Learning If you cant observe it You cant

Learning If you can’t observe it, You can’t study it

The schools of behaviorism

The schools of behaviorism

History of Behaviorism Thorndike (1900’s - 1932) an American psychologist whose theory of connectionism (forming associations between stimuli and responses) was dominant in the US during the first half of the 20 th century. • Thorndike focused much of his attention on education, especially learning and transfer. He thought transfer happened only when the situations have identical elements and call for similar responses.

History of Behaviorism Thorndike The instinctive and intelligent behavior of chickens Studies under James at Harvard Goes to Columbia Puzzle boxes for cats Not reasoning nor insight Trial and error Single response, no problem Two response, but problem

History of Behaviorism Thorndike Law of Effect Annoyers Satisfier Stamp-in=reinforce The effect of any action thus determines whether it becomes the response to a given stimulus or not.

History of Behaviorism Thorndike Law of Exercise A response will be more strongly connect to a stimulus in proportion to the number of times it has been connected with that situation and to the average vigor and duration of the connection

History of Behaviorism Thorndike Animals are not people! To T: The number, delicacy and complexity of cell structures in human brain make for a corresponding number, delicacy and complexity of associations.

Enter the dog

Classical Conditioning: The Elements of Associative Learning Ivan Pavlov Typical Conditioning Trial: ריור Test Trial: ריור

Classical Conditioning: Definitions Unconditioned(al) Stimulus (US): a stimulus that has the ability to produce a specified response before conditioning begins. Unconditioned(al) Response (UR): the response produced by the US. (SALIVATION PRODUCED BY THE FOOD)

Classical Conditioning: Definitions Conditioned(al) Stimulus (CS): an initially neutral stimulus that comes to produce a new response because it is associated with the US. Conditioned Response (CR): the response produced by the CS. (SALIVATION PRODUCED BY THE BELL)

The schools of behaviorism

Philosophical Foundations of Learning Theory Empiricism says that all knowledge comes from experience. Beginning with Aristotle, empiricist philosophers have proposed theories to explain how experience gets translated into knowledge. The basic process proposed was association. An association is a connection between ideas. If two ideas (representations) are associated, when you think of one you will automatically think of the other. For example: ? ? ?

Philosophical Foundations of Learning Theory Why chair? Probably because we see tables and chairs together so often. This statement points to two key principles philosophers used to explain the formation of associations: Temporal Contiguity Two events that are experienced at the same time will tend to be associated. Frequency The more often we experience events that are contiguous, the more strongly we will associate them.

Watson • John B. Watson (1916, 1926), an American psychologist is credited as the founder of behaviorism. – Watson strove to make the new field of psychology more scientific. – He believed that all behavior, even that which appeared instinctive, is the result of conditioning that occurs in response to a stimulus. – Like E. L. Thorndike, Watson was popular in the first half of the 20 th century

“Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own special world to bring them up in and I’ll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to be any type of specialist I might select – a doctor, a lawyer, artist…” -Watson 1924

Who was he • Fear of the dark • Father was a drunk and abandonded the family • The original fight club • Talked his way into Furman college • University of chicago to study Philosophy • First to build a rat maz

Running record ex. • 12 min. , 3 min. , 8 min. , 2 min. , 3 min. , then. 33 min, . 16 min. , . 08 min, . 108 min. A fundamental discovery: Learning is not an even process: Rather, slow haphazard improvements followed by a sudden solution.

From rats to people • 1) studied how young he could get rats to solve the mazes, • 2) turned to neurology. Killed rats aged from 1 to 30 days and examined the state of their brains at each age. Wanted to link their psychological abilities with the physiological development of their cortex.

Ph. D • "If you could understand rats without the convolutions of introspection, could you not understand people the same way? "

Youngest professor • (a) Previous study had been of vision. Hooded birds. • (b) In 1906 Watson began to operate on a group of six-month-old rats who had previousl¥ learned the maze. • Made one group blind by removing eyeballs. • One group deaf by removing middle ear. • Took out olfactor bulb of one group to be sure they • could not smell. • Snipped the whiskers off two rats. No effect.

Therefore • WATSON HYPOTHESIZED THAT RATS WERE LEARNING BY • KINESTHETIC SENSE. HE & HARVEY CARR --IDENTICAL MAZE, HALF AS LARGE, rats that had learned the maze kept running into walls. • "I never want to see another rat go round the maze. ”

Pavlov’s influence • Won Nobel in 1905 • Translated in 1915 • to condition humans with a bell (CS) a small electric shock to the foot, (US) and a toe-flexing response. The bell and shock occurred simultaneously. The reflex was not fully reliable but some were conditioned. A subject trained in may and retested in October required only one reminding shock for the reflex to reappear. They carried out a number of experiments, and Watson believed that emotions as well as saliva flows and toe movements could be conditioned

Baby love • First to observe children in their natural setting • Believe mental illness was conditioned response • Wanted to become a social engineer • "are really consolidations of instinct and habit. "

Getting radical • -- Society can employ psychology to retrain those of its members who did not conform to civilised standards. The criminal, the laz¥, the drifters, and even the mentally ill could be turned into useful members of society. It would not be left up to them to choose that. And those few criminals whose nervous systems were so askew that they could not be conditioned into decent members of society ought to be "etherized. "

Ten gallons of rye and college students? • The first study of the affects of alcohol on performance

Puzzle box

So what did he do? • Psychology as the behaviorists views it • President of the APA • Editor of the psych bulliten • And the most famous experiment of them all

Contiguity • - (Behaviorism)- One explanation for learning in behaviorism; an association is built between two events simply because they occured simultaneously or overlapping in time. For example, if food is presented while some auditory signal is given, a dog will "learn" to salivate when it hears the auditory signal, even if no food is present.

Little Albert • three basic emotional reactions: fear, rage, and love. • Prove he could condition responses

The Psychological Care of the Infant and Child • Children should be awakened at 6: 30 A. M. for orange juice and a pee. Play 'till 7: 30. Breakfast should be at 7: 30 sharp; at 8: 00 they should be placed on the toilet for twenty minutes or less 'til bowel movement is complete. Then follow up with a verbal report. The child would then play indoors 'till 10 P 00 A. M. , after 10: 00 outside, a short nap after lunch, then "social play" with others. In the evening a bath, quiet play until bedtime at 8: 00 sharp. =1928

• He argued that institutions like the Boy Scouts and the YMCA could lead to homosexuality. Girls were even in more danger because they held hands, kissed, and slept in the same bed at pajama parties. "Our whole social fabric is woven so as to make all women slightly homosexual. ” • Mothering is a sexual act • Kids should be removed 4 weeks after

Methodological Behaviorism – • • All psychologists can observe is behavior so that is all they should study. Law of Parsimony – simpler explanations are preferred “mental” events cannot be measured and so should not be studied Deterministic Stimulus-Response (S-R) • 6 • Watson’s Methodological • Behaviorism • • • Extreme nurturist position Believed everything of importance was learnt – not innate

Scandal • "I did not know anything about industry, and above all • that I did not know the habits and dwelling places of that peculiar and widely distributed animal we call the "consumer. " Theoretically, I had been studying this animal all my days; practically, I did not know how to get at him. "

Love letter • I have been an awful sinner, I know. . Promise me your heart and body will still be mine. . Every cell I have is yours, individually and collectively. I can't be any more yours than if a surgical operation made us one. . [I wish we could go] to the North Pole where the days and nights are six months long, [He implied that this would allow record-breaking kissing. ] Everything will be lovely and we ought to play safe. Still, play we will. . My total reactiions are positive toward you. So, likewise, each and every heart reaction. "

Coffee Break • “good to the last drop”

Lucky stripe • “Lucky Strike Means Fine Tobacco. ” • "Since the time of the serpent in the garden of Eden influenced Eve and Eve in turn persuaded Adam, the world has tried to find out ways and means of controlling human behavior. In advertising, we call the process selling. "

"dispense with rational copy almost entirely. "

From door to this • "…tell him something that will tie him up with fear, something that will stir up a mild rage, that will call out an affectionate or love response, or strike at a deep psychological or habit need. "

• Girls! Don't worry anymore • about smoke-stained teeth • or tobaco tainted breath. • You can smoke and still be lovely • if you'll just use Pebeco twice a day.

Men want • 1) she must be healthy; • 2) she must be young; • 3) she must be receptive; • 4) and she must be impregnable

Women want • So much more complicated…. • Genes…. • • sex for what it can mean in the future. romance.

Personnel testing • Unfortunately, there are many vocations in life in which no form of testing is applicable. Who would attempt today to pick out by any form of general intelligence or special performance tests a good business executive —a good newspaper man—the proper material to make an advertising man—a good department store buyer…(Watson, 1927, p. 9).

"If You're a Failure, Change Your Personality" • If I can get this idea across to you of studying yourself, inventorying yourself as you would a business, writing a description of yourself, shortly you would get into a position to turn loose on the. . . fellow you do business with. . . it is getting yourself in a position where you can predict the other fellow's behavior that puts you in command in a selling situation (Watson, 1934, p. 3).

Behavior therapy • a. Thirty cases of simply removing children from the feared object (like Rabbit) and having no such objects present for two weeks. No effect. It was not enough to do nothing. Fears did not disappear by themselves. • b. Talking a child out of its fears. Another rabit case: They read her Beatrix Potter stories; they explained that rabits were nice creatures; got her to make Plasticine rabbites; they managed to get her to say that she liked rabbits and was not frightened of them. But next time she saw rabbit, she jumped up, screamed, and stopped playing. So much for words and positive thinking. • c. Social pressure: Boy called "fraidy cat" when showed self afraid of frongs. • Deconditioning: Only worked on children who were already afraid.

Behavior therapy • Peter: Dog and other animal fears. "Direct-un-conditioning. " • "We secured permission to give him his mid-afternoon snack. Crackers and milk. Lunch served in room 40 feet long. Just as he began to eat, rabbit displayed in a wire mesh cage. We displayed it far enough away not to disturb eating. • Gradually rabbit brought closer and closer. Eventually, rabbit could be paced on table by Peter and finally Peter would eat with one hand play with the rabbit with the other. • Watson noted that they did not know circumstances in which Peter's fears first arose. If they had, might have been able to spot "primary fear" and how this had been "transferred" to other objects. Thought this knowledge would be centrally important. • When his son Billy developed a phobia of goldfish, Watson successfully treated it in similar fashion. Unsuccessful with nail-biting.

And his kids • Billy became a respected, successful psychiatrist in New York. Became Freudian and turned against his father's behaviorism. His first suicide attempt was stopped by younger brother Jimmy. Second attempt, in mid-30 s, was successful. • d. Watson & Mary's son Little John was "a rather rootless person who often sponged on his father. " Plagued throughout life with stomach trouble and intolerable headaches. Died in his early 50 s of bleeding ulcers. • e. Jimmy also had chronic stomach problems for years, but after intensive analysis is alive and doing well. • f. John & Mary's daughter Polly attempted suicide over and over.

Even the grandkids • "We couldn't talk about feelings, we couldn't talk about affection, we couldn't talk about touching, but we could talk about sex. • Lesbian for crossing the street

The schools of behaviorism

Hull’s Neobehaviorism • Clark Hull (1884 – 1952) • Other sciences use intervening variables • (gravity, gene) – why not psychology? • But intervening variables must be • operationalized – defined so their effects can • be measured.

Drive Reduction Theory • • • Major influences : Pavlov, Darwin, Thorndike and Tolman. theory attempts to synthesis of theories of these researchers plus Newtonian physics. interested in hypnosis, and wrote a book entitled Hypnosis and Suggestibility in 1933. During the 1940's and 1950's Hull's work was much-cited in the psychological literature. And theory: he notion that behavior occurs in reponse to "drives" such as hunger, thirst, sexual interest, feeling cold, etc. When the goal of the drive is attained (food, water, mating, warmth) the drive is reduced, and this constitutes reinforcement of the behaviors that lead to the drive reduction, and ultimately learning.

Drive Reduction Theory bonding of the drive with the goal of the drive was a type of reinforcement

Drive Reduction Theory Hunger Food= survival

Hull’s Neobehaviorism • • Still did not allow introspection and mental terms But permitted physiological intervening variables • • • Outside world Interior world Outside world Environmental events Conscious thoughts & feelings Unconscious drives Observable behavior

Hull’s Neobehaviorism • • Still an S – R theory Still mechanistic approach Rather like modern computer-inspired cognitive psychology Very influential in 40 s and 50 s Very dry mathematical approach become unwieldy and went out of fashion

The schools of behaviorism