The Behaviourist Perspective
Classical Conditioning (Pavlov) Operant Conditioning (Skinner)
What do Psychologists do? They explain behaviour But how do they explain it? Many different APPROACHES or PERSPECTIVES to explaining behaviour
The Behaviourist Perspective
This Perspective believes that we are born a blank slate, and that we learn our behaviour as a result of our
experiences in our environment. Therefore, this is a NURTURE explanation.
Classical Conditioning: The Behaviourist Perspective
Classical conditioning was first observed by Ivan Pavlov in the late 1800’s.
He was studying how dogs salivation helps digest food, whilst studying this he noticed that dogs would salivate sometimes before their food arrived.
Pavlov then realised that that the dogs had ASSOCIATED food with other stimulus… Such as the laboratory assistant
Pavlov applied this learning by association to humans.
Unconditioned response – not learned, it is automatic e.g. salivation
Unconditioned stimulus – consistently leads to an automatic response e.g. food
Conditioned response – a new learned response to previously neutral stimulus
Conditioned stimulus – a neutral stimulus with the unconditioned stimulus that produces a conditioned response
Have you been classically conditioned?
At the dentist… are you frightened as you walk through the door? As you sit in the chair?
Going to the dentist is associated with pain – you expect pain whenever you go to the dentist
So what is classical conditioning?
Classical conditioning is when a stimulus creates a response….
But this is a new response.. One we never had before
Classical conditioning basically involves learning a new behaviour via the process of association. In simple terms two stimuli are linked together to produce a new learned response in a person or animal. There are three stages of classical conditioning. At...