1. ASSUMPTIONS MADE BY THE BEHAVIOURAL (A PSYCHOLOGICAL MODEL) ABOUT PSYCHOPATHOLOGY SUMMARY: THE BEHAVIOURAL MODEL CONSIDERS ENVIRONMENTAL CONDITIONS AND BELIEVES ALL BEHAVIOUR INCLUDING ABNORMAL BEHAVIOUR IS A RESULT OF LEARNT EXPERIENCES. ACCORDING TO THE MODEL THIS FAULTY “LEARNING” HAPPENS IN THREE WAYS; CLASSICAL CONDITIONING, OPERANT CONDITIONING AND SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY.

2. CLASSICAL CONDITIONING Classical conditioning can explain how phobias develop. The neutral stimulus that produces no fear in a person e.g. a dog, is paired with an unconditioned stimulus – something that automatically produces fear, such as a loud noise or barking for young children. This pairing or association turn the neutral stimulus into a conditioned stimulus

3. OPERANT CONDITIONING Operant conditioning can explain how phobias are maintained because when negative reinforcement occurs, something that is unpleasant is removed. So, fear of dogs is the unpleasant thing; avoiding dogs is negatively reinforcing because the individual does not have to face the fearful object too closely, so their fear level is reduced but their phobia is maintained.

4. SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY- LEARNING THROUGH OBSERVATION Modelling- This is when an individual copies another’s behaviour (often if they are a role model). For instance some psychologists believe phobias are a result of young children copying their parent’s fear of, e.g. pigeons. Vicarious reinforcement- This is when an individual observes somebody receiving reinforcement for a behaviour and so they imitate it in order to try and get that reward themselves. This is used in an explanation of anorexia nervosa

5. How could you test these assumptions? What problems would exist with testing these assumptions?

6. MATCH THE EVIDENCE TO THE ASSUMPTION Mineka et al (1984) monkeys developed a snake phobia simply by observing another monkey experience fear in the presence of another snake. Watson and Rayner (1920) conditioned Little Albert (a small boy) – all small children are scared of loud noise. Noise was repeatedly paired with a white rat – eventually Little Albert was scared of the white rat because he had learnt to associate the rat with the noise. DiNardo et al (1988) found that many people had fearful experiences with dogs but did not go on to develop dog phobias, although 50% of dog phobics had a fearful encounter with a dog.