Neo behaviorism in psychology

The United States from 1914 to 1945.
Introduction

Neobehaviorism ― the modification of Watson’s Behaviorism that allowed for the experimental analysis of operationally defined unobservable variables related to cognitive states and emphasized the study of learning along with the use of animal models for human behavior.
Three Neobehaviorists

Tolman, Hull and Skinner.
Neobehaviorism

Purposive Behaviorism ― Tolman’s version of Neobehaviorism that emphasized goal directed activity in animals and humans while only relying on objective behavioral data.
Neobehaviorism

Edward Chase Tolman (1886–1959)
Tolman popularized the use of the white rat in psychology.
Expectancy ― an internal state in which an organism anticipates an event based upon prior learning trials.
Neobehaviorism

Edward Chase Tolman (1886–1959)
Cognitive maps.
Latent learning.
The distinction between learning and performance.
Figure 14.1

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Figure 14.3

Neobehaviorism

Edward Chase Tolman (1886–1959)
Intervening variable ― unobservable variables such as internal states or cognitions assumed to influence behavior.
Operationism ― the idea that science is best understood as a public, operationally defined enterprise in which phenomena may only be analyzed via methods that yield concrete results.
Neobehaviorism

Clark Hull (1884–1952)
Hypothetico-deductive system ― a system using logic derived from a small, restricted set of given truths used to deduce new, derived, and logically consistent statements. After, those deductions are tested experimentally. Statements experimentally confirmed are kept and the others are discarded.
Neobehaviorism

Hull’s System
In its final “revision of the system a total of eighteen postulates and twelve corollaries was produced.
Three types of variables:
Stimulus, organismic or intervening, and response.
Hull’s equation.
Hull was an S-R theorist.
Figure 14.4

Neobehaviorism

B. F. Skinner (1904–1990)
Radical Behaviorism
Mentalism ― explaining behavior by recourse to variables such as cognitions, memories, or motivations.
Radical Behaviorism explains learned behavior through selection by consequences.
SD → R → SR
Neobehaviorism

B. F. Skinner (1904–1990)
Radical Behaviorism
Applied behavior analysis ― the design, application, and assessment of environmental modifications that lead to improvements in human behavior in the real world using principles derived from Radical Behaviorism.
Neobehaviorism

B. F. Skinner (1904–1990)
Understanding Skinner
Five common misperceptions or myths:
1 the role of physiology and genetics in behavior.
2 the extent to which all behavior can be conditioned.
3 the uniqueness of the individual.
4 the use of punishment in controlling behavior.
5 the existence of internal states.
Neobehaviorism

B. F. Skinner (1904–1990)
Understanding Skinner
Baseline ― the environmental situation or context that exists before a treatment or intervention is applied.
Intervention ― a specific alteration to the baseline condition designed to change the response rate initially observed.
Neobehaviorism

B. F. Skinner (1904–1990)
Long-term Successes of Radical Behaviorism.
Four basic schedules of intermittent reinforcement.
Shaping ― the reinforcement of successive approximations of a final, desired response.
Skinner’s utopian visions appear most prominently in his books Walden Two (1948) and Beyond Freedom and Dignity (1971).
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Neobehaviorism

Radical Behaviorism Today
The Trend Toward Cognitivism

With the exception of radical behaviorism, most of contemporary psychology has been dominated by a new cognitive paradigm, one derived from the sources outside of neobehaviorism.