Social Learning Theory

Paper 1

Two psychological theories used for explaining behavior are behaviorism and social learning theory. Although the two both deal with behavior, they focus on slightly unalike components in their efforts to explain why people act the way they do. Behaviorism and social learning theory have convincing sources of support so there is no well-defined response to which one does a superior job at explaining behavior.

Behaviorists believe that development is not tied to biologically determined stages. Development results from organization of existing behaviors. There are two categories of learning: classical conditioning and operant conditioning. Classical conditioning focuses on associations linked to involuntary behaviors. Pavlov is the father of modern learning theory. Through his experiment he discovered that an unconditioned stimulus could automatically trigger an involuntary response. For example, a dog was placed in a dark room and a light was turned on. After 30 seconds some food was placed in the dog’s mouth, stimulating the salivation reflex. This procedure was repeated several times- each time the presentation of food was paired with the light. After a while the light, which initially has no relationship to salivation, produced the response itself. The dog has been conditioned to respond to the light. In Pavlov’s terms, the presentation of food was the unconditioned stimulus. The light was a conditioned stimulus; its effect required conditioning. Salivation to the food was called the unconditioned reflex, salivation to the light a conditioned reflex.

John Watson was the founder of behaviorism in the Unites States. He extended classical conditioning by accounting for a greater variety of learning. Watson formulated two ...

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...avior, some behaviorists believe physical discipline is an operant technique that gains immediate compliance. However, there are other behaviorists who believe that physical discipline does not teach on how to behave. They believe it is better to reward behaviors that are incompatible with the undesired behaviors. Extinction can be a better alternative in some cases. From a social learning theorist perspective, physical discipline is a model of aggressive behavior that the child would observe, learn and use. It could cause long term behavioral problems such as the child might use aggression to resolve conflict in their current or future relationships. It is better to explain to the child what she can do and why so the child internalizes rules.

Behaviorists believe in using direct reinforcement. However, social learning theorists believe in vicarious reinforcement.