Theories of Personality 5.pdf

Experimental Analysis of Behaviour How do behavior and learning theories study personality experimentally? John Dollard, Neal Miller, and B.F. Skinner are behavior and learning theorists who emphasize experience and learning as the primary forces that shape human behavior. Dollard and M...

Experimental Analysis of Behaviour How do behavior and learning theories study personality experimentally? John Dollard, Neal Miller, and B.F. Skinner are behavior and learning theorists who emphasize experience and learning as the primary forces that shape human behavior. Dollard and Miller's orientation has been called psychoanalytic learning theory because it is a creative attempt to bring together the basic concepts of Freudian psychoanalytic theory with the ideas, language, methods, and results of experimental laboratory research on learning behavior. Neal Elgar Miller (born August 3, 1909, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, U.S.— died March 23, 2002, Hamden, Connecticut) was an American psychologist, who, with John Dollard, developed a theory of motivation based on the satisfaction of psychosocial drives by combining elements of a number of earlier reinforcement theories of behavior and learning. John Dollard (29 August 1900 - 8 October 1980) was an American psychologist and social scientist known for his studies on race relations in America and the frustration-aggression hypothesis he proposed with Neal E. Miller and other psychologists. Habits, Drives, and Learning Process Dollard and Miller emphasize the role of learning in personality and place less stress on personality structure. They suggest that the structure of personality can be defined very simply as habits. The primary dynamic underlying personality development and the acquisition of the habits is drive reduction. A drive is a strong stimulation that produces discomfort, such as hunger. Primary Drives- are those associated with physiological processes that are necessary for an organism's survival, such as the drives of hunger, thirst, and the need for sleep. Secondary Drives- are learned on the basis of primary ones. (e.g., being motivated to eat at one's usual dinner hour or wanting money to buy food).  Experimental Analysis of Behaviour Dollard and Miller also distinguish between primary and secondary reinforcers. Reinforcer - is any event that increases the likelihood of a particular response. Primary Reinforcers - are those that reduce primary drives.(e.g., food, water, or need for sleep). Secondary Reinforcers - are originally neutral, but they acquire reward value when they are associated with primary reinforcers. (e.g., money to buy food). Four main conceptual parts of Learning Process DRIVE CUE RESPONSE REINFORCEMENT Drive - a stimulus impelling a person to act, but in no way does the drive direct or specify behavior. It simply impels. Cue - a specific stimulus that tells the organism when, where, and how to respond. Response - is one's reaction to a cue. Reinforcement - refers to the effect of the response. Effective reinforcement consists of drive reduction. If a response is not reinforced by satisfying a drive, it will undergo extinction. Dollard and Miller have conducted extensive studies on different aspects of the learning process. A number of these studies have been in the area of responses to frustration and conflict. Frustration - occurs when one is unable to reduce drive because the response that would satisfy it has been blocked. Conflict - occurs when frustration arises from a situation in which incompatible responses are occurring at the same time. 4 TYPES OF CONFLICT 1. Approach- Approach Conflict - the individual is simultaneously attracted to two goals that have positive value but are incompatible. 2. Avoidance - Avoidance Conflict - a person faces two undesirable alternatives. 3. Approach - Avoidance Conflict - one goal both attracts and repels the individual. 4. Double Approach - Avoidance Conflict - which an individual must deal simultaneously with multiple goals that both attract and repel.  Experimental Analysis of Behaviour B.F. Skinner (born March 20, 1904, Susquehanna, Pennsylvania, U.S.— died August 18, 1990, Cambridge, Massachusetts was an American psychologist and an influential exponent of behaviorism, which views human behavior in terms of responses to environmental stimuli and favors the controlled, scientific study of responses as the most direct means of elucidating human nature. B.F. Skinner emphasized overt behavior- which refers to observable and measurable actions—because he believed that psychology should focus on what can be empirically studied. Skinner argued that behaviors like speaking, walking, or writing could be objectively measured and analyzed, making them suitable subjects for scientific inquiry. In contrast, he viewed internal processes like thoughts and emotions as less reliable for study because they are subjective and not directly observable. Operant conditioning is a learning process where behaviors are shaped and maintained by their consequences. It involves reinforcement and punishment to either increase or decrease a behavior. Positive reinforcement- introduced to increase a behavior Negative reinforcement- introduced to decrease a behavior Punishment in operant conditioning decreases the likelihood of a behavior being repeated. It involves applying an unpleasant consequence or removing something desirable following a behavior. Unlike reinforcement, punishment aims to reduce or stop undesirable behaviors by associating them with negative outcomes. PSYCHOTHERAPY Behavior modification - seeks to eliminate undesired behaviors by changing the environment within which they occur. Skinner's approach to behavior modification has been notably successful in areas in which traditional insight therapy has failed or is inappropriate. One of its more spectacular successes has been with mute individuals, who for obvious reasons are not amenable to traditional therapies, which are largely based on talking.