The scientific development of behavioural theory can be traced directly from Pavlov’s 19th century discoveries in classical conditioning. Important foundations are laid by John B. Watson (1913), American Psychologist, through the article “Psychology as the Behaviorist views it”. Significant research and publication on the subject were conducted by Watson, Thorndike and many others, but it was not systematically refined and developed until B.F.Skinner. Skinner took behaviourism towards its current popularity (Gibson and Mitchell, 2003).
Views of behaviourists
1. Behaviour is a set of learned responses to events, experiences, or stimuli in a person’s life history.
2. Behaviour can be modified by providing appropriate learning condition and experiences.
Behaviourists stood for the aspects that can be empirically observed or measured. Psychology got the status of science when empirical observation and measurements intervened. The behaviourists focuses on specific behavioural goals, emphasizing precise and repeatable method. The behavioural theoretical approach to conselling has grown steadily since 1950s. Today, it is utilized in a wide variety of settings. The approach has been successful in the treatment of smoking, weight control, and other eating disorders, substance abuse, speech difficulties, behavior problems and others (Gibson and Mitchell, 2003).
Counselling, for a behaviourist involves the systematic use of a variety of procedures, which are intended specifically established goals between a client and a counselor. A wide variety of techniques drawn from knowledge of learning processes are employed for the purpose of counseling and therapy. The first among them is operant learning.
Operant learning:
The approach is based on the usefulness of reinforcements and timing of their presentation in producing the change. Reinforcements may be concrete rewards or expressed as approval or attention. The theory (Operant conditioning) is based on the work of B. F. Skinner, who drew on the idea of classical conditioning, but thought individuals to be more active in the learning process than that theory allowed. For learning to occur, it is essential that the person be an active participant. In this theory, when learning is rewarded, behaviour is perpetuated or maintained, while punished behaviour is removed.
Operant conditioning principles of behaviour intervention were developed by Skinner through systematic laboratory research. The process involves learning from one’s actions as one operates the environment. The student's behaviour is modified by the consequences of his/her responses.
Operant conditioning principles:
Operant conditioning is learning from one’s action as one operates the environment (UNESCO, 2000). Main principles are positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement, non-reinforcement, extinction, punishment, shaping, stimulus control, token economics and time out.
Reinforcement could be positive, negative or neutral. The behavioural change is attempted to be brought by first identifying the behaviour to be changed and defining the objective.
Positive reinforcement: The use of rewards for positive responses, to strengthen the new behaviour.
Non reinforcement: No reward for the undesirable behaviour (to diminish problem behaviour)
Extinction: Stopping rewarding-established behaviour (to stop responding the way he/she does)
Punishment: Presentation of some form of discomfort or unpleasant consequences to a response (to suppress the response)
Shaping: Process of rewarding successive responses in order to reach a desired response
Stimulus control: Controlling the situation in which the behaviour occur
Token economy: Usage of symbolic reinforcements for desirable behaviour. These reinforcements, later, will be exchanged as genuine reinforcements (find points, then prize)
Time out: Removal of an individual from the source of the problem in order to help him/her change. There are three main ways – observational time, exclusion, seclusion.
Observational time: the individual is withdrawn from a reinforcing situation. For example, a child is placed outside the perimeter of the activity.
Exclusion: The individual is asked to leave the reinforcing situation to a non-reinforcing. For example, a child who misbehaves while watching a game can be removed to a place where there is no game.
Seclusion: Putting the child in an isolated room where he/she is alone
Views of behaviourists
1. Behaviour is a set of learned responses to events, experiences, or stimuli in a person’s life history.
2. Behaviour can be modified by providing appropriate learning condition and experiences.
Behaviourists stood for the aspects that can be empirically observed or measured. Psychology got the status of science when empirical observation and measurements intervened. The behaviourists focuses on specific behavioural goals, emphasizing precise and repeatable method. The behavioural theoretical approach to conselling has grown steadily since 1950s. Today, it is utilized in a wide variety of settings. The approach has been successful in the treatment of smoking, weight control, and other eating disorders, substance abuse, speech difficulties, behavior problems and others (Gibson and Mitchell, 2003).
Counselling, for a behaviourist involves the systematic use of a variety of procedures, which are intended specifically established goals between a client and a counselor. A wide variety of techniques drawn from knowledge of learning processes are employed for the purpose of counseling and therapy. The first among them is operant learning.
Operant learning:
The approach is based on the usefulness of reinforcements and timing of their presentation in producing the change. Reinforcements may be concrete rewards or expressed as approval or attention. The theory (Operant conditioning) is based on the work of B. F. Skinner, who drew on the idea of classical conditioning, but thought individuals to be more active in the learning process than that theory allowed. For learning to occur, it is essential that the person be an active participant. In this theory, when learning is rewarded, behaviour is perpetuated or maintained, while punished behaviour is removed.
Operant conditioning principles of behaviour intervention were developed by Skinner through systematic laboratory research. The process involves learning from one’s actions as one operates the environment. The student's behaviour is modified by the consequences of his/her responses.
Operant conditioning principles:
Operant conditioning is learning from one’s action as one operates the environment (UNESCO, 2000). Main principles are positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement, non-reinforcement, extinction, punishment, shaping, stimulus control, token economics and time out.
Reinforcement could be positive, negative or neutral. The behavioural change is attempted to be brought by first identifying the behaviour to be changed and defining the objective.
Positive reinforcement: The use of rewards for positive responses, to strengthen the new behaviour.
Non reinforcement: No reward for the undesirable behaviour (to diminish problem behaviour)
Extinction: Stopping rewarding-established behaviour (to stop responding the way he/she does)
Punishment: Presentation of some form of discomfort or unpleasant consequences to a response (to suppress the response)
Shaping: Process of rewarding successive responses in order to reach a desired response
Stimulus control: Controlling the situation in which the behaviour occur
Token economy: Usage of symbolic reinforcements for desirable behaviour. These reinforcements, later, will be exchanged as genuine reinforcements (find points, then prize)
Time out: Removal of an individual from the source of the problem in order to help him/her change. There are three main ways – observational time, exclusion, seclusion.
Observational time: the individual is withdrawn from a reinforcing situation. For example, a child is placed outside the perimeter of the activity.
Exclusion: The individual is asked to leave the reinforcing situation to a non-reinforcing. For example, a child who misbehaves while watching a game can be removed to a place where there is no game.
Seclusion: Putting the child in an isolated room where he/she is alone
Operant theorists believe that reward is a more powerful method of shaping behavior than punishment. Reward has the virtue of indicating what behaviour is required, while punishment only indicates what response an individual should withhold. Punishment can also cause anxiety, hostility, and resentment in an individual. Aversive stimuli, as we have already seen, can also lead to avoidance learning. The individual can learn to avoid the parent, teacher, or supervisor or to perform the undesired response out of their range.
Skinner (1971) believed that society in general has gradually shifted from systems of control based on the use of aversive stimuli to ones which use reward. Teachers now try and make children want to learn through reward rather than through punishment. Parents increasingly offer rewards to their children in the form of approval rather than using punishment to shape their children’s behaviour. And some organizations have replaced aversive autocratic managerial practices with the potentially more rewarding democratic supervisory styles.
