BURRHUS FREDERIC

SKINNER
BEHAVIORAL ANALYSIS
 REPORTERS
MINEROSE DAWN DABASOL KRISTEL JEAN ROSAPA
 TOPICS 8. Control of Human Behavior: Social Control,
1. Biography
Self-Control.
2. About Thorndike, Watson, Skinner's
9. The Unhealthy Personality: (1)
Thoughts about studying animals and
Counteracting Strategies, (2) Inappropriate
human behavior.
behavior.
3. Three Characteristics of Science by
10. Psychotheraphy
Skinner.
11. How conditioning affects personality.
4. Conditioning: Classical (elicited) and
12. How personality affects conditioning.
Operant (emitted) and Subtopics of
13. Concept of Humanity by Skinner
Operant Conditioning.
14. Case Study
5. Human Behavior shaped by three forces:
(1) Natural Selection, (2) Cultural
Practices, and (3) The individual history of
reinforcement.
6. Inner States: Self awareness, Drives,
Emotions, Purpose and Intention
7. Complex Behavior: Higher mental
processes, Creativity, Unconscious
behavior, Dreams, and Social behavior.
BIOGRAPHY OF B.F SKINNER
Burrhus Frederic Skinner was born on March 20, 1904, in Susquehanna,
Pennsylvania.
His father was a lawyer and an aspiring politician while his mother
stayed home to care for their two children.
Skinners were Presbyterian
Skinner was inclined toward music and literature, Skinner entered
Hamilton College, a liberal arts school in Clinton, New York.
He married Yvonne Blue The Skinners had two daughters—Julie, born in
1938, and Deborah (Debbie), born in 1944.
Skinner was becoming a successful and well-known behaviorist, he
was slow to establish financial independence
August 18, 1990, Skinner died of leukemia
Edward L. Thorndike

The first psychologist to systematically study the

consequences of behavior.

Who worked originally with animals (Thorndike, 1898, 1913)

and then later with humans (Thorndike,1931)

Discovered the "law of effect" that has two parts which are;
stamped in (satisfier), and stamped out (annoyer).
John B. Watson

Studied both animals and humans and became convinced

that the concepts of consciousness and introspection must
play no role in the scientific study of human behavior.

Watson (1913) argued that human behavior, like the behavior

of animals and machines, can be studied objectively.

Watson further argued that the goal of psychology is the

prediction and control of behavior.
 THREE CHARACTERISTICS OF
SCIENCE BY SKINNER
1.Science is cumulative
-Science, in contrast to art, philosophy, and literature, advances in a
cumulative manner. However, cumulative knowledge is not to be confused
with technological progress.

2.Empirical observation
In Skinner’s (1953) words: “It is a disposition to deal with facts rather than
with what someone has said about them”. There are three components to the
scientific attitude which are;
First, it rejects authority
Second, science demands intellectual honesty

3. Search for order and lawful relationships.

-Third, component of science is a search for order and lawful relationships.
 CONDITIONING
Classical (elicited) and Operant (emitted) Conditioning
-With classical conditioning (which Skinner called respondent conditioning),
a response is drawn out of the organism by a specific, identifiable stimulus.
With operant conditioning (also called Skinnerian conditioning), a behavior is
made more likely to recur when it is immediately reinforced.

An elicited response is drawn from the organism, whereas an emitted

response is one that simply appears. An emitted responses do not
previously exist inside the organism.
CLASSICAL CONDITIONING

Classical conditioning theory states

that behaviors are learned by
connecting a neutral stimulus with a
positive one, such as Pavlov's dogs
hearing a bell (neutral) and expecting
food (positive). The learned behavior is
called a conditioned response.
WHAT IS SKINNER'S THEORY?
Skinner's theory of operant conditioning suggests that learning and
behavior change are the result of reinforcement and punishment.

OPERANT CONDITIONING
A method of learning that uses rewards and punishment to modify
behavior. Through operant conditioning, behavior that is rewarded is
likely to be repeated, and behavior that is punished will rarely occur.
SHAPING
Shaping can be illustrated by the example of training. Through this
process of reinforcing successive approximations, the experimenter
or the environment gradually shapes the final complex set of behaviors.

In all instances of operant conditioning, three conditions are present:

the antecedent (A), the behavior (B), and the consequence (C). The
antecedent (A) refers to the environment or setting in which the
behavior takes place.
WHY DOES IT EMIT NEW RESPONSES THAT HAVE
NEVER BEEN REINFORCED BUT THAT GRADUALLY
MOVE IT TOWARD THE TARGET BEHAVIOR?
The answer is that behavior is not discrete but continuous; that is, the
organism usually moves slightly beyond the previously reinforced
response.

Skinner (1953) put it this way: “The reinforcement of a response

increases the probability of all responses containing the same
elements”
 REINFORCEMENT
It strengthens the behavior and it rewards the person. Reinforcement,
therefore, can be divided into that which produces a beneficial
environmental condition.

Positive reinforcement refers to the process of rewarding or

reinforcing desirable behavior in order to increase the likelihood that
the behavior will be repeated in the future.

Negative reinforcement is the encouragement of certain behaviors by

removing or avoiding a negative outcome or stimuli.
 PUNISHMENT
is the presentation of an aversive stimulus, Although punishment does
not strengthen a response, neither does it inevitably weaken it. Skinner
(1953) agreed with Thorndike that the effects of punishment are less
predictable than those of reward.

Effects of Punishment When the contingencies of reinforcement are

strictly controlled, behavior can be precisely shaped and accurately
predicted. With punishment, however, no such accuracy is possible.
Punishment ordinarily is imposed to prevent people from acting in a
particular way. Consequently, one effect of punishment is to suppress
behavior. Another effect of punishment is the conditioning of a
negative feeling by associating a strong aversive stimulus.
 CONDITIONED AND GENERALIZED REINFORCERS
Conditioned reinforcers (sometimes called secondary reinforcers) are
those environmental stimuli that are not by nature satisfying but
become so because they are associated with such unlearned or
primary reinforcers as food, water, sex, or physical comfort.

Money is a conditioned reinforcer because it can be exchanged for a

great variety of primary reinforcers. In addition, it is a generalized
reinforcer because it is associated with more than one primary
reinforcer.
CONDITIONED AND GENERALIZED REINFORCERS

Skinner (1953) recognized five important generalized reinforcers that

sustain much of human behavior:
attention,
approval,
affection,
submission of others, and
tokens (money).
SCHEDULES OF REINFORCEMENT
Reinforcement can follow behavior on either a continuous schedule or
an intermittent one.

With a continuous schedule, the organism is reinforced for every

response. Skinner preferred intermittent schedules not only because
they make more efficient use of the reinforcer but because they
produce responses that are more resistant to extinction.

The four basic intermittent schedules are fixed-ratio, variable-ratio,

fixed-interval, and variable-interval.
SCHEDULES OF REINFORCEMENT
Fixed-Ratio
a fixed-ratio schedule, the organism is reinforced intermittently
according to the number of responses it makes.

Variable-Ratio
the variable-ratio schedule, it is reinforced after the nth response on
the average.

Fixed-Interval
the fixed-interval schedule, the organism is reinforced for the first
response following a designated period of time.

Variable-Interval
A variable-interval schedule is one in which the organism is reinforced
after the lapse of random or varied periods of time.
OPERANT EXTINCTION
responses can be lost for at least four reasons;

First, they can simply be forgotten during the passage of time.

Second, and more likely, they can be lost due to the interference
of preceding or subsequent learning.
Third, they can disappear due to punishment.
Fourth cause of lost learning is extinction, defined as the
tendency of a previously acquired response to become
progressively weakened upon nonreinforcement.
 HUMAN BEHAVIOR SHAPED BY THREE FORCES:
Natural selection plays an important part in human personality. Not
every remnant of natural selection continues to have survival value.

Cultural Evolution, selection is responsible for those cultural

practices that have survived, just as selection plays a key role in
humans’ evolutionary history and also with the contingencies of
reinforcement.
“People do not observe particular practices in order that the group
will be more likely to survive; they observe them because groups that
induced their members to do so survived and transmitted them”

The Individual History of Reinforcement, is a process whereby

individuals control their own behavior by rewarding themselves
when a certain standard of performance has been attained.
INNER STATES: SELF AWARENESS, DRIVES,
EMOTIONS, PURPOSE AND INTENTION
Inner States
Skinner (1989b) did not deny the existence of internal states, such as
feelings of love, anxiety, or fear. Internal states can be studied just as
any other behavior.
Self-Awareness
Each person is subjectively aware of his or her own thoughts, feelings,
recollections, and intentions.
Drives
simply refer to the effects of deprivation and satiation and to the
corresponding probability that the organism will respond.
INNER STATES: SELF AWARENESS, DRIVES,
EMOTIONS, PURPOSE AND INTENTION
Emotions
Skinner (1974) recognized the subjective existence of emotions, he
insisted that behavior must not be attributed to them.

Purpose and intention

exist within the skin, but they are not subject to direct outside
scrutiny. A felt, ongoing purpose may itself be reinforcing.
COMPLEX BEHAVIOR: HIGHER MENTAL
PROCESSES, CREATIVITY, UNCONSCIOUS
BEHAVIOR, DREAMS AND SOCIAL BEHAVIOR.
Complex Behavior
Skinner believed that even the most abstract and complex behavior is
shaped by natural selection, cultural evolution, or the individual’s
history of reinforcement.

Higher mental processes

refers to the human ability to take knowledge and learning and use it
create new things, ideas and concepts.
COMPLEX BEHAVIOR: HIGHER MENTAL
PROCESSES, CREATIVITY, UNCONSCIOUS
BEHAVIOR, DREAMS AND SOCIAL BEHAVIOR.
Creativity
is simply the result of random or accidental behaviors (overt or covert)
that happen to be rewarded.

Unconscious Behavior
behavior is labeled unconscious when people no longer think about it
because it has been suppressed through punishment because people
rarely observe the relationship between genetic and environmental
variables and their own behavior, nearly all our behavior is
unconsciously motivated.
COMPLEX BEHAVIOR: HIGHER MENTAL
PROCESSES, CREATIVITY, UNCONSCIOUS
BEHAVIOR, DREAMS AND SOCIAL BEHAVIOR.
Dreams
Dream behavior is reinforcing when repressed sexual or aggressive
stimuli are allowed expression. Skinner agreed with Freud that dreams
may serve a wish-fulfillment purpose.

Social Behavior
Groups do not behave; only individuals do. Individuals establish groups
because they have been rewarded for doing so. If the positive
reinforcement is strong enough, its effects will be more powerful than
those of punishment.
CONTROL OF HUMAN BEHAVIOR
Ultimately, an individual's behavior is controlled by
environmental contingencies. Those contingencies may have
been erected by society, by another individual, or by oneself,
but the environment, not free will, is responsible for behavior.

Social control is to describe to a person the

contingencies of reinforcement. Describing
contingencies involves language, usually verbal,
to inform people of the consequences of their
not-yet-emitted behavior. Many examples of
describing contingencies are available,
especially threats and promises. A more subtle
means of social control is advertising, designed
to manipulate people top urchase certain
products. In none of these examples will the
attempt at control be perfectly successful, yet
each of them increases the likelihood that the
desired response will be emitted
Despite Skinner’s stand against free
will, he went ahead and introduced
the concept of self control. What he
meant by self control was that
human beings were able to
generate various responses in an
attempt to change their behavior. As
stated earlier, human behavior is
shaped by the environment in which
an individual lives.

SOCIAL CONTROL
SELF CONTROL
CONTROL OF HUMAN BEHAVIOR
A. SOCIAL CONTROL
1. Operant Conditioning

—Society exercises control over its members through positive reinforcement, negative
reinforcement and punishment

2. Describing Contingencies

—It involves language, usually verbal to inform people of the consequences of their not yet
emitted behavior. Examples are threats, promises and advertising.

3. Deprivation and Satiation

Deprivation refers to a period in which the reinforcer has not been presented, resulting in an
increase in behavior to receive the reinforcer. Satiation refers to a period of sufficient
availability of the reinforcer, resulting in a decrease of behavior to work for the reinforcer

4. Physical Restraints

Physical restraint acts to counter the effects of conditioning, and it results in behavior
contrary to that which would have been emitted had the person not been restrained. Some
people might say that physical restraint is a means of denying an individual's freedom.
THE UNHEALTHY PERSONALITY
COUNTERACTING STRATEGIES
happens when social control is excessive, may take place in the form of :

Escape
people withdraw from.the controlling agent either physically and psychologically

Revolt
behave more actively, counteracting the controlling agent

Passive Resistance
conspicuous feature is stubbornness
THE UNHEALTHY PERSONALITY

INAPPROPRIATE BEHAVIOR

follow from self defeating techniques of counteracting social control or

from unsuccessful attempts at social control
 PSYCHOTHERAPY
Skinner believed that psychotherapy is one of the chief
obstacles blocking psychology's attempt to become scientific.
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NON BEHAVIORAL THERAPISTS
may affect behavior accidentally or unknowingly

BEHAVIORAL THERAPISTS
have developed variety of techniques over the years, most based on
operant conditioning (Skinner, 1988), although some are built around
the principles of classical conditioning.

TRADITIONAL THERAPISTS
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HOW CONDITIONING AFFECTS PERSONALITY

Personality change occurs when new behaviors become stable over

time and/or across different situations. One domain in which
personality change may be evidenced is in psychotherapy. In fact,
a major goal of therapy is to change behavior, and if the changes are
stable over time and situations, then one could talk about changing
personality. We say this to make clear that whereas Skinner
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HOW PERSONALITY AFFECTS CONDITIONING
Several thousand studies with both animals and humans have demonstrated the power
that conditioning has to change behavior/personality. With humans in particular,
however, it is clear that different people respond differently to the same reinforcers, and
personality may provide an important clue about why this may be so. Returning to
research on d-amphetamine and smoking, for example, there appears to be systematic
individual differences on the effect; that is, it works for some people but not others. Just
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STRATEGY N°1 STRATEGY N°2 STRATEGY N°3
Results supported the joint subsystem hypothesis and contradicted the separa-
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impulsive showed a lower startle response especially when viewing negative images,
compared to participants who were highly anxious but not impulsive. In other words, for
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STRATEGY N°1 STRATEGY N°2 STRATEGY N°3

Concept of Humanity by Skinner

Is Skinner’s concept of humanity optimistic or pessimistic? At first thought,

it may appear that a deterministic stance is necessarily pessimistic. However, Skin-
ner’s view of human nature is highly optimistic. Because human behavior is shaped
by the principles of reinforcement, the species is quite adaptable. Of all behaviors,
the most satisfying ones tend to increase in frequency of occurrence. People, there-
fore, learn to live quite harmoniously with their environment. The evolution of the
species is in the direction of greater control over environmental variables, which
results in an increasing repertoire of behaviors beyond those essential for mere sur-
vival. However, Skinner (1987a) was also concerned that modern cultural practices
have not yet evolved to the point at which nuclear war, overpopulation, and de-
pletion of natural resources can be stopped. In this sense, he was more of a real-
ist than an optimist.
 Case Study 25

Yolanda had always been an excellent student. In grade school, she always
earned As and Bs, and the teachers always spoke highly of her during
parent–teacher conferences. When her parents came home from these confer-
ences, they often would repeat to her the positive remarks they had heard. She
also excelled academically in high school even when she took advanced courses.
She took algebra when she was in eighth grade, college algebra as a junior, and
calculus as a senior. She also took physics and advanced biology in the later part
of high school. She was on the honor roll each semester, achieving a higher than
90 percent average each time. Again, teachers commented positively about her.
The positive remarks and superior grades made her feel good about herself and
boosted her self-esteem. At her high school graduation, she was valedictorian.
Understandably, Yolanda was college bound. She majored in psychology
and again showed outstanding academic aptitude.
Initially, Yolanda worked hard and earned excellent grades, but she was
attending a large state university, and the personal attention she was used to
getting for her superior academic performance was not as readily
forthcoming as it had been in grade school or high school. She no longer
received trophies or certificates for doing well in her classes, and, because
most of her courses took place in large lecture halls that she attended with
about 300 other students, her professors did not know who she was, let
alone that she was one of the top students in the class. By her second
semester, Yolanda’s grades began to falter, and her grade point average
(GPA) for the second semester turned out to be 2.01, a drop from her first-
semester GPA of 3.5. By the end of her third semester, Yolanda was on
probation. She decided to drop out of college and try STRATEGY
working N°3
in the “real
world” for a while.
Yolanda waited on tables for the next year and took stock of her life. She did
not really enjoy her job. She did not make as much money as she would have liked
and was tired of rude and inconsiderate customers. She felt as though she could do more,
and she felt embarrassed when she told old friends from high school that she was no
longer attending college. She felt as though they were looking down on her. She also felt as
though she had disappointed her parents. They had encouraged Yolanda to achieve, partly
for her benefit but, because of discrimination they had faced when they were younger,
partly to demonstrate to the world that African Americans could achieve as much as others.
She then decided to try college again. She applied to a smaller college close to home and
was pleased to find that she
was not a number there but rather a person to whom professors talked. She majored again
in psychology, got to know her professors, and studied hard.
She did well in her courses, achieving a 3.6 GPA her first semester back in school.
She soon became known within the psychology department as a rising star. Her
professors talked to her, listened to her ideas and questions, andSTRATEGY
guided herN°3
toward
graduate school. Her advisor suggested that she conduct some research if she was
interested in attending graduate school because competition for graduate studies in
psychology is fierce.
One needed to stand out from other good students to be accepted into a program.
She began a research project the second semester of her
junior year and completed it the first semester of her senior year. Under the guid-
ance of her research advisor, she submitted her research findings to the Eastern
Psychological Association, and it was accepted as a poster presentation.
Yolanda’s superior college grades (she ended up with a 3.8 GPA), her good
Graduate Record Exam scores, and her research presentation helped her gain
admission into a clinical psychology graduate program at a prestigious university.
There, she worked closely with a number of advisors and eventually earned her
Ph.D. She now works as a psychology professor at a smaller undergraduate
college.
 APPLICATION QUESTIONS

Using Skinner’s radical behaviorism theory, analyze Yolanda’s behavior by

answering the following questions.
1. What motivates our behavior, according to Skinner’s theory? Is it
internally or externally motivated?
2. How could Yolanda’s early success in school be explained by radical
behaviorism?
3. How could radical behaviorism explain Yolanda’s dropping out of
college? Everest Drew Remy
4. How couldCantu
Skinner’s theory explain
HollowayYolanda’s decision
Marsh to go back to
college? Ceo Of Ingoude Ceo Of Ingoude
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5. How could Skinner’s theory explain Yolanda’s success in college the
second time and in graduate school?
THANKS FOR
LISTENING