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Skinners Legacy
By: Miran Solanki
B.F. Skinner is one of the most notable psychologists because of his research in operant conditioning in behavior. He was born in Pennsylvania on March 20, 1904 and during his childhood he liked to invent. He grew up being very curious and eventually went to Hamilton College for education. He got a B.A. in English Literature even though he was unhappy with his career choice. He then became inspired by the writings of Pavlov and Watson and therefore decided to go to Harvard University to study psychology. Skinner conducted research mainly on operant conditioning and negative reinforcement and contradicted the beliefs of Watson and Pavlov as he experimented. Pavlov believed that behavior was influenced on a preceding stimulus. However due, to Skinners own cumulative recorder that he built, he soon figured out that behavior depends on what happens after the response, also known as operant behavior. Another invention that he created was the Skinner Box where rats learned to obtain food by pressing a lever to show the reinforcement that they needed. These advancements made him one of the leaders in behaviorism and behavior psychology. By 1945, Skinner became the Psychology Department chair at the University of Indiana. He later moved to join the psychology department at Harvard University. He died on August 18, 1990. His legacy is remembered through his 200 articles and 20 books that he published about behaviorism. B.F. Skinner was one of the most influential psychologists of the 20th century.

http://psychology.about.com/od/profilesofmajorthinkers/p/bio_skinner.htm

How to Train Your Dog Using Operant Conditioning

By: Alana Zick
So lets say youve gotten a new puppy, but you have no idea where to start in training. First and foremost, if youre going to take on the task on your own, its important to understand operant conditioning. So what is operant conditioning? It is a type of learning that operates on the environment, in which ones behavior is modified to reinforcements and punishments. The varying rewards can affect the frequency of a response, and in turn help to shape behavior. Operant conditioning runs of four main types of reinforcements/punishments. Understanding these can be tricky at first, but is crucial to getting your desired behavior. 1. Use POSITIVE REINFORCEMENT: Anything good that is added (positive) that increases (reinforces) behavior. Dogs respond well to rewards for their good behavior, and will increase the desired behavior when they realize it is something that is desired and rewarded. 2. Use NEGATIVE REINFORCEMENT: Anything bad that is taken away (negative) to increase (reinforce) behavior. Unlike PR, NR helps to decrease an undesired behavior (ex. Pulling slightly and briefly at the collar when the dog tries to take the treat before sitting). This causes the dog to feel a negative effect from disobeying the command given, and as a result will decrease that behavior. 3. Utilize POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE PUNSISHMENT: PP is anything bad that is added (positive) that decreases (punishes) behavior. NP is anything good that is taken away (negative) to decrease (punishes) behavior. By using PP, it will help to diminish the unwanted behavior (ex. Using a spray bottle or making a sharp noise when you see your dog trying to get your food from the table). The dog will recognize the disapproving tone and decrease the action. By using NP, you get the same effect. This could be the removal of your dogs favorite toy after they rip it into shreds instead of simply chewing on it. 4. Balance ACQUISITION AND EXTINCTION: In order to get the desired response from your dog, you will need to utilize different rewards after different intervals. Using fixedinterval and fixed-ratio schedules help develop the quickest acquisition but are more susceptible to extinction. This is why it is important to practice the method of successive approximations to ensure the best results. By using these four basic steps you should be an adequate dog trainer in no time! If you still have trouble understanding how NP, PP, NR, & PR work, try using the diagram below.

What Do You See?

Take a look at the photos below and try to find a commonality amongst them.

Easy right? You may have said that each photo contains an object depicting an emotion of fear, sadness, or apprehension. Well, youre wrong. In reality, each picture is a pi cutre of part of a sink. So why is it that you saw a face, an emotion? This is due to the phenomenon of pareidolia, a form on apophenia that causes us to create patterns, faces, etc. out of inanimate or truly meaningless objects. Our brain processes the images and assigns meaning to them that isnt actually there. This phenomenon can be so influencial, that people have actually paid thousands of dollars over the years for objects that had faces. Examples include: - A chicken nuggest shaped like president George Washington that sold for $8,100 on eBay - A piece of toast that had the burnt image of the Virgin Mary (or Madonna after the maker of the toast Diana Duyser took a bite) that sold for $28,000 on eBay almost a decade later! So the next time you see a face, remember its your brain at work exemplifying the fact that perception is reality!

Name That Scientist!

This physiologist was most well-known for his work in classical conditioning. His discovery of the relationship between different stimuli causing the salivation of dogs contributed to a whole new concept of learning. If you guessed Ian Pavlov, youre right! Pavlovs work was so profound and influential that his discoveries are still eminent in our learning world today.

Bandura and the Bobo Doll

By: Alana Zick
Psychologist Albert Bandura conducted an experiment in 1961 to investigate the power of imitation and how it can lead to one inquiring a particular social behavior. In this case, the behavior modeled was aggression, and the responses may surprise you. There were different tests and variations of the experiment, but the one most well-known involves the measurement of the childrens behavior after exposed to an adult model that either received a reward, a punishment, or no response for showing aggression toward a bobo doll. The participants in this experiment came from Stanford University Nursery School and consisted of kids from ages of 3-6 years old, 36 of them boys and 36 of them girls (Bandura, Ross & Ross 1961). There were two adult role models, one male and one female. The children were organized into 4 groups and a control group. 24 children were exposed to an aggressive model and 24 children were exposed to a non-aggressive model. The two groups were then divided into males and females which ensured that half of the children were exposed to models of their own sex and the other half were exposed to models of the opposite sex. The remaining 24 children were part of a control group (McLeod, S. A. (2011). Bobo Doll Experiment. Retrieved from http://www.simplypsychology.org/bobo-doll.html). The first stage consisted of modeling. The children were brought into the experimental room on their own, accompanied by one adult model. The model was sent to an area that contained the Bobo Doll along will a mallet and tinker-toy set. For the non-aggressive group, the model did not interact with the Bobo Doll. In the aggressive group, the model used distinctive aggression methods towards the doll (such as hitting it, kicking it, verbally abusing it) in which the child was exposed to for ten minutes. After the fixed-interval schedule of ten minutes elapsed, the child was taken to a new room where their level of aggression was observed. The new room contained aggressive and non-aggressive toys. The childs behavior was observed for a time interval of 20 minutes through a one way mirror. What the results showed was that children who were exposed to the aggressive model imitated that behavior when placed in the new room alone. It also showed that boys responded stronger to samesex models than girls. This experiment ultimately demonstrated Banduras social learning theory, or the theory that people learn by watching others be rewarded or punished for something. This ties in to the idea of observational learning and how media can influence children. So the next time you leave your TV running, remember the power that imitation through observational learning really can have!

Is Punishment Necessary?
By: Miran Solanki
Punishment is a response that occurs after a behavior to reduce the chance that the same behavior will be repeated. It is used in operant conditioning as a method of eliminating unwanted behaviors. There are two different types of punishment: Positive Punishment: presenting a different stimulus after a behavior occurs Negative Punishment: taking away a desirable stimulus after a behavior occurs Punishment is only effective in some instances. The punishment will be more effective if it used immediately after the certain behavior has occurred. Also, it will work better if it used more often instead of sparingly. In a sense, punishment is ineffective because the behavior is likely to happen again once the consequence is relived. For example, a person who has stolen and is put in jail will probably steal again after he is released. This also makes punishment negative to society because the person who stole will be more secretive and it will be harder to catch. This is all due to the punishment that he got. Now, prison is explainable but it doesnt do the full justice that it was meant to do as with a lot of punishments. People need to realize if they want the short-term gains from punishment or the long-term consequences.

Thorndikes Puzzle Box

By: Alana Zick
Edward Thorndike is most well-known for his experiments using a puzzle box that helped him to observe the development of operant conditioning within behaviorism. Thorndike was curious to see whether animals learned tasks through observation or imitation, and created the puzzle box which measured 20 in long, 15 in wide, and 12 in tall to find out. His puzzle boxes were strategically arranged so that the animal inside (usually cats) would need to perform a desired task (such as pushing a button or pulling a lever) in order to be released. Thorndike would measure the amount of time it took for the animal to realize that the intended stimulus would trigger their release and usually a food reward as well. At first, the cats would wander and meow but eventually came across the lever which released them by chance. He found that after accidentally stepping on the switch, the cat would find the switch faster in succeeding trials by learning that it brought favorable consequences. Thorndike kept track of the escape times and was able to graph the results, which showed that the animals caught on, escaping faster each time until the response became fairly constant. The learning curves that resulted supported his idea that cats showed gradual rather than insight learning. This led to Thorndikes Law of Effect which stated that any behavior that is followed by pleasant consequences is likely to be repeated, and any behavior followed by unpleasant consequences is likely to be stopped.

Test Yourself
Take a look at the image provided below. First, try to say the word you see and then reverse the task and try to say the color, not the word.

Did you find that it was much easier to say the word? If you did, you experienced the Stroop Effect, which explains how the words have a strong influence over your ability to say the color due to the speed of processing and selective attention theories. Did you also happen to notice that the word WHITE was spelt wrong in one area, or did you experience intentional blindness? If so, youre not alone! The brain is not able to process all the stimuli that occurs around us, and fails to notice one thing when another attention-demanding task is being performed.

Did You Know

Stress results in poorer performance! The next time you feel over whelmed, take a breath and dont save that studying for the last minute! Science has shown that short periods of studying are actually more effective than cramming in lengthy hours the night before an exam. So now you know!

Changing Your Behavior For the Better

By: Miran Solanki
People everyday wish that they could have a better personality or attitude towards things because they want to make themselves better. The best way to change your behavior is to change your attitude. There are three components in attitudes: Emotion: how it makes you feel Cognitive: you beliefs or thoughts Behavior: how it influences the way you act Classical Conditioning and Operant Conditioning cab be used to change your attitude and in turn change your behavior. Classical conditioning can be used to create positive emotions to certain targets by associating those objects with happiness. Operant condition can be used strengthen and weaken certain attitudes. These behaviors will then be different than before because of the attitudes that were altered. One of the main ways people create attitudes towards things is by observing the people around them. For example, children will usually have the same political attitudes as their parents because their parents are the primary influences in their life. To change your behavior, you should change the people you always talk to and try to get multiple opinions on certain subjects. It will then change the way you think. However you might get psychological dissonance from conflicting beliefs, so be aware of this. In conclusion, there are many ways to change your behavior for the better instead of being traditional.

http://psychology.about.com/od/socialpsychology/a/attitudes.htm