CHAPTER 12

Skinner:
Operant Condition
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Theory
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 introduction

During the 1920s and 1930s, while Freud, Adler, and Jung
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were relying on clinical practice and before Eysenck and McCrae
and Costa were using psychometric procedures to build personality
theories, a number of behaviorists were constructing models based
on laboratory studies of human and nonhuman animals. Early
behaviorists included E. L. Thorndike and J. B. Watson, but the
most influential of the later theorists was B. F. Skinner. Behavioral
models of personality avoided speculations about hypothetical
constructs and concentrated almost exclusively on observable
behavior. Skinner rejected the notion of free will and emphasized
the primacy of environmental influences on behavior.
 LEARNING OBJECTIVES

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Skinner: Operant Condition Theory

OUTLINE

Overview of Behavioral Analysis The Unhealthy Personality

Biography of Skinner Psychotherapy

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Scientific Behaviorism Related Research

Icon Conditioning Icon Critique of Skinner

The Human Organism Concept of Humanity

Overview of Behavioral Emerged from Laboratory Studies of Animals and
Analysis Humans

Minimized Speculation
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Focused on Observable Behavior

Avoided All Hypothetical Constructs

Behavior Is Lawfully Determined

Behavior Is Product of Environmental Stimuli

Biography of Skinner Born in Susquehanna, Pennsylvania in 1904

Constructed gadgets, played music, and

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wrote novels as a child

Attended Hamilton College, earning a BA

Earns his PhD in psychology at Harvard in

1931

Accepts first job at age 32, teaching at the

University of Minnesota
 Published The Behavior of Organisms in
1938.
Biography of Skinner Invents controversial and well-publicized
baby tender
IconTrains pigeons to guide bombs into enemy
ships in World War II, which he demonstrated
in 1944

Realized his early ambition of becoming a

writer when he wrote Walden Two

Also taught at Indiana University and at

Harvard

Died in 1990 of Leukemia

Precursors of Skinner’s Scientific Behaviorism
Precursors of Skinner’s Scientific Behaviorism

John B. Watson
• Behavior can be studied objectively
• Consciousness and introspection must play no role in the
scientific study of behavior
• Goal of psychology is the prediction and control of
behavior
• Best reached through study of stimulus-response
connections

Consciousness and introspection

• NO ROLE
Humans = Machines
• OBJETIVITY
Scientific Behaviorism

Philosophy of Science
• Scientific behaviorism allows for
interpretation of behavior, not an explanation
of its causes

Characteristics of Science
• Cumulative
• An attitude that values empirical observation
o Rejects Authority
o Demands Intellectual Honesty
o Suspends judgment until clear trends emerge
• Science is a search for order and lawful
relationships
 Conditioning

Classical Conditioning
• A response is drawn out of the organism
by a specific, identifiable stimulus
• Behavior is elicited from the organism
• A neutral (conditioned) stimulus is paired
with an unconditioned stimulus a number
of times until it is capable of bringing
about a previously unconditioned
response
 Conditioning

Operant Conditioning
Also known as Skinnerian Conditioning
• Shaping –gross approximations of the behavior
o Successive Approximation.
 Antecedent
 Behavior
 Consequence
• Operant Discrimination – It is that behavior that takes place on an environment where we expects
that a similar behavior may have the same reinforcement.

• Stimulus Generalization – the generalization of the rewards they were able to have form previous
events be available on another event that possesses the same qualities or characteristics.
 Conditioning

Operant Conditioning
Reinforcements – it strengthens the behavior and rewards the person or
organism which performs a favorable behavior.
• Positive Reinforcement – a stimulus that is added to a situation that
increases the likelihood of a behavior will again occur.
• Negative Reinforcement- a stimulus that is removed to a situation that
increases the likelihood of a behavior will again occur.

Punishments – it decreases the likelihood of a behavior to be repeated.

Furthermore, it does not strengthen a response but weakens it.
• Positive Punishment – a stimulus is added to a situation where it
decreases the likelihood of a behavior will again occur.
• Negative Punishment – a stimulus is removed to a situation where it
decreases the likelihood of a behavior will again occur.
 Conditioning

Operant Conditioning
• Conditioned Reinforcement – objects that cannot
directly remove a certain condition but may be used to
obtain objects that can directly remove a certain
condition

• Generalized Reinforcement - when an object can be

associated with more than one primary reinforcement.
 Conditioning

Operant Conditioning
Schedules of Reinforcement
• Continuous Schedule – when the organism is reinforced for
every response. Considered to be an inefficient use of
reinforcement.
• Intermittent Schedules – when the organism is reinforced in
a variety of schedule for every response. This is considered
to be more resistant to extinction.
• Fixed Ratio
• Variable Ratio
• Fixed Interval
• Variable Interval
 Conditioning

Operant Conditioning
Learned Responses and Extinction
• Learned Responses
o Can be forgotten during the passage of time
o Can be lost due to preceding and subsequent learning
o Can disappear due to punishment
o Can be lost due to extinction.
• Operant Extinction
o When an experimenter systematically withholds
reinforcement of a previous learned response until the
probability of that response diminishes to zero.
 Natural Selection - the selection of mates and other survival
contingencies play an important role in shaping one’s personality.
The Human Organism Cultural Evolution - cultural practices just like survival
contingencies shapes on personality.
Inner States
• Self-Awareness
• Drives
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• Emotions
• Purpose and Intention
Complex Behavior
• Higher Mental Processes
• Creativity
• Unconscious Behavior
• Dreams
• Social Behavior
Control of Human Behavior
•Social Control - a variety of technique where society controls
over a member of it
•Self-Control
 Counteracting Strategies – developed due to the effects of social
control.
The Unhealthy • Escape – people withdraw from the controlling agent either
Personality physically and psychologically.
• Revolt – people rebels through a variety of way that can
overthrow or challenge an established organization.
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• Passive Resistance – considered to be a more effective way of
irritating the controller if escape and revolt have failed.

Inappropriate Behaviors - these are self-defeating behaviors that

reveals itself whenever other counteracting strategies does not work.
• Excessively vigorous behavior
• Excessively restrained behavior
• Blocking out reality
• Self-deluding responses
• Self-punishment
 Psychotherapy viewed as one of the major
Psychotherapy obstacles to a scientific study of human behavior

Therapist molds desirable behavior by

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reinforcing slightly improved changes in
behavior

Behavior therapists play an active role in the

treatment process, using behavior modification
techniques and pointing out the positive
consequences of some behaviors and the
aversive effects of others
 Related Research

How Conditioning Affects Personality

• Tidey, O’Neil & Higgins (2000)
o Reinforcers can change their value over time and
in combination with other stimuli

How Personality Affects Conditioning

• Philip Corr (2002)
o People vary in their responses to reinforcers
depending on their personalities

Reinforcement and the Brain

• Beaver et al. (2009)
o High behavioral activation (i.e., actively pursuing
rewards) is positively correlated with higher brain
activation in response to rewards, as measured by
fMRI
Critique of Skinner

• Research Generation (VERY HIGH)

o It organized huge amount of research.
• Falsifiability (HIGH)
o It lends to be either confirmed or disconfirmed.
• Organization and Explanation of Data (HIGH)
o Factors were reduced to some quantity.
• Guidance for Practitioners (AVERAGE)
o As some psychologists criticize his work.
• Internal Consistency (HIGH)
o Most terms were operationally defined.
• Parsimony (VERY HIGH)
o It also predicated on the idea of the fewest factors
possible.
 Determinism over Free Will (no free will)
Concept of Humanity
Optimism over Pessimism
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Causality over Teleology

Unconscious over Conscious

Social Influence over Biology

Uniqueness over Similarity

REINFORCEMENTS AND SOCIAL CONTROL

THANK YOU!