College of Education

School of Continuing and Distance Education 2014/2015 – 2016/2017

Lecturer: Dr. Kingsley Nyarko, Department of Psychology Contact Information: knyarko@ug.edu.gh

Session Overview

At the end of the session, the student will be able to

• Explain the behavioral learning principles.

• Use the principles to produce desirable learning outcomes in students.

• Choose the most appropriate principle in given situations to promote behavioral change among children.

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Session Outline

• Principles of Learning

• Relationship between Classical and Operant Conditioning

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Reading List

• Educational Psychology: Theory and Practice (10th Ed.) (Slavin, R. E. (2012). Pages 171-184.

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PRINCIPLES OF BEHAVIORAL LEARNING

Topic One

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

• The Role of Consequences—Pleasurable consequences strengthen behavior; unpleasant consequences weaken it. In other words, pleasurable consequences increase the frequency with which an individual engages in a behavior, whereas unpleasant consequences reduce the frequency of a behavior.

• Reinforcement—The process in which a behavior is strengthened, and thus, more likely to happen again. Reinforcement could be positive or negative.

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

• Positive Reinforcement—Making a behavior stronger by following the behavior with a pleasant stimulus. For example, a rat presses a lever and receives food.

• Negative Reinforcement—Making a behavior stronger by taking away a negative stimulus. For example, preventing a child from doing the dishes in order to do their home work.

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

• Primary and Secondary Reinforcers—Reinforcers fall into two broad categories: primary and secondary. Primary reinforcers satisfy basic human needs. Some examples are food, water, security, warmth, and sex.

• Secondary reinforcers are reinforcers that acquire their value by being associated with primary reinforcers or other well-established secondary reinforcers. For example, money has no value to a young child until the child learns that money can be used to buy things that are themselves primary or secondary reinforcers.

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

• Grades have little value to students unless their parents notice and value good grades, and parents’ praise is of value because it is associated with love, warmth, security, and other reinforcers.

• Money and grades are examples of secondary reinforcers because they have no value in themselves but have been associated with primary reinforcers or with other well-established secondary reinforcers.

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

• There are three basic categories of secondary reinforcers. One is social reinforcers, such as praise, smiles, hugs, or attention. Other types of secondary reinforcers are activity reinforcers (such as access to toys, games, or fun activities and token (or symbolic) reinforcers (such as money, grades, stars, or points that individuals can exchange for other reinforcers).

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

• Extrinsic Reinforcers-- praise or rewards given to motivate people to engage in a behavior or activity that they might not engage in without it.

• Intrinsic Reinforcers– are the inherent desire, interest, value or meaning that individuals derive from engaging in a particular activity or behavior. People like to draw, read, sing, play games, hike, or swim for no reason other than fun of doing it.

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

• Punishment—The process in which a behavior is weakened, and thus, less likely to happen again. There are two types of punishment: positive and negative.

• Negative Punishment—Reducing a behavior by removing a pleasant stimulus when the behavior occurs. For example, denying a child the opportunity to go for break to play with their peers.

• Positive Punishment—Reducing a behavior by presenting an unpleasant stimulus when the behavior occurs. For example, canning a child for talking in class.

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

Guidelines for Using Positive Punishment

• Punishment should specify what behaviour is being punished. The child should know what he is being punished for, and all threats of punishment must be removed as soon as the child stops the behaviour.

• It should be delivered immediately after the undesired behaviour has been exhibited. A delay in the administration of the punishment will prevent the child from making an association between the undesired behaviour and the punishment.

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

• Teachers and parents should use the least painful punishment possible to avoid negative reactions to the pain by the recipient. Negative punishment should be preferred to positive punishment. The child could be asked to remain in class during break time, than caning them.

• Punishment should not be mixed with reward in our attempts at correcting misbehaviors exhibited by children. It will be counterproductive when a child punished for a deviant behavior starts crying and is kissed or hugged by adults.

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

• Reinforce acceptable behaviours to replace unacceptable ones that are being eliminated. A child punished for misbehaving in class, after exhibiting the desired behaviour, for example sitting quietly in class should be extrinsically rewarded by praising them.

• Whilst punishment has begun, don’t quit. That is don’t reinforce begging, pleadings, crying or other unacceptable behaviours by letting the child go unpunished.

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

• The Premack Principle—One important principle of behavior is that we can promote less-desired (low-strength) activities by linking them to more-desired activities.

• In other words, access to something desirable is made contingent on doing something less desirable. For example, telling a child to read before being allowed to watch their favourite cartoon.

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

• Shaping—It is a technique of reinforcement used to teach new behaviors. At the beginning, people/animals are reinforced for easy tasks, and then increasingly need to perform more difficult tasks in order to receive reinforcement.

• For example, originally the rat is given a food pellet for one lever press, but we gradually increase the number of times it needs to press to receive food, the rat will increase the number of presses.

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

• Extinction—The elimination of the behavior by stopping reinforcement of the behavior. For example, a rat that received food when pressing a bar, receives food no longer, will gradually decrease the amount of lever presses.

• Generalization—In generalization, a behavior may be

performed in more than one situation. For example, the rat who receives food by pressing one lever may press a second lever in the cage in hopes that it will receive food.

• Discrimination—Learning that a behavior will be rewarded in one situation, but not another. For example, the rat does not receive food from the second lever and realizes that by pressing the first lever only, it will receive food.

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

• Schedules of Reinforcement—A schedule of reinforcement is basically a rule stating which instances of a behavior will be reinforced. In some cases, a behavior might be reinforced every time it occurs. Sometimes, a behavior might not be reinforced at all.

• In real-world settings, behaviors are probably not going to be reinforced each and every time they occur. For situations where you are purposely trying to train and reinforce an action, such as in the classroom, in sports or in animal training, you might opt to follow a specific reinforcement schedule.

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

• Continuous Reinforcement—In continuous reinforcement, the desired behavior is reinforced every single time it occurs. Generally, this schedule is best used during the initial stages of learning in order to create a strong association between the behavior and the response. Once the response is firmly attached, reinforcement is usually switched to a partial reinforcement schedule.

• Partial Reinforcement—In partial reinforcement, the response is reinforced only part of the time. Learned behaviors are acquired more slowly with partial reinforcement, but the response is more resistant to extinction. There are four schedules of partial reinforcement

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

• Fixed-ratio schedules-- Are those where a response is reinforced only after a specified number of responses. This schedule produces a high, steady rate of responding with only a brief pause after the delivery of the reinforcer.

• Variable-ratio schedules—Occur when a response is reinforced after an unpredictable number of responses. This schedule creates a high steady rate of responding. Gambling and lottery games are good examples of a reward based on a variable ratio schedule.

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Principles of Behavioral Learning

• Fixed-interval schedules—Are those where the first response is rewarded only after a specified amount of time has elapsed. This schedule causes high amounts of responding near the end of the interval, but much slower responding immediately after the delivery of the reinforcer. Example, learning only when an exam draws close.

• Variable-interval schedules—Occur when a response is rewarded after an unpredictable amount of time has passed. This schedule produces a slow, steady rate of response. Example, conducting unannounced quizzes; or making spot checks of students’ doing assignment in class.

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Sample Questions

1. Examine any five principles of behavioral learning theories.

2. How is schedules of reinforcement important in teaching and learning?

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RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CLASSICAL AND OPERANT CONDITIONING

Topic Two

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Relationship between Classical and Operant Conditioning

• One of the simplest ways to remember the differences between classical and operant conditioning is to focus on whether the behavior is involuntary or voluntary.

• Classical conditioning involves making an association between an involuntary response and a stimulus, while operant conditioning is about making an association between a voluntary behavior and a consequence.

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Relationship between Classical and Operant Conditioning

• In operant conditioning, the learner is also rewarded with incentives, while classical conditioning involves no such enticements.

• Also remember that classical conditioning is passive on the part of the learner, while operant conditioning requires the learner to actively participate and perform some type of action in order to be rewarded or punished.

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Relationship between Classical and Operant Conditioning

• Today, both classical and operant conditioning are utilized for a variety of purposes by teachers, parents, psychologists, animal trainers and many others.

• In animal training, a trainer might utilize classical conditioning by repeatedly pairing the sound of a clicker with the taste of food. Eventually, the sound of the clicker alone will begin to produce the same response that the taste of food would.

• In a classroom setting, a teacher might utilize operant

conditioning by offering tokens as rewards for good behavior. Students can then turn in these tokens to receive some type of reward such as treat or extra play time.

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Topic Three

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DOING RESEARCH Topic Four

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Doing Research

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References

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