1. The Learning Approach
(Behaviourism)

2. Is behaviour learnt (nurture) or genetic (nature)?
NATURE NURTURE
Where do you stand?

3. Are some behaviours more nature than nurture?
Consider the following:
Obedience
Academic Intelligence
Musical talent
Artistic talent
Phobia of flying
Gambling Addiction

4. Task:
In groups, role play how we learn a new behavior from our environment.
You have 3 minutes

5. Watson ( )
"Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up and I'll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select-- doctor, lawyer, merchant-chief, and yes, even beggarman and thief, regardless of his
talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors."(Watson, 1930)

6. What is it all about? We are born as “blank slates” (tabula rasa)
All we have at birth is the capacity to learn
All behaviour is learned from the environment
Focus of the approach: observable behaviour using the scientific method

7. Some definitions.... Stimulus : Response :
Any change in the environment that an organism registers.
Response :
Any behaviour that the organism emits as a consequence of a stimulus.
Can you think of some?

8. Classical conditioning
Learning by association
Ivan Pavlov:
Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine 1904

9. Dog hears the lab technician
That’s a reflex
What’s going on?
Dog hears the lab technician

10. How does it work? Before conditioning Bell: Neutral stimulus (NS)
Food: unconditioned stimulus (UCS)
Salivation: unconditioned Response (UCR)
During conditioning
Bell: Neutral stimulus (NS)
Pairing
Food: unconditioned stimulus (UCS)
Salivation: unconditioned Response (UCR)
After conditioning
Bell: Conditioned stimulus (CS)
Salivation: Conditioned response (CR)

11. Classical Conditioning

12. Work it out....
A child is afraid of spiders. One day he is in a lift and notices a spider. Now he is afraid of lifts.
A child sneezes when there are flowers about. She often visits her grandmother’s house, where there are flowers. Even when there are no flowers at her grandmother’s house, she still sneezes.
Neutral stimulus (NS)?
Unconditioned response (UCR)?
Conditioned stimulus (CS)?
Unconditioned stimulus (UCS)?
Conditioned response(CR)?

13. More definitions: match up the correct definitions
Unconditioned Stimulus(UCS): behaviour elicited by the Conditioned Stimulus (salivation).
Unconditioned Response(UCR): the new stimulus-response relationship we created by associating a new stimulus with an old response
Neutral Stimulus (NS): a behaviour that is already elicited by a stimulus (salivating).
Unconditioned Reflex: an existing stimulus-response connection.
Conditioned Stimulus (CS):a thing which is not associated in the unconditioned relationship (bell).
Conditioned Response (CR): a thing that can already elicit a response (food).
Conditioned Relationship: a new stimulus we deliver the same time we give the old stimulus (the bell)

14. Quick check
1. Which is the correct pairing part of the classical conditioning procedure?
q UCS + CS
q NS + CS
q NS + UCS
q UCS + NS
2. In Pavlov’s procedure, what was the CR? 
q research assistant
q bell
q salivation
q food
3. The final step in the classical conditioning procedure is to present the NS alone to see if it:
q elicits the CR
q elicits the CS
q elicits the UCR
q elicits the UCS

15. Inducing a phobia: Little Albert

17. Tasks
1. Explain the Little Albert study using the principles of Classical Conditioning.
Hint – Draw out the formula to help you
2. Complete the CC review activity on the learning space
3. Homework: Complete the APRC for your classic study.

18. Debate time!
1. Using GRAVE argue the strengths and weaknesses of your classic study.
Is the research credible?
2. Evaluate Watson and Raynor’s (1920) study of Classical Conditioning. (8 marks)

19. Questions
Using the scenario explained in the second bullet point of ‘CC extra’ on the learning space, write an explanation of the scenario using technical terminology from Classical Conditioning. (6 marks – A02)