Summarise_and_Evaluate_Two_Approaches_in_Psychology_Which_Attempt_to_Explain_Human_Behaviour.

There are four main approaches that attempt to explain human behaviour, Behaviourism, Cognitive, Biological and Humanistic. The Biological Approach looks at the relationship between biology, behaviour and mental processes. It is a very scientific approach and believes nature over nurture. The Humanistic Approach was developed in the 1960’s to replace behaviourism and psychoanalysis. It is focused on an individual’s potential and believes in growth and self-actualisation. In this assignment the Cognitive and Behaviourism Approaches will be described and critically evaluated, including strengths and weaknesses. Cognitive Psychology studies mental processors of how people think, remember, perceive and learn. Information is acquired through our five senses, processed and stored in our memory. It is subsequently used in developing theories and decision making, enabling us to make sense of our environment in a logical and organised way. It is 50% nature and 50% nurture. Cognitive Development was pioneered by Jean Piaget (1896-1680) as an alternative to the behaviourist approach by trying to explain though processes involved. His theory attempted to describe how children learn and adapt to the world through constant interactions. He suggested that there were two main processors of importance: accommodation, where the individual adjusts to fit with their environment, and assimilation where the outside world is tailored to the individual. Piaget argued that a child’s cognitive development will pass through four stages, described below: Sensorimotor Stage – (0-2yrs) in which the child interacts with their environment through manipulating objects. Pre-Operational – (2-7yrs) in which the child’s thinking is dominated by perception. The child becomes more capable of symbolic functioning, but is still influenced by their own environment. Language development occurs in this phase. Concrete Operational – (7-11yrs) in which the child can only apply logical reasoning to objects that are real or can be seen. The Formal Operations Stage – (11-16yrs +) in which the child can now think logically about events or abstract ideas. One of the strengths of Piaget’s theory is that it is still considered to be the most comprehensive and detailed analysis of children. His ideas have greatly influenced teaching methods, determining what should be taught to children within their various Piagetian stages and how it should be taught. Unlike other theorists he included the biological factors such as the maturity of the brain and environmental interaction in the development of intelligence. He was the first theorist to explain how a child’s cognitive ability develops over time, categorising the development stages. Although not 100% accurate most theorists agree with the categorisations and sub-divisions and used this information to further develop and expand on his work. Although we have described three strengths of Piaget’s theory there are also a number of weaknesses. It was initially developed by observation of he’s own children and a small number of other children with the same social backgrounds and upbringing. His findings based on this narrow sample were then applied to a general population without him attempting to provide supporting evidence. Later research discovered that ecological and cultural factors did not influence the sequence of stages but did have an effect on the rate at which they were attained. He used the clinical method rather than a scientific one. The experimenter discussed tasks with the child, making substantial demands on the child’s language skills. The result was that Piaget generally underestimated the child’s cognitive abilities. Donaldson (1978) “suggests that Piaget’s tasks do not make human-sense to children” (Gorman, 2004, p78). Similarly he often misjudged a child’s capability as the tasks set were overly complicated. When Peter Bryant simplified some of Piaget’s experiments he found that children under five were capable of logical thought. Later researchers also discovered that most teenagers do not reach the formal operational stage, suggesting that formal reasoning was not the natural end point of cognitive development. Overall Piaget’s work has paved the way for other research and has massively affected teaching methods globally. According to (Dansen, 1994) “Despite remaining a vital source of influence and inspiration, both in psychology and education, today there are hardly any ‘orthodox’ Piagetians left” (Gross, 2005, p582) The behavioural approach is based on explaining an individual’s behaviour through observation and learning from the environment, it is a100% nurture. It was influenced by the philosophy of EMPIRICISM (all knowledge comes from the environment and the scientific procedures of the physical sciences). John B Watson began the behaviourism movement in 1913. He wrote an article based upon the work of Pavlov, Thorndike and Skinner. In 1920 Ivan Pavlov conducted research into classical conditioning which is based upon the idea of learning by association. His study involved training a dog to form an association between a neutral stimulus (bell) and an unconditioned stimulus (food). After several feeding in which the bell was rung, Pavlov rang the bell without presenting any food (conditioned stimulus) and found that the dog still salivated (conditioned response). Shortly afterwards John B Watson applied Pavlov’s classical conditional study to a human subject. The case of little Albert involved conditioning a young child to be afraid of a white rat by creating an association with a loud noise. Initially Albert showed no fear of the rat and a number of other stimuli, but after repeated exposure to the rat while striking a steel bar with a hammer behind his head he created an association and began to show fear. Eventually Albert became afraid of the rat without the conditioned stimulus. Through generalisation, Albert became afraid of other white fury objects, such as cotton wool and fur coat. In 1940 B F Skinner conducted detailed studies of operant conditioning based on Thorndike’s (1911) law of effect. He developed a chamber in which a small animal would learn a specific response and consequences would follow a particular behaviour. He used reinforcement, the process in which the animal is rewarded for behaviour and can take one of two forms. Positive reinforcement is anything pleasurable which increases the probability of a response and negative reinforcement is the removal of anything unpleasant which increases the probability of a response. Punishment is the opposite of reinforcement and was used to reduce the probability of an event occurring. Behaviour which is reinforced tends to be repeated while that which is not tends to be extinguished. According to (Skinner 1938) “behaviour is shaped and maintained by its consequences” (Gorman, 2004, p110). Albert Bandura developed the social learning theory by expanding on the learning theory, including classical and operant condition, suggesting that all behaviour is learned by watching and imitation others. In 1960 he conducted a study of aggression through imitation using a Bobo doll and he concluded that children would imitate observed actions. “Bandura exaggerated the extent to which children imitate the behaviour of models. Children are likely to imitate aggressive behaviour towards a doll, but they are much less likely to imitate aggressive behaviour towards another child. Bandura consistently failed to distinguish between real aggression and play fighting, and it is likely that much of the aggressive behaviour observed by Bandura was only play fighting (Durkin, 1995) (Eysenck, 2006, p77) One of the weaknesses of the learning theory is that most of the studies were carried out on animals. Humans and animals may not always react in the same way and so the findings may not always be easily transferable. The behaviourism approach purposely excludes internal influences. It does not consider the impact of cognitive processes on behaviour or the effect of the individual’s emotional state. Humans, in particular, are able to manipulate their position during the learning theory so that they can adopt the positive behaviour in order to receive the reward before reverting back. For example you could persuade someone to say that the world was flat by continuing to reward them but it would not alter their internal knowledge that the earth is actually round. In practice behavioural therapy addresses the symptoms of a condition rather than the route cause. Positives to the behaviourism approach are that it is a very scientific and methodical form of research conducted under well controlled environments. Responses are observable, repeatable and easily recorded The practice of behaviourism is wide spread. Parents and teachers alike will use positive and negative reinforcements to influence a child’s behaviour whether or not they are aware of the theory behind it. The learning approach has resulted in behavioural therapies designed to help promote healthier behaviours and treating phobias. The principles have also enhanced our understanding of many social issues. Overall the behavioural approach is unbiased and remained popular until 1950’s when the humanistic and cognitive approaches gained favour. In conclusion, the behaviourist approach gave a good understanding of how behaviour could be altered through a variety of methods but omitted a number of key influences. The cognitive approach took into consideration the mind and mental processes which go into decision making effecting behaviours but it did not consider cultural and social aspects. These four approaches attempt to describe how behaviour develops in individuals and parts of each are still in use today.