Pavlov was most famous for his experiments with dogs. Pavlov started by studying the digestion in dogs; he noticed dogs began to salivate before they were actually given their food. He suspected this was triggered by the dogs associating certain noises, such as footsteps of their owner, with being fed. So, at this stage Pavlov established that food caused the dog to salivate. He then created a loud noise by itself (ringing a bell)- this caused no salivation. He then paired the ringing of the bell with the food and presented this to the dog- resulting in the dog salivating. After several pairings of the food with the ringing of a bell, the dog would begin to salivate purely just from the noise because the dog now automatically associates the noise with food- He classically condition the dog to associate the two together
‘Little Albert` was a famous experiment that was conducted by behaviourist, John B Watson and graduate student Rosalie Raynor. Watson was interested in expanding Pavlov’s studies further to show that emotional reactions could also be classically conditioned in people. The experiment was based on a child that Watson and Raynor named Little Albert. They exposed the child to a number of stimuli such as a rabbit, a monkey, masks, burning newspapers and a white rat. They created a fear in Little Albert. Watson and Raynor proved emotional responses could be conditioned in humans. This conditioning also caused Albert to gain a fear of other objects which resemble a rat (furry or white objects).
These techniques are also used as treatment for phobias or addictions. Aversion therapy is the process where addictions such as addiction to alcohol is linked with something undesirable and unpleasant. An alcoholic would be given a certain tablet which would make them ill if they drank alcohol. This ideally would cure their addiction because every time they drink alcohol they know it would make them ill, therefore they just avoid it completely. Phobias are treated by the person in fear being presented by what it is they fear over and over again and building up a hierarchy of their fear. For example, a person may fear cotton wool, the person would be shown photo after photo of cotton wool, then maybe shown other objects that look like cotton wool, then eventually the person would come into contact with the cotton wool itself. The aim is to remove the undesirable feelings and behaviour towards the object and replacing it with a more desirable one. This is what is known as systematic destination. Other little examples of classical conditioning in day to day life are things like associating a Friday night with eating a take away or eating popcorn whilst watching a film.
The skinner box was used to investigate rewards and punishments on behaviour. Skinner identified three types of responses; neutral operants, reinforces and punishers. The Skinner box, also known as an operant conditioning chamber, was used to expose unconditioned and conditioned stimuli to animals. The Skinner box could be simply designed or more complex with different ways of monitoring and stimuli. The stimuli would include things such as food, coloured lights and response levers that monitor the animal’s behaviour. When Skinner tested classical conditioning on a bird, the bird would be learn to associate a red light with being fed. Eventually the bird would automatically associate the red light with food, therefore the bird would start to peck for the food upon just the sight of the red light.
Skinners theory of Operant conditioning originates from the ideas of Edward Thorndike (1898). He created an experiment using a puzzle box, he placed a cat in this puzzle box and a piece of fish outside of the box to tease the cat and encourage the cat to try and escape. Thorndike timed how long it took the cat to escape and noted all the different routes in which the cat would try to escape so it could get to the food. A lever was also in the box, which if touched would allow the cat to get out, eventually whilst the cat would try to frantically escape the cat would knock the lever allowing it to escape and get the food. This would then be repeated and the cat would be placed back into the box, then each time the time it took for the cat to escape got quicker and quicker because the cat adopted the behaviour of that touching the lever would lead to the food. In conclusion Thorndike believed behaviour that leads to good consequences is likely to be repeated, and behaviour which leads to bad consequences would put an end to that certain behaviour.
Piaget created many experiments to put children’s mental abilities to the test. Piaget introduced a process named schemas, he believed this is the basic building block of intelligence. Schemas is how knowledge is structured in our minds and that development occurred through the reorganisation and construction of these ‘schemas’ through the processes of assimilation and accommodation. Accommodation refers to having a change to an existing schema, while assimilation refers to just adding new information to a schema. Piaget devised four stages of cognitive development and associated them to a person’s ability to understand and assimilate new information. The sensori-motor stage (0-2 years)- the stage the child achieves object permanence, object permanence is a child’s understanding that objects continue to exist even though they are not visable or heard. The pre-operational stage (2-7 years)- children are egocentric; meaning children are unable to see things from another person’s perspective. The concrete operational stage (7-11 years)- Children become less egocentric and better at conservation tasks, Piaget conducted conservation tests on children. The formal operational stage (11years +)- children gain ability to think about abstract concepts, problem solving, they can explore values, philosphies, beliefs and can also think about the past and future. Piaget also studied the way in which children play throughout each stage of cognitive development. During the sensori-motor stage the children play in a way that is named solitary play. Solitary play is the type of play when children play alone and don’t have any interest in playing with other children. Parallel play is next, this is inbetween the stages of sensori-motor and pre-operational, the children play near each other and could be playing the same game however they are not talking or doing the same activity. Co-operative play takes place at the pre-operational stage, children are working together to play a game. Lastly is complex play, this happens at the concrete operational stage, the children are able to make believe e.g. plays and dramas
Piaget tested egocentrism with the three mountain experiment which proved the child was unable to see things from someone else perspective, therefore proving his theory of children being egocentric during the pre-operational stage. Piaget’s conservation tests included testing children on conservation of volume, mass and number. His results from these tests proved that most children showed little understanding of conservation prior to the age of five.
Elizabeth Loftus is also a key figure in cognitive psychology, she studied memory. She believed memory is reconstructive and that most of our memories are unreliable. Loftus studied eye witness testimonies and through the use of leading questions she displayed how it’s possible to distort a person’s memory of an event. She believes memories can become distorted by other information which occurs after the event. Loftus and Palmer (1974) Reconstruction of automobile destruction was the experiment that proved witness testimonies can be unreliable and influenced. They asked people to estimate the speed of motor vehicles using different forms of questions. They did this because the estimation of the speed of a vehicle is something people tend to be quite poor at judging; therefore this might lead them to be more open to suggestion by the phrasing of the question.
Samuel and Bryant devised an experiment to prove that Piaget’s method of asking the same question twice during the conservation tests would encourage the children to change their answer. They did this by exposing the children to different conditions; standard, one judgement and fixed array control. Standard was Piaget’s traditional method of asking a question, then transforming the volume, mass or number, then asking the same question again. One judgement is similar to Piaget’s traditional method, but instead of asking the question twice, the question is only asked once (the post transformation question). Fixed array control is not showing the child the transformation of the volume, mass or number taking place, and just revealing the post transformation instead. After putting these to the test the results proved Samuel and Bryant right, as the children made less mistakes in the one judgement text compared to Piaget’s standard test and the fixed array control.
Martin Hughes also criticised Piaget’s work; he argued Piaget’s test on egocentricity (the three mountains test) was not legitimate as the experiment was too confusing for the child and was made difficult because the child had to match the dolls view with a photograph. Hughes decided to devise a more simple experiment which would be easier for the children to understand- the policeman doll study. The majority of the children were able to get the answers correct, therefore they proved they have lost their egocentric thinking and are fully able to picture things from other perspectives. This shows Piaget underestimated the children’s abilities.
Overall the cognitive and behavioural approaches both try to explain human behaviour. Behaviourists focus on actions that can be observed externally and cognitive theories focus on internal states; how humans process information. Behavioural methods have had a lasting effect and are now used in therapeutic settings to help people learn new skills and behaviours i.e. overcoming addictions or phobias. Piaget’s work generated interest in the development of children and had a lasting impact on the future of education and development of children. Cognitive psychology has helped to explain many aspects of everyday behaviour and experience. It has answered the questions like why people forget things, why they experience visual illusions, and why eyewitness testimony is often inaccurate. Careers such as behavioural and cognitive therapists exist because of these approaches. Behavioural therapists will usually treat disorders such as phobias and obsessions and Cognitive therapists will usually treat emotional disorders, such as depression and will encourage the client to challenge and alter their thought processes to help with their disorder.
by
katrinamcgrath7 (student)
