The Behavioural and
Social Cognitive approach
• Behaviourism – what can be directly observed and measured
• The belief that development is observable behaviour that can be
learned through experience with the environment
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Continuity in development
Not in stagelike fashion
Pavlov’s classical conditioning
Skinner’s operant conditioning
Bandura’s social cognitive theory
Ivan Pavlov
• Handout – iceberg
• He began to see that dogs salivate when they taste food. When there are
certain sounds, even before eating they salivate
• Example: ringing the bell to get food, ringing the bell later – even if they
don’t get food they associate that sound with food
• 1920’s John Watson demonstrated Pavlov’s concept of classical
conditioning could be applied to humans
• VIDEO(SEE CLASSICAL CONDITIONING – IVAN PAVLOV)
• You might recognize the guy in the video as Philip Zimbardo (Stanford prison
experiment)
• Classical conditioning is when you have a neutral stimulus (like
ringing the bell) to produce another stimulus (food)
John Watson’s demonstration
• Albert experiment – showed albert a white rat to see if he was
afraid, he was not. A loud noise was sounded and it caused albert
to cry. After only several pairings with the loud noise, Albert
began to fear the rat even when the noise was not sounded
• Albert had been classically conditioned to fear the rat
• The experiment would probably be seen as unethical today
• VIDEO
Classical Conditioning formula
• See if you can apply Pavlov’s formula to little Albert’s experiment
Apply Pavlov’s Classical conditioning formula
• Original Stimulus (loud noise) = Desired response (fear/ crying)
• Original stimulus (loud noise) + Neutral stimulus (rat) = Desired
response (fear/crying)
• Neutral stimulus (rat) = Desired response (fear/crying)
• So what Pavlov and Watson argued is that we are conditioned to
fear and be scared of things at a young age
• We are classically conditioned to fear
• Does the pairing of ethnic groups or gender with specific
behaviours lead to stereotypes
B.F. Skinner
Operant Conditioning
Skinner’s Operant Conditioning
• Classical conditioning may explain how we develop involuntary responses
such as fear, but B.F. Skinner argued that a second time of conditioning
accounts for the development of types of behaviour.
• Operant conditioning – the consequences of a behaviour produce
changes in the probability of the behaviours future occurrence. If a
behaviour is followed by a rewarding stimulus, it is more likely to recur.
But if a behaviour is followed by a punishing stimulus, it is less likely to
occur
• Example: when a person smiles at a child after the child has done
something, child is more likely to engage in that activity than if the
person gives the child a nasty look
Formula
• On your iceberg handout
• Behaviour + rewarding stimulus = reoccurrence
• Behaviour + punishing stimulus = no reoccurrence
• Can you think of your own examples here?
• Skinner thought that rewards and punishments shape individuals’
development
• Example: a shy person learned to be shy because of the
environmental experiences they had while growing up
• Modifications to an environment can help a shy person become
more socially oriented.
• Behavioural changes are brought about by rewards and
punishments, not by thoughts and feelings.
• Bird video
• Big bang video
• Penny knows that she will get chocolate if she does something good. So she
continues to do something good to get that chocolate.
Operant Conditioning - Closure Issue (Big Bang Theory)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZi92OEbaqs
Your turn
• Operant Conditioning Practicum Experiment (Handout)
Albert Bandura
Turn to page 52-53
• Read on your own and take notes
• Behavioural and social cognitive approach – view of psychologists
who emphasize behaviour, environment, and cognition as the key
factors in development
• Albert Bandura and Walter Mischel are the main architects of
social cognitive theory’s contemporary version
• Bandura’s early research focused on observational learning
(learning that occurs through observing what others do – also
known as imitation or modelling)
• Bandura believes that people cognitively represent the behaviour
of others and then sometimes adopt this behaviour themselves
• Example: parents who tell their kids they have 3 options – a, b, or c may
hear their child resolve a conflict with a friend saying the same thing
• The belief that people acquire behaviours, thoughts, and feelings through
observing others’ behaviour
• Important part of life-span development
Most recently Bandura said there are 3
elements…
• Behaviour
• The person – individual’s confidence that he or she can control his
or her success
• The environment
• Each element can change the person’s cognition
The example used…
• College student’s achievement behaviour
Your turn…
• In groups of 3-4, complete the “Applying Banudra’s Theory”
handout
Examples
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4N5J9jFW5U
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsTlJyox0Kg – Bobo doll
experiment