Learning Unit 4_Personality Psychology PDF

# Chapter 07: Behavioural and Learning Theory Perspectives of Personality ## Author: Lionel J. Nicholas ## Learning Objectives After completing this chapter, you should be able to: - Understand why the behavioural and learning theory perspective of personality differs so markedly from other the...

# Chapter 07: Behavioural and Learning Theory Perspectives of Personality ## Author: Lionel J. Nicholas ## Learning Objectives After completing this chapter, you should be able to: - Understand why the behavioural and learning theory perspective of personality differs so markedly from other theories. - Understand how behavioural and learning theory moved psychology and personality towards more objective and scientific methods. - Describe the early experiments that formed the basis of a learning theory view of personality. - Distinguish between the different kinds of conditioning and schedules of reinforcement. ## 7.1 Introduction Generally, personality theorists infer the existence of psychological structures in the mind of a person that explain the individual's consistent styles of emotion and behaviour. The behavioural approach is an exception: this approach considered the existence of invisible personality structures to be speculative and not verifiable by basic research, as was required by behaviourists. South Africa's most prominent contributor to the early development of personality theory and therapy, Joseph Wolpe (1915–1997), made his contributions in behaviourism and learning theory (Pervin & Cervone, 2010). Behaviourism was the dominant school of thought in mid-twentieth century psychology, but it now has far fewer followers than it had in its heyday. It lost influence primarily because it overlooked the question of how individuals assign meaning to environmental events (Pervin & Cervone, 2010). The importance of the internal cognitive processes of such meaning making led to the cognitive revolution in which another South African, Arnold Lazarus, was a key figure. It also led to theoretical disagreements between Wolpe and Lazarus (1932-2013), his erstwhile student, and a parting of ways (Poppen, 1995). ## 7.2 I. P. Pavlov Behaviourism as an approach to personality differs markedly from any other approach, in that it explains behaviour in terms of the causal influence of the environment. It also determines such environmental influences entirely through controlled laboratory research with animals or people. Ivan P. Pavlov (1849-1936), a Russian physiologist, developed the principles of classical conditioning from animal studies. He was awarded a Nobel Prize in 1904 for his work on digestive processes. Haggbloom et al. (2002) rated Pavlov 24th among the 100 most eminent psychologists of the 20th century. In Pavlov's classic studies, a dog salivates when food is presented – this is an unconditioned response (UR). The food is an unconditioned stimulus (US). The response occurs without any learning or conditioning. A new stimulus is then introduced – for example, the sound a bell – which is initially neutral. Thereafter, a bell is sounded just before the presentation of the food, over a series of trials. A bell is then sounded without the food being presented, and the dog salivates upon hearing the bell. The bell is the conditioned stimulus (CS) after learning has taken place; the salivation in response to the bell is the conditioned response (CR). Todes (2016) reports that Pavlov's bell is a myth and that Pavlov used an adjustable buzzer in his famous experiments with dogs. Pavlov experimented with a wide range of animals, but stopped at the giraffes recommended by Alfred Nobel. He had a bad experience with mice and a better one with chimpanzees. He always returned to dogs, whom he believed had distinct personalities (Haslam, 2016). Pavlov developed a theory of personality types (Wolman, 1965), but tried to avoid mentalistic terms. He recognised that dogs showed emotions similar to fear and anger. Pavlov used Hippocrates' four types for classifying his experimental dogs, and believed that humans could similarly be classified. Based on his animal studies and years spent observing mental patients, Pavlov, who was influenced by Russian physiologist I. M. Sechenov (1829–1905), developed a theory of personality types (Wolman, 1965): - Choleric - Melancholic - Sanguine - Phlegmatic. These types of psychological phenomena were reduced to a physiological theory, in which human behaviour was linked to the nervous system (Wolman, 1965). However, Pavlov criticised behaviourism for indiscriminately putting together psychology and physiology: The psychologist takes conditioning as the principle of learning, and accepting this principle as not subject to further analysis, not requiring ultimate investigation, he endeavours to apply it to everything and to explain all the individual features of learning as one and the same process. For this purpose he takes one physiological fact and in a decisive way gives it a specific meaning in the interpretation of certain concrete facts of the learning process and does not seek an actual confirmation of that meaning. From this, the physiologist is inclined to think that the psychologist, recently split off from the philosopher, has not yet altogether renounced partiality toward the philosophical method of deduction from pure logical work, without verifying every step of thought through agreement with actual fact. The physiologist proceeds in quite the opposite way. (Pavlov, 1933, p. 91) ## Sechenov, Pavlov and another Russian physiologist, Vladimir M. Bechterev (1857-1927), while researching neurophysiology, pursued topics that overlapped with psychology. They also applied the objective methods of physiology to psychology, which at the time focused on subjective explanations of behaviour (Kazdin, 1978). Sechenov, regarded as the father of Russian physiology, combined his interest in physiology and psychology, of which he was an early student, to propose that all behaviour was entirely reflexive. Having previously demonstrated the inhibitory influence of the brain on spinal reflexes, he proposed that, given specific environmental influences, resulting behaviour would inevitably occur. Sechenov tried to free psychology from speculative concepts, and he emphasised the role of reflexes and learning in explaining behaviour. His work was initially banned because of its determinism, and materialistic and mechanistic views. This led to court action against him for undermining public morals. His work was later widely read, however (Kazdin, 1978). Bechterev, also influenced by Sechenov, was not only a physiologist, but also a neurologist and psychiatrist who focused on the anatomy and physiology of the brain and spinal cord. He proposed that the problems of psychology could be analysed through examining reflexes. He extended Pavlov's work to humans, and noted several advantages of his method over Pavlov's in researching learned reflexes (Kazdin, 1978). He believed that reflexology was the answer to the questions posed by personality, and that it could replace psychology, writing that: The neuroscience which we call reflexology, has for its aims the study of personality by means of objective observations and experiment and the registration of all its external manifestations and their external causes, present or past, which arise from the social environment and even from the framework of inherited character. (Bechterev, 1933, p. 81) Bechterev established a theory of conditioning based on physiology, and he experimented in many areas of conditioning. His theory of energy 'ascribed mental functions to organic matter ... and reduced the higher mental processes to simple transformations of physical energy' (Wolman, 1965, p. 67). J. B. Watson, who will be discussed in the next section, and other learning theorists applied a number of Bechterev's findings. Personality was considered to be the sum of consistent behavioural patterns that were not unchangeable, as some conditioned reflexes could become extinct or reinforced, and new ones could become established. Therefore, it was necessary to consider innate or conditioned reflexes, and the influence of the social and physical environment, on the expression of personality (Wolman, 1965). Kazdin (1978) contended that one of the most comprehensive attempts to integrate learning concepts with personality theory was John Dollard and Neal E. Miller's (1950) Personality and Psychotherapy: An Analysis in Terms of Learning, Thinking and Culture. It tried to integrate psychoanalytic concepts were translated into learning terms; for example, the pleasure principle, transference and neurotic conflict were explained in terms of reinforcement, stimulus generalization and acquired drives. Miller was rated as the eighth-most eminent psychologist of the 20th century (Haggbloom et al., 2002). Julian B. Rotter also attempted to extend learning theory to personality by emphasising a person's expectancy of reinforcement and the perceived value of the reinforcing event (Kazdin, 1978). Rotter was rated the 64th-most eminent psychologist of the 20th century (Haggbloom et al., 2002). Andrew Salter (1914-1996) used processes such as excitation and inhibition originally suggested by Sechenov - and later by Pavlov and Bechterev - to propose a theory of maladaptive behaviour in his 1949 book Conditioned Reflex Therapy: The Direct Approach to the Reconstruction of Personality. Salter (1949) contended that social development fosters inhibition, and that the goal of therapy is to confront inhibitions and to encourage an excitatory personality. Salter's conditioned-reflex therapy was applied to previous narrow applications and proposed that: ‘The individual's problems are a result of his social experience and by changing his techniques of social relations, we change his personality' (Salter, 1949, p. 316). Salter also influenced Wolpe's use of personality tests as a diagnostic tool and his in vivo therapy techniques, of which he was an early proponent (Poppen, 1995). ## 7.3 J. B. Watson John B. Watson (1878–1958), the founder of behaviourism, believed that ‘the time seems to have come when psychology must discard all reference to consciousness; when it need no longer delude itself into thinking that it is making mental states the object of observation' (Watson, 1913, p. 158). Emotions were assumed to be hereditary pattern reactions. Personality was considered to be a totality of behavioural patterns, which are consistent. Certain conditional reflexes could become extinct or reinforced and new ones could develop, according to Watson (Wolman, 1965). ## View of the theorist John B. Watson had few pleasant memories of his early schooling, during which he admitted to having been lazy and insubordinate. Even during his experience at Furham University, he felt that college led to softness and prolonging of infancy. However, graduate work at Chicago University was highly rewarding and he worked night and day, receiving his PhD as the youngest-ever graduate (Jones, 1975). In 1908, he became a professor at Johns Hopkins University, where he developed his views on behaviourism and published his landmark paper in 1913. Watson was the most influential psychologist of his time, and behaviourism dominated psychology for half a century. In 1920, the publication of his conditioning of a child referred to as Little Albert (this will be discussed in further detail later in section 7.3.1) increased his already elevated status considerably, and he received a 50 per cent increase in salary (Benjamin et al., 2007). A few months later, the university president asked for his resignation because of a divorce action citing an affair with his 21-year-old assistant and student, Rosalie Rayner, who would later become his wife. Excerpts of his love letters to Rayner were published in newspapers, and Watson could find no other academic position. He spent the rest of his career in advertising. In 1974 a story emerged that the real reason for Watson's being fired was not his divorce, but rather that he and Rayner had conducted physiological studies of sexual intercourse, with themselves as subjects. The story attracted widespread interest and was reported in textbooks and journals. Even this author was taken in by the story, reporting it in Nicholas (2008). Benjamin et al. (2007) reported that the story did not meet the standards of research evidence, and it was gradually dropped from the research literature. Benjamin et al. (2007), citing the following letter, contended that Watson was very forthright about sex and would have mentioned his sex research: The final situation began about Xmas. Miss Rayner and I became friends and Mary became interested in another man. My wife started at Xmas to say that her interest in me was purely maternal. She told the Rayners and the man that married life with me was a bore and that she hated for the evening to come. I finally overheard her asking the man for intercourse. She told me also that our renewal of sex life six years ago was for her only a bluff. Miss Rayner went frankly to her and asked her if she minded our close friendship. Mary told her and her parents the same thing that she did not mind and that Rosalie could have me as far as she was concerned. (quoted in Benjamin et al., 2007, p. 137) McConnell (1974), who first published the story, based it on anecdotal 'evidence', which Benjamin et al. (2007) argued should never have made it into print. Watson was cited as the 17th-most eminent psychologist of the 20th century (Haggbloom et al., 2002). ## Watson initially identified three fundamental emotions in infants from which all other emotions evolve through conditioning: - Love - Rage - Fear. He first accepted instincts as important in explaining human behaviour, but later denied their influence. He believed that: [If given al dozen healthy infants, well-informed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might mention (doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant, thief etc., and even beggar-man and thief, regardless of his talents, I admit it, but so have the advocates of the contrary and they have been doing it beyond my facts and penchants, tendencies, abilities - I am going beyond my facts and penchants, tendencies, abilities, and race of his ancestors. I am going beyond my facts and years. Please note that when this experiment is made I am to be allowed to specify the way the children are to be brought up and the type of world they have to live in.] (Watson, 1924, p. 104, as cited in Kazdin, 1978) ## 7.3.1 The *study* involving Little Albert Watson and Rayner (1920) reported a study that established whether: 1. An infant (Albert) could be conditioned to fear an animal whose appearance would be accompanied by a fear-arousing noise 2. The fear would be generalised to other animals or objects 3. How long the fear would persist. Psychology textbooks and articles provided distorted reports of the experiment. These distorted reports included Watson's own published descriptions of the study; he altered and deleted aspects of the study in them. Watson and Rayner (1920) also stated that directly conditional emotional responses persist and modify personality throughout life, yet their experimental results did not conclusively prove this. Watson and Rayner presented the results of their experiment as proof that fear is as primal a factor as love in influencing personality, disputing the Freudian notion that sex ‘or in our terminology love is the principle emotion in which conditioned responses arise which later limit and distort personality' (Watson & Rayner, 1920, p. 14). ## RESEARCH ISSUE: The Little Albert experiment See this website for information about this experiment: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMnhyGozLyE Harris (1979) contended that the study was unconvincing of Watson's general view of personality and emotions. Harris (1979) noted that the experimental conditions were compromised in that: 1. The stimuli were insufficient for generalisation effects. 2. Emotional responses were not reliably accessed. 3. There was incomplete follow-up. 4. Instrumental and classical conditioning were confounded. 5. The study relied on only one subject. ## Watson, being aware of the problem, suggested that Mary Cover Jones extend his research on infant development for her PhD dissertation. Initially, Jones submitted her study which included a study of another child, known as Little Peter), as a dissertation topic. However, her committee turned it down because of the limited number of cases. Jones eventually compared measures on over 300 children for her PhD (Jones, 1975). Later paragraphs of this section will discuss the work of Jones in further detail. Concerns about the ethics of the Little Albert experiment and whether it could have caused the infant lasting harm prompted Beck, Levinson, and Irons (2009) to launch a search for Little Albert. They found that: - He had died at the age of six of hydrocephalus, with no reports of such harm before his death. - His name was Douglas Merritte. ## What happened to Little Albert? See this website for information about what happened to Little Albert: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJnJ1Q8PAJk. Watson and Rayner were aware of the ethical issues involved in their experiment. However, they rationalised that Little Albert was a stolid and unemotional infant, and they felt that they could do him 'relatively little harm' (Watson and Rayner, 1920, p. 2). They set forth with 'considerable hesitation', but comforted themselves that once the child left the nursery he would be exposed to similar fear experiences. ## Watson and Rayner considered the following deconditioning methods, which they did not implement because Albert was taken away from the hospital: - Exposing Albert to the feared stimuli in the hope that might habituate and lose his fear - Showing the fear objects and ‘simultaneously stimulating the erogenous zones (tactical). We should try first the lips, then the nipples and as a final resort the sex organs' (Watson and Rayner, 1920, p. 12) - Feeding Albert candy while the animal was shown - Engaging in constructive activity around the feared object. By conditioning emotional reactions, Watson showed that objective behavioural methods could be used to explore emotional states and private experience. Through researching how emotional reactions evolve, treatment methods could be developed (Kazdin, 1978). ## Activity Discuss the ethical issues surrounding Little Albert. ## Mary Cover Jones (1897–1987), a Vassar classmate of Rayner's, explored certain therapeutic techniques upon the advice of Watson, by selecting institutionalised children who showed fear when exposed to various animals or a loud noise (Jones, 1975), Jones used the following procedures to eliminate fear reactions: - Disuse: Not exposing the child to the feared stimuli for weeks or months - Verbal appeal: Associating verbally positive experiences (for example, pleasant stories about animals) with the feared animals - Negative adaptation: Repeatedly presenting the feared object - Repression: Exposing the fearful child to the feared object in the presence of fearless children who would ridicule the fear response - Distraction: Substituting another activity for the feared object - Direct conditioning: Associating the feared object with another stimulus that evoked a pleasant reaction. - Social conditioning: Placing the fearful child with a group of fearless children who would play with the feared object and be imitated by the fearful child. Only two methods were successful: direct conditioning and social imitation. Jones (1924) demonstrated the effectiveness of these methods in the classic study of Peter, a 34-month-old baby who feared a range of stimuli. Peter was successfully conditioned using a fear hierarchy and exposure to three fearless children: 1. Rabbit anywhere in the room in a cage causes fear reactions. 2. Rabbit 12 ft away in cage tolerated. 3. Rabbit 4 ft away in cage tolerated. 4. Rabbit 3 ft away in cage tolerated. 5. Rabbit close in cage tolerated. 6. Rabbit free in room tolerated. 7. Rabbit touched when experimenter holds it. 8. Rabbit touched when free in room. 9. Rabbit defied by spitting at it, throwing things at it, imitating it. 10. Rabbit allowed on tray of high chair. 11. Squats in defenceless position beside rabbit. 12. Helps experimenter to carry rabbit to its cage. 13. Holds rabbit on lap. 14. Stays alone in room with rabbit. 15. Allows rabbit in play-pen with him. 16. Fondles rabbit affectionately. 17. Lets rabbit nibble his fingers. (Jones, 1924, pp. 310-311, cited in Kazdin, 1978) Wolpe invited Jones to present a keynote address at a conference (Behavior Therapy - 50 Years of Progress) to discuss the state of the science of behaviourism. Wolpe had previously enquired of Jones about her neglect of opportunities in the field of behaviour therapy. Jones indicated that she felt that her small contribution was not significant, and that her marriage, children, and working on a longitudinal project with her husband had determined her path (Jones, 1975, p. 185). ## 7.4 E. L. Thorndike Edward L. Thorndike (1874-1949) initially applied the ideas of Alexander Bain to his own research. Bain - who was a contemporary of Charles Darwin (naturalist and proponent of the theory of evolution) and Herbert Spencer (key philosopher of social and biological evolution) - applied evolutionary theory to psychology. He proposed that the evolution of mind results from the development of nervous tissue connections (Wolman, 1965). Thorndike developed a psychological theory combining functionalism and associationism. The connection between nerves was assumed to determine the flow of neural current, which Thorndike believed controlled psychological functions (Wolman, 1965). Before Pavlov and Hull (whose work is discussed in the next section), Thorndike developed a theory of learning, initially termed a trial-and-error process and later a selecting-and-connecting process. Pavlov acknowledged the importance of Thorndike's work (Kazdin, 1978). Learning was based on neural connections between a stimulus and a response, where unsuccessful impulses would be extinguished and successful impulses would be retained. Successful impulses were linked to pleasure – for example, a cat confined in a box learning to get out and reach food (see Figure 7.2); this was a point at which Thorndike departed from a purely physiological explanation of learning and embarked on a psychological explanation. His main law of learning was the law of effect: successful steps in learning were rewarded, and vice versa. Pleasure or satisfaction determined which responses would be learned. Thorndike's theory of brain connections was not supported by scientific research (Wolman, 1965). ## Thorndike was recently rated 9th among the 100 most eminent psychologists of the 20th century (Haggbloom et al., 2002). ## RESEARCH ISSUE: Thorndike's puzzle box See this website for information about Thorndike's puzzle box: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDujDOLre-8 ## 7.5 E. R. Guthrie, E. C. Tolman and C. L. Hull B. R. Guthrie (1886-1959) proposed in 1935 that all that was required for learning to occur was the pairing of a stimulus and a response. Rewards or consequences therefore did not strengthen learning. While Guthrie's hypothesis was experimentally refuted, his emphasis on contiguity remained important. E. C. Tolman (1896-1961) introduced the notion of purposiveness of the animal, assuming consciousness of a particular goal and thus eliciting criticism from Watsonian behaviourists. Anticipating cognitive behaviourism, Tolman argued that organisms learned meanings and developed cognitions. Tolman was rated 45th among eminent psychologists of the 20th century (Haggbloom et al., 2002). C. L. Hull (1884-1952) synthesised Pavlov's work on reflexes and Thorndike's trial-and-error learning, proposing that reinforcement is the central learning. Hull's hypothetico-deductive theory of behaviour included definitions, postulates, corollaries, and theorems to predict behaviour. Hull proposed intervening variables between stimuli and responses. He was rated the 21st-most eminent psychologist of the 20th century (Haggbloom et al., 2002). ## 7.6 B. F. Skinner B. F. Skinner (1904–1990) was strongly opposed to the view that his ideas constituted a personality theory. Rather, he wanted to replace personality theory with a new way of thinking (Pervin & Cervone, 2010). While he acknowledged the body/mind problem, he believed that: 'Modern sciences have attempted to put forth an ordered and integrated conception of nature ... The picture which emerges is almost always dualistic' (Skinner, 1953, p. 23). Behaviourists were convinced that inferring internal states such as feelings – or even cognitions - cast a blemish on the scientific objectivity that was essential for psychology to call itself a science. Behaviourists in general had no difficulty with the concept of personality, and many studies used the term, but unlike other personality theories, behaviourism eschewed any speculation about structures in the mind. ## Early approaches to moving personality theory towards more objective and scientific methods included translating psychoanalytic concepts in terms of behavioural concepts. Skinner, for example, considered the behaviours associated with the id, ego and superego as a product of individual responsiveness to reinforcement and punishment, while behaviour is shaped by and maintained the environment. Evolutionary theory is central to understanding the behavioural approach to psychology and personality. Adaptations that allowed for survival and reproduction solve both physiological and psychological problems and were transmitted to future generations (see Chapter 1). While Darwin's profound and vital contribution to evolutionary theory was published in 1859, its importance to personality theory has been explained in the past two decades. Evolutionary psychology has, however, become increasingly important for personality research. ## Skinner (1974) challenged psychoanalysis's claims that behaviourism cannot deal with unconscious. He asserted that 'it deals with nothing else' (p. 153). Skinner argued that the interplay among behaviour, genetic and environmental variables is unconscious, as long as they are unobserved. Skinner noted that Freud emphasised that these variables need not be conscious to be effective. Consciousness has a causal effect through a verbal environment, and it is this special verbal environment that induces self-observation. Creating consciousness, therefore, simply makes the individual more responsive to the environment as a source of stimulation. Skinner considers the id, ego and superego as contingencies that are almost inevitable when an individual lives in a group. The ego is, therefore, a product of individual susceptibility to reinforcement and punishment, whereas behaviour is shaped and maintained by the environment. Skinner (1974) maintained that Freud's analysis seems 'convincing because of its universality but it is environmental contingencies rather than the psyche which is invariant' (p. 151). Skinner also believed that Jung's collective unconscious and archetypes are better explained by the evolution of the species and cultural practices, which arise from the sameness of things that reinforce or injure and ensure survival. In Skinner's view: The scientist humbly admits that he is describing only half of the universe and he defers to another world - a world of mind or consciousness - for which another mode of inquiry is assumed to be required. Such a point of view is by no means inevitable ... It obviously stands in the way of a unified account of nature. The contribution which a science of behavior can make in suggesting an alternative point of view is perhaps one of its important achievements. (Skinner, 1981, p. 502) Skinner therefore believed that behaviour is determined by the evolutionary history of the species, together with the individual's environmental circumstances. He wrote: There are remarkable similarities in natural selection, operant conditioning and the evolution of social environments. Not only do all three dispense with a prior creative design and prior purpose they invoke the notion of survival as a value. What is good for the species is what promotes his wellbeing. What is good for a culture is what permits it to solve its problems. (Skinner, 1974, p. 205) ## 7.6.1 Types of selection by consequences Skinner identified three types of selection by consequences. Personality could therefore be understood via phylogenetic, ontogenetic and cultural events. ### 7.6.1.1 Phylogenetic This is also known as natural selection as proposed by Darwin, whereby the environment selects variation among individuals on the basis of survival and reproductive success (Farmer & Nelson-Gray, 2005). Reliable behaviour patterns contribute to survival and reproduction. Natural selection contributed to determining the types of events, which act as positive or negative reinforcers, resulting in certain consequences being associated with a greater or lesser likelihood for survival and reproductive success (Farmer & Nelson-Gray, 2005). ### 7.6.1.2 Ontogenetic Behaviours act on the environment to produce consequences or effects. Those behaviours that are successful or efficient are selected on the principle of reinforcement, and vice versa (Farmer & Nelson-Gray, 2005). ### 7.6.1.3 Cultural This refers to the development, maintenance and modification of group behaviour. Cultural practices occur through genetic inheritance, modelling, imitation, rule adherence and consequent reinforcement, and vice versa. ## 7.6.2 Operant and respondent behaviour When behaviour occurs in the presence of specific eliciting stimuli, Skinner labelled it respondent behaviour; when no such stimuli are present, it is operant behaviour. Modifications of the environment were labelled stimuli, and the responsive behaviour was labelled a response. An operant reflex is spontaneous and does not originate in the environment. Pavlov paired the reinforcer with the stimulus, whereas Skinner made the reinforcer contingent upon the response - for example, when a pigeon in a laboratory experiment lowers its head, food is presented (see the websites featured in the box at the end section 7.6.4 for videos on Skinner's work with pigeons). The frequency with which the head is lifted when the food is presented is the process of operant conditioning. Through operant conditioning, the efficiency of one's behaviour is improved. One's behaviour is the result of the consequences that have followed similar behaviour in the past (Wolman, 1965). The term 'operant' denoted that the behaviour operates on the environment and generates consequences. Skinner was unable to explain why reinforcement reinforces, and he suggested that the link between reinforcement and behaviour should be sought in the process of evolution. He did, however, provide a detailed description of reinforcement, and suggested that researchers should look to the primary reinforcers - such as food, water, sex and avoidance of injury – for an explanation. ## 7.6.3 Schedules of reinforcement Reinforcement does not occur every time it is desired in everyday life. Upon observing a rat in his laboratory continuing to press a bar without being reinforced, Skinner investigated four rates of reinforcement: - Fixed interval - Fixed ratio - Variable ratio - Variable interval. ### 7.6.3.1 Fixed interval reinforcement Fixed interval reinforcement requires that the reinforcer is presented after a fixed time interval. The reinforcer is presented, regardless of the number of responses during that time interval. Skinner found that the shorter the interval between reinforcements, the greater the frequency of the response. He also found that the extinction of response would occur more quickly if the rat had been reinforced continually, rather than intermittently. Employment that is paid weekly or monthly operates on a fixed interval schedule. ### 7.6.3.2 Fixed ratio reinforcement In the fixed ratio schedule of reinforcement, the rat is reinforced after a specified number of responses – for example, every fifth or tenth response will be rewarded. A worker who is paid on commission, or for every piece of work he or she produces, is paid corresponding to a fixed ratio. ### 7.6.3.3 Variable ratio reinforcement In a variable ratio schedule of reinforcement, behaviour is reinforced randomly. For example, a gambler putting money into a slot machine from which he or she could win or lose a small or large amount of money within an unpredictable time period is a variable reinforcement schedule. Behaviour reinforced in this way is highly resistant to extinction. Where the timing of the reinforcer cannot reliably be predicted, it results in enduring response behaviour. ### 7.6.3.4 Variable interval reinforcement A variable interval schedule of reinforcement is based on reinforcement following the first response after a variable amount of time has elapsed. For example, someone who goes fishing may be rewarded within half an hour, and then might catch a fish after an hour or an hour and a half (Pervin & Cervone, 2010). ## 7.6.4 Successive approximation (shaping) More complex behaviour in animals and humans is achieved via shaping. Skinner trained a pigeon to pick at a specific spot in its cage in the following way: - At first, he provided a food pellet when it turned in the direction of the spot. - Next, it received food when it moved towards the spot. - It then received food for only the movements closer to the spot. - Thereafter, food was given for when the pigeon thrust its head toward the spot. - Then, it was reinforced only when its beak touched the spot. - The pigeon was conditioned in less than three minutes (Schultz & Schultz, 2009). Noted analyst Erich Fromm unwittingly participated in one of Skinner's shaping experiments. Skinner wrote: Though I did not try to impose an operant analysis on the group, I once demonstrated its effectiveness. A guest for the day, Erich Fromm, proved to have something to say about almost everything, but with little enlightenment. When he began to argue that people were not pigeons, I decided that something had to be done. On a scrap of paper I wrote 'Watch Fromm's left hand. I am going to shape a chopping motion' and passed it down the table to Halleck. Fromm was sitting directly across the table and speaking mainly to me. I turned my chair slightly so that I could see him out of the corner of my eye. He gesticulated a great deal as he talked, and whenever his hand came up, I looked straight at him. If he brought the hand down, I nodded and smiled. Within five minutes he was chopping the air so vigorously that his wristwatch kept slipping out over his hand. William Lederer had seen my note, and he whispered to Halleck. The note came back with an addendum: 'Let's see you extinguish it.' I stopped looking directly across the table, but the chopping went on for a long time. It was an unfair trick, but Fromm had angered me - first with his unsupported generalizations about human behavior and then with the implication that nothing better could be done if people were to be regarded as pigeons'. (Skinner, 1983, pp. 150-151) Skinner explained how the environment could shape superstitious behaviour in animals and humans. He placed a hungry pigeon in a box and fed it a food pellet every 15 seconds on a fixed interval schedule. A single reinforcement would ensure that the pigeon would repeat the specific behaviour emitted when the food pellet arrived, and would again be reinforced, since the pigeon would show more of the initially reinforced behaviour. While the connection between the behaviour and the reinforcer is unintentional, specific meaning is attached to the reinforced behaviour. Once the behaviour is established, it may persist indefinitely with only occasional reinforcement. ## RESEARCH ISSUE: Behaviourism and superstitious beliefs See this website for a video about behaviourism and superstitious beliefs: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6zS7v9nSpo ## RESEARCH ISSUE: Skinner's work with pigeons See these websites for videos about Skinner's work with pigeons: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKSvu3mj-14 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=erhmsIcHvaw ## In your own experience Do you exhibit superstitious behaviours that Skinner's experiment explains? ## View of the theorist Skinner was born in Susquehanna, Pennsylvania. He watched his 16-year-old brother die of massive cerebral haemorrhage, but was seemingly unaffected by it. He thought of himself as an emotional person, but one who was able to accept what happens. Skinner majored in English literature and, after encouragement by Robert Frost, spent a year trying to be a writer. During this time he also read Pavlov, Watson and Bertrand Russell. This led to his enrolment in Harvard's psychology programme. E.G. Boring, the director of Harvard's psychological laboratory, believed that Skinner's reflexism would end like Gestalt psychology - all semantics with no substance. Boring, who had studied under structuralist psychologist E.B. Titchener, removed himself from Skinner's dissertation committee rather than block the dissertation's approval. Skinner completed his doctorate in three years and returned to Harvard in 1947. He wrote Walden Two (Skinner, 1948), a bestseller, in an attempt to apply behavioural science to the social world. He then wrote Beyond Freedom and Dignity (Skinner, 1971); its premise was that scientific shaping of cultural practices which de-emphasises individual autonomy will create a better future for humanity. ## The American Psychological Association (APA) bestowed a Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award on Skinner, citing Skinner as: An imaginative and creative scientist, characterized by great objectivity in scientific matters and by warmth and enthusiasm in personal contacts. Choosing simple operant behavior as subject matter, he has challenged alternative analyses of behavior, insisting that descriptions take precedence over hypotheses.