Chapter 11

Neo-Behaviorism

Modified: 2022-01-07 (2:09 am)


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Neo-Behaviorism: the modification of Watson's Behaviorism that allwowed for the experimental analysis of operationally defined variables related to cognitive states and emphasized the study of learning along with the use of animal models for human behavior.


ZEITGEIST

Learning Objective: Discuss how World War I led to major social changes in the United States during and after the war.

PREVIEW

A slow-moving neobehaviorist movement gradually emerged from Watson’s ideas (see chapter 9). Neobehaviorism promoted the use of animal models for studying learning and freely extrapolated results from rats, monkeys, and pigeons to humans. Tolman’s Purposive Behaviorism posited expectancies and cognitive maps in humans and rats. He and Hull used mazes extensively to investigate learning. Although their methods were similar, the ends each sought were different. Tolman’s S-S approach saw animals as goal directed. Hull did not. He saw his animals as automatically responded to the variables that controlled learning in a straight S-R fashion. Their theories differed too. Hull looked for a hypothethico-deductive approach that would ultimately yield a universal theory of learning. Tolman’s theory was never fully developed. Mostly, he concentrated on disproving Hullian theory without offering a palatable cognitive alternative.

Behaviorism evolved into two types of Neobehaviorism: mediational and radical. Mediational versions such as Tolman’s and Hull’s permitted the existence of unobservable or intervening variables as long as they could be operationally defined, a borrowing from modern physics. Radical Behaviorism dispensed with any type of unobservable variables, labeling them as mentalistic, and instead adopted a selectionist methodology where the survival of a particular behavior depended on the consequences that followed it. Reinforcers selected for survival of behaviors while punishers selected for their extinction.

Skinner’s Radical Behaviorism itself survives to the present, but mostly as a small, self-isolated subfield. Its proponents often label themselves as behavior analysts or applied behavior analysts. Nevertheless, its accomplishments have been many starting with the operant chamber (Skinner Box) and the cumulative recorder. Applied behavior analysis moved Radical Behaviorism out of the laboratory and into homes, classroom, businesses, and hospitals. Its discoveries of schedules of reinforcement, the partial reinforcement extinction effect, and shaping are covered in all introductory psychology texts. Less influential have been Skinner’s contributions to the study of language acquisition and his utopian desire to transform the world for the better using Radical Behaviorism.

INTRODUCTION

THREE NEOBEHAVIORISTS

Rats in Psychology

Lockard (1968, p. 734) noted that “the albino rat ... occupied the laboratory as the result of a chance chain of circumstances.” Watson was one of the first beneficiaries having received his rats from a colony established earlier at Chicago. Tolman, Hull, and Skinner all used albino rats in their research. Tolman even went so far as to dedicate his book, Purposive Behavior in Animals and Men (1932) to the “white rat.” Around midcentury, comparative psychologist Frank Beach documented just how pervasive the use of the albino white rat or Rattus norvegicus had become. He wrote (Beach, 1950, p. 119):

one cannot escape the conclusion that psychologists ... have tended to concentrate upon one animal species and one type of behavior in that species. Perhaps it would be appropriate to change the title of our journal to read “The Journal of Rat Learning.”

The behavior in question was learning and his analysis of journal articles demonstrated that studies of conditioning and learning had exceeded all other topics in every year but one during the period spanning from 1927 to 1948. What has happened since then?

The short answer is that both the number of animal species studied has increased and that the topics studied are wider too. In addition, the studies using white rats have declined precipitously. Shettleworth (2009, p. 215) wrote, “the classic criticisms of Beach and others regarding undue focus on a small number of species do not apply to contemporary research on comparative cognition ... the range of problems being studied is also much broader than in the past.” Psychology has moved away from its once dominant animal model and today continues to study human behavior and a much broader range of animals, both for their own sake as well as to shed light on human behavior.

expectancy: an internal state in which an organism anticipates an event based upon prior learning trials.

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

Intervening Variables: 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. (Modern Physics and Operationism)

Learning Objective: Explain the logic behind Tolman’s use of intervening variables.

Latent Learning and Cognitive Maps

Jensen (2006) noted that nearly all of the general psychology textbooks he surveyed gave incomplete and misleading accounts of the current status of latent learning and cognitive maps. The history of latent learning shows that “There was no resolution at all ... The debate ended because it became clear to psychological researchers and theorists that given the hypothetical nature of the variables involved in latent learning, no empirical solution was likely” (p. 195). He argued that most current textbooks do not tell students that the issue of latent learning was essentially abandoned. Instead, those texts uncritically point to Tolman’s cognitive map as the only solution left standing. Later he notes that “although the cognitive map metaphor might retain its appeal, a close examination of the metaphor as a scientific explanation for human and animal navigation through spatial environments exposes substantial weaknesses” (p. 204). He argued that other historical and contemporary explanations for latent learning do exist; they are just no longer covered in introductory psychology texts. Ultimately, Jensen is concerned with the pervasive effect of such historical misinformation upon new psychology students, especially those who eventually major in the discipline.

 

Hypothetico-Deductive system: a system using logic derived from a small 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.

Learning Objective: Demonstrate what happens in Hull’s equation when H, D, V, or K have a zero value.

Token Economies in the Classroom

Token economies, a type of applied behavior analysis, have been created for a wide variety of natural situations. All varieties are similar in that they use tokens (e.g., arbitrary items such as poker chips or stickers) as conditioned reinforcers. The tokens may be cashed in for primary reinforcers such as food according to published schedules.

A classroom token economy is a form of contingency management where students may earn tokens for following explicit, behaviorally based classroom rules. Little and Akin-Little (2008) revealed that 73% of teachers surveyed had created their own set of classroom rules. Maggin et al. (2011) reviewed 24 studies of classroom token economies and concluded (p. 22),  “students generally respond to these types of interventions” but that “practitioners need to be aware that the use of token economies in schools and classrooms likely requires careful oversight and systematic protocols for delivering generalized conditioned and secondary reinforcement” They also called for more rigorous research that better reported student characteristics and contexts in which token economies are designed and delivered. Despite the fact that managing behavioral contingencies in the real world is more difficult than doing so in the laboratory, many teachers do so successfully every day.

 

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.

Mentalism: explaining behavior by recourse to variables such as cognitions, memories, or motivations.

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.


Learning Objective 2: Assess the scientific and practical contributions made by radical behaviorism.
Learning Objective 3: Describe the types of behaviorism that existed in the past and compare to the types that currently exist.
Learning Objective 4: Explain the logic behind Tolman’s use of intervening variables.
Learning Objective 5: Demonstrate what happens in Hull’s equation when H, D, V, or K have a zero value.
Learning Objective 6: Judge why so many students and faculty misunderstand Skinner’s position and fall victim to the five myths.

 

Glossary

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.

Methodological Behaviorism the most prevalent form in contemporary psychology, it requires the elucidation of observable stimuli and behaviors along with a commitment to formal theory testing.

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

expectancy an internal state in which an organism anticipates an event based upon prior learning trials.

intervening variable unobservable variables such as internal states or cognitions assumed to influence behavior.

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.

mentalism explaining behavior by recourse to variables such as cognitions, memories, or motivations.

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.

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.

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.

shaping the reinforcement of successive approximations of a final, desired response.

 

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