He called this conditioned response (Myers, 2008). In the operant conditioning, living organisms associate their actions with a certain outcome. As a result, actions that are followed by reinforcers tend to increase, while those followed by punishers usually decrease (Davis, 2008). Skinner showed this by placing a hungry rat in a skinner box that had a lever. Whenever the rat knocked the lever, a food pellet dropped into a container next to the lever.
In his classic studies Pavlov rang a bell each time before giving his dogs food and eventually the dogs were conditioned to salivate when they heard the bell in expectancy of food. Another way through which people learn is through operant conditioning, which was studied by Skinner. In his experiments Skinner put a pigeon in a ‘skinner box’, which had a key hidden in one of the walls. If the pigeon pecked on this key it would release food from the dispenser, which was outside the box. Behaviourists analyse this in terms of reinforcement – behaviours that are rewarded are continued.
“Hebb based his theory on experiments involving both humans and laboratory animals, on clinical case studies, and on logical arguments developed from his own insightful observations of daily life.” (Pinel, 2009) 3. Name one to three important theorists associated with biological psychology. John Watson was the founder of behaviorism. He used his sons to do a lot of research about behavior. Watson wrote, experimented and researched behavior using both humans and animals.
Captive Chimps in Relation to Humans Marshonda Theus Park University Abstract In my paper I will be discussing the comparisons in captive chimps and primates and captive humans. Psychology is important because it allows us to study and understand the behavior and mental processes in humans and animals. It is so important for us to understand the way the chimps and primates mental processes and behaviors because everything from their anatomy to the way that they communicate is similar to us as humans. I invite you to read and explore with me the similarities in the psyche of chimps and primates in comparison to humans. It will be covering the areas of the human versus chimp brains, evolution from ape theory, diet, communication, and the documentary of Koko to prove that chimps and humans should share the same branch in the animal world.
An idea that the story gave me was the ‘Worm’ had a control over him from an early age, “When he was hungry, he imagined he was feeding the worm rather than himself”. This proved that the worm had a higher status over Andy himself and when it demanded, Andy delivered. I believe this inner dominance gave Andy the strength to beat his grandfather while he was asleep; it gave him a sense of relief of all the pressure he had built up and helped him forget some of his dreadful past. Ultimately this gave him the drive to finally hunt down his ex-wife and petrol bomb her house. As well as symbolism MacDougall also uses structure to piece together Andy’s motives for his actions in the climax of the story.
It has contributed in the treatment of medical issues also. In some cases, animal testing has greatly helped animals, for instance there have been programs that have aimed to re-establish populations of threatened or endangered species by making appropriate living conditions and improving the well-being of captive animals. Animal research also helps explain the central nervous system, and in understanding how the nervous system works we are able to understand behaviours that are problematic in mental illness, drug addiction and memory disorders. 90% of the animals used in psychology research are rodents i.e. rats, mice, birds and pigeons.
This observation lead Pavlov on to the belief that the dog learnt that at the sight of a stimulus it meant food, therefore it had “learnt” Dogs would normally salivate at the smell of food this is known as “unconditioned reflex” continuing with his experiments he found that by using other stimulus in this case a bell he could condition the dog to salivate on its sound even to the extent of the dog salivating at the sound of the bell though there was no food, “Classical Conditioning”. The bell known as the “unconditioned stimulus” and the dog salivating to its sound lead Pavlov on to label this response; “condition response”. Out of Pavlov theory grew the understanding
He studied the salivation in dogs and concluded that a neutral stimulus becomes a conditioned stimulus to a dog and make it salivate, when it is paired with food. For example, when giving food to a dog, it starts salivating. When making a tone with a bell everytime before giving food to the dog, the salivation starts with the bell-ringing. The final part of this experiment is the observation of salivation, only at the bell-ringing, even when no food follows. This is in principle a learning effect.
Classic conditioning is learning by association for example stimulus such as ringing of the bell at lunch time provoked a conditional response so we associated the bell to food. Operant conditioning- patterns of behaviour can be stimulated through positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement and punishment. Skinner Skinner carried out experiments on rats and later known as ‘Skinner box’. This box was fitted with a bar in the inside and allowed the rat to press the bar every time the rat pressed the bar the rat would be presented with a food pellet, and the pressing of the bar was recorded. The rat learnt that by pressing the bar the food would appear and began to press it to get fed.
The theory of classical conditioning was introduced near the turn of the nineteenth century (1900) by Russian scientist Ivan Petrovich Pavlov. Pavlov’s experiment was originally intended to study the physiology of salivation, however it turned out that his experiments led him to the discovery of conditioned reflexes. Pavlov’s experiments involved measuring stomach secretions in dogs as they were introduced to food, meat, meat powder, etc. As Pavlov progressed through his experiments he noticed that the dogs had began to salivate upon seeing the food. Then Pavlov began to notice that the dogs began to salivate when he saw an empty plate, or when he saw the experimenter; the dogs even salivated at the sound of the foot steps from the experimenter as they were about to enter the room.