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The basic principles of classical conditioning theory
The basic principles of classical conditioning theory
The basic principles of classical conditioning theory
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Classical conditioning developed from the findings of Ivan Pavlov laying the foundations for behaviourism which was the dominant approach in psychology from the late 1800s to the early 1900s. Behaviourism studied the nature of relationships between the environment and the fact of observable behaviour. This essay will describe the important features of classical conditioning, consider their use in explaining pathological behaviour and will be answered using a variety of empirical evidence from academic texts, journal papers focussing on the following topics: the findings of Ivan Pavlov and the conditional reflex, the components of classical conditioning, acquisition, extinction, spontaneous recovery and stimulus generalisation, the work of Watson and Rayner with little Albert and conditioned fear response and finally, how phobias and addictions can be explained by classical conditioning.
The work of J.B Watson and other behaviourists argued psychology should be indicative of predicting and controlling overt behaviour using the conditional reflex. (J. B. Watson, 1994) In 1938 Watson published his paper outlining the behaviourist’s interpretation, discussing this as a new psychological, scientific and objective experimental approach in examining observable behaviour. (J. B. Watson, 1994) Classical conditioning as discussed by (Clark, 2004) was realised through the work of Nobel Prize winner Ivan Pavlov for his findings in the areas of physiology and digestion. Nevertheless, in his acceptance speech he only referred to the phenomenon of conditional reflexes. Pavlov used dogs in his experiments where the amount of saliva secreted was measured when the dog was presented with meat powder. The paradigm as defined by (Colman, 2009) is one...
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In the following essay I will be looking into the study conducted by Watson and Rayner (1920) on a small child known as ‘Little Albert’. The experiment was an adaptation of earlier studies on classical conditioning of stimulus response, one most common by Ivan Pavlov, depicting the conditioning of stimulus response in dogs. Watson and Rayner aimed to teach Albert to become fearful of a placid white rat, via the use of stimulus associations, testing Pavlov’s earlier theory of classical conditioning.
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Classical conditioning refers to a type of learning in which a previously neutral stimuli took on the ability to stimulate a conditioned response in an individual (Gormezano & Moore, 1966). To prove that environment was more impactful than genetics, Watson conducted an experiment on an infant, little Albert. Initially, Albert showed little fear towards rats. When Watson repeatedly exposed Albert to the rat accompanied by a loud noise, the latter began to develop fear towards not just the rat but also other furry animals. Watson successfully showed that the acquisition of a phobia can be explained by classical conditioning (Watson & Watson, 1921). Regardless of their genes, the associations of the right stimuli can result in the development of a new behaviour in any individual.
The phobia I possess is Glossophobia, this type of phobia is defined as a fear of public speaking. Interpreted as Classical Conditioning. My first encounter with glossophobia started in grade school where I participated in a Spelling Bee. I did not know that I would be standing before a crowd of my peers using a strange contraption called a microphone. I have always been shy, but this took my shyness to a whole new level. It caused me to freeze, misspell a word I knew how to spell. My second encounter is when I had to recite a poem in my high school English class. That time it was worse, I got flushed, I was stuttering, and ended up just not finishing the poem that should have only, taken a couple of minutes. The teacher saw I was struggling and I was getting laughed at by my fellow students. After embarrassing myself for 15 minutes, he decided to help me through the poem. That 15 minutes seemed like an eternity to me. Since my high school days, I have gotten better at speaking in public, but I still find I get nervous, and my blood pressure elevates, but I can coach myself through my material mentally and present my project to an audience with a little more ease. This is a classical case of Classical Conditioning.
Ivan Pavlov developed a theory called classical conditioning which proposes that learning process occurs through associations between an environmental stimulus and a naturally occurring stimulus. Classical conditioning involves placing a neutral signal before a naturally occurring reflex like associating the food with the bell in Pavlov experiment. In classical conditioning, behavior is learnt by association where a stimulus that was originally neutral can become a trigger for substance use or cravings due to repeated associations between those stimuli and substance use (Pavlov, 1927).
I. Introduction of classical conditioning Classical conditioning also called as Pavlovian conditioning or respondent conditioning. It is a kind of learning a new behavior through association that when a conditioned stimulus (CS) is paired with an unconditioned stimulus (US) and evokes a conditioned response (CR). It also is a learning process that occurs through associations between an environmental stimulus and a naturally occurring stimulus (Cherry, 2014). Classical conditioning has much strength such as can help to explain all aspects of human behavior and many of advertisers will use classical conditioning to advertise their produces, however it also have some weaknesses such as all classical conditioning responses must involve a reflex and classical conditioning is a completely physical process, learning is not important as reflected in scenario. This paper will talk about the strengths and the weaknesses of classical conditioning theory followed by a brief description of the scenario and the strengths and weaknesses of applying classical conditioning on it.
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