Behavioral and Cognitive
Learning
By San Juanita Alanis
Introduction:
Behaviorism and cognitivism are two different
ways that people learn. Behaviorist believe
that learning takes place when a change in
behavior is the result of an experiment.
Cognitivists believe that learning takes place
when a change in mental representations and
associations resulting from experience. This
is why it is so important for an instructional
designer to understand the different types of
learning in order to meet the student’s needs.
Cognitive Learning
Benjamin Bloom
• Benjamin Bloom was born on February 21,
1913 in Lansford Pennsylvania.
• Died on September 13,1999
EDUCATION:
• Benjamin Bloom received a Bachelor’s and
a Master’s Degree from Pennsylvania State
University in 1935.
• And a Ph. D in Education from the University
of Chicago in March 1942.
• He then became an instructor in the
Department of Education at the University of
Chicago in 1944.
What did he Accomplish?
• He was appointed Charles H. Swift Distinguished Service
Professor of Education at the University of Chicago at Hyde
Park.
• At this university he founded and chaired the program in
Measurement, Evaluation and Statistical Analysis (MESA).
• Founding member of IEA (1958).
• Initiator of the IEA Pilot Study (1960) and First International
Mathematics Study (1964).
• Consultant on evaluation and curriculum to
nations throughout the world.
• Past President of the American Educational Research
Association (AERA). Member of the United States National
Academy of Education.
• Author and co-author of 17 major books.
The three types of learning are:
• Cognitive: mental
skills (Knowledge)
• Affective: growth in
feelings or emotional
areas (Attitude)
• Psychomotor:
manual or physical
skills (Skills)
His major theory was that you can not understand a concept if you
do not first remember it, similarly you can not apply knowledge and
concepts if you do not understand them.
•
In 1950 he developed the
chart on cognitive objectives.
The six levels of learning are:
1. Knowledge: the ability to
recall or recognize
information, ideas, and
principles in the approximate
form in which they were
learned.
2. Comprehension: the
translation, comprehension,
or interpretation of
information based on prior
learning.
3. Application: the selection,
transfer, and use of data and
principles to complete a
problem or task with a
minimum of direction.
Continue the Six levels of Learning
4. Analysis: distinguishing,
classifying, and relating the
assumptions, hypothesis,
evidence, or structure of a
statement or question.
5. Synthesis: the origination,
integration, and combination of
ideas into a product, plan, or
proposal that is new to the
individual.
6. Evaluation: an appraisal,
assessment, or critique
developed on the basis or
specific standards and/or criteria
(Huitt, 2004).
In the 1990's, a former student of Bloom, Lorin Anderson, revised Bloom's Taxonomy and
published this- Bloom's Revised Taxonomy in 2001. The key to this is the use of verbs rather than
nouns for each of the categories and a rearrangement of the sequence within the taxonomy. They
are arranged below in increasing order, from low to high.
•
•
•
•
•
•
Here is Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy.
Remembering - Recognising, listing,
describing, identifying, retrieving, naming,
locating, finding
Understanding - Interpreting,
Summarizing, inferring, paraphrasing,
classifying, comparing, explaining,
exemplifying
Applying - Implementing, carrying out,
using, executing
Analyzing - Comparing, organizing,
deconstructing, Attributing, outlining,
finding, structuring, integrating
Evaluating - Checking, hypothesizing,
critiquing, Experimenting, judging, testing,
Detecting, Monitoring
Creating - designing, constructing,
planning, producing, inventing, devising,
making
The vital elements of mastery learning
are:
1.
Clearly specifying what is to
be learned and how it will be
evaluated;
2.
Allowing students to learn at
their own pace;
3.
Assessing student progress
and also providing
appropriate feedback or
remediation;
4.
Testing that final learning
criterions have been
achieved.
Behaviorist
Ivan Pavlov
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
According to Mindy Lautenheiser “Ivan Petrovich
Pavlov was born on September 14, 1849, at Ryazan,
Russia.
Pavlov died in Leningrad on February 27, 1936.
EDUCATION
1870: Leaving his religious career, Pavlov enrolled to
take a natural science course at the University of St.
Petersburg.
1875: Graduated from the University of St. Petersburg
and took an assistantship from Cyon in his laboratory
at the Military-Medical Academy; received the degree
of Candidate of Natural Sciences
Summer of 1877 : He spent time in Physiological
Laboratory of Professor R. Heidenhain at Breslau
1879: Graduated from the Military-Medical Academy
1879: Completed third course of study at the
Academy of Medical Surgery; awarded his first gold
medal.
Major Theories
Pavlov began experiments with dogs that proved their
reflexes could be conditioned by external stimuli. He
would condition the dogs by the ringing of a bell at
feeding time. These dogs would salivate upon hearing
the bell, whether or not food was present. This is what
he called Classical Conditioning.
Important Terms
• Unconditioned stimulus (UCS) - stimulus that
causes a natural response.
• Unconditioned response (UCR) - natural
inbuilt reflex to a stimulus.
• Conditioned stimulus (CS) - a stimulus that
causes a natural learned response due to
association with a previous inbuilt response.
• Conditioned response (CR) - a natural learned
reflex to a stimulus due to association with
another inbuilt response.
Classical Conditioning
•
Pavlov conducted, perhaps, the most
famous of all psychological experiments
(1927) when he showed that by pairing a
conditioned stimulus (a bell) with an
unconditioned stimulus (food), a dog
would begin to salivate (response) when
the bell was rung without presenting the
food
Conclusion
People learn in different ways. As we
have seen by the two different theorists
that I chose it is very important for an
instructional designer to understand the
different types of learning in order for
effective learning to take place.
References
ATHERTON J S (2009) Learning and Teaching; Bloom's taxonomy [On-line] UK:
Available: http://www.learningandteaching.info/learning/bloomtax.htm Accessed:
4 October 2009.
Bloom Benjamin. Benjamin Bloom and the Taxonomy of Learning. 2002-2009.
http://oaks.nvg.org/taxonomy-bloom.html Accessed 4 October 2009.
Pavlov Ivan. Nobel Lectures. Physiology or Medicine 1901-1921. Elsevier
Publishing Company. Amsterdam. 1967.
http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1904/pavlov-bio.html
Accessed 4 October 2009.