to encourage future good behaviour
Behaviour is encouraged by a positive stimulus being added
Negative Reinforcement:
This is when something ‘undesirable’ (the negative reinforcer) is removed when something happens. E.g being told by the teacher that you’ll have no extra homework if you pass your test
Behaviour is encouraged by a negative stimulus being added
Skinner (1938)- Rats showing operant conditioning:
Method:
Skinner created a ‘Skinner box’, in which he placed one rat at a time
Each Skinner box contained a variety of stimuli:
A speaker
Light
A floor which gave an electric shock and a food dispenser which released food when the lever was pressed
A hungry rat was placed in the Skinner box
The time taken for the rats to learn that pressing the lever would release food was recorded
Result:
Initially, the rat would run around the cage until it accidentally pressed the lever and was rewarded with food
The more the rat was put back into the box, the quicker they got at learning where the lever was
Conclusion:
Rats can learn behaviours through operant conditioning
A behaviour such as pressing a lever can be positively reinforced by receiving food
Evaluation:
Skinner’s experiment has been hugely influential in promoting the idea of behavioural psychology
However, his experiment did use animals, which means the results might not be generalisable to humans
His sample size was also small, reducing the reliability of his friends
Skinner carried out other variations of his study to test negative reinforcement
E.g he showed that a rat could learn to prevent an electric shock by pressing the lever when a light came on
Watson and Rayner (1920)- Little Albert learned to fear
Method: The participant was an 11-month-old boy called ‘Little Albert’. He showed no fear of white fluffy objects such as rats or rabbits. The researchers tried to create a conditioned response to these objects. A white rat was placed in front of Little Albert. As he reached out for it, a metal bar was struck loudly behind his head. This was repeated twice at first, then 5 more times a week later
Results: When Little Albert was shown a rat, he would start to cry. This was extended to other fluffy objects, such as a white Santa Claus beard
Conclusion: A fear response to white fluffy objects had been conditioned in Little Albert, showing that abnormal behaviour can be learned
Evaluation: The experiment was very unethical- such an experiment couldn’t be repeated today. Not everyone goes on to develop a fear or phobia after a negative situation, so learning theory can’t be the full story. It was a laboratory study, so it lacked ecological validity as the situation was artificial. However, the results support Pavlov’s idea of classical conditioning