Week 2
Behaviorism puts an emphasis on observable behavior while disregarding internal mental process and emotions. Through this process, learning occurs through interactions of the learner’s environment and is primarily driven by reinforcement and external stimuli.
The Top 4 Most Influential Researchers Who Contributed to Behaviorism
1874 -1949
1878 - 1958
Edward Thorndike is considered the first out of the four theorists to study operant conditioning. His two major theories are considered the foundation of behaviorism. His famous study included the law of cause and effect. In this experiment, cats were placed in a box and once a lever was pushed by the cat, they would receive food. After completing the experiment multiple times, the time decreases for each cat to push down the lever to receive their reward of food. When connecting teaching and learning, the law of cause-and-effect states that behavior followed by positive results will likely be repeated and negative behavior will slowly disappear.
John Watson is known as the first psychologist to use humans in experiments. His famous experiment involved a 9-month-old toddler boy, named Albert. Albert was presented with many unfamiliar animals and items. When initially presented with the various items and animals he showed no fear. The experiment incorporated a sharp noise of a steel bar being struck; this took place when Albert touched the rat. When this happened, Albert crawled away and cried. Albert was then afraid to touch the rat, which he was not prior to the loud sharp noise. As a result, Albert became hesitant around the rat. When making connections to behaviorism and Watson’s experiment, it proves that learning had occurred when Albert’s environment was controlled as his behavior had changed after the loud sharp noise.
1904-1990
1849 - 1936
B.F. Skinner’s research was extensive on operant conditioning. He believed that behavior is either random or a reaction to the environment. His research was well known as the “skinner box”, where rats were tested and when the rat hit a lever in the box then food was released. Through his experiments, he concluded that behaviors followed by positive outcomes are more likely to be repeated, while behaviors that result in negative consequences are less likely to occur. This is known as reinforcement.
Ivan Pavlov is known for his work with conditioning dogs. At the start of his experiment, he realized that the dogs began to salivate when hearing him walking down the stairs prior to the arrival of their food. He then played a tone when he fed the dogs and the dogs learned to salivate at the sound of the tone even without the presence of food. The dogs had associated the sound with food. This was known as the conditional reflex. When making the connection between Pavlov’s findings and behaviorism this shows how controlled changes to a subject’s environment can affect the subject’s observable behavior.
When implementing behaviorism in instructional design it must be assumed that the knowledge or skills to be acquired are objective, meaning there is only one correct answer or specific process to follow. Facts and standardized procedures are examples of “objective” knowledge.
The instructional designer should carefully consider specific techniques that can be utilized for behavioristic E-Learning activities.
Please see a list of techniques which be utilized below:
Discrimination- Use discrimination whenever the learning objective requires learners to identify if a concept belongs. A drag and drop exercise is an example of the discrimination technique.
Generalization- This technique is used after identifying the attributes of an item belonging to one category that are expected to assign the same attribute to all items within the category.
Association- This technique can be used when the learning objective requires newly presented information to be linked to specific application. An example of the association technique is a matching exercise.
Chaining- This technique is met through repetition and online practice where learners can reach the desired outcome at the end by following the steps exactly as presented. An example of the chaining technique is the drag and drop.
Strengths
Behaviorism has the potential to promote active engagement and self-regulation. Behaviorism involves the ability to clearly observe and measure behaviors. Behaviorism is easier to collect data on and can provide immediate feedback.
​
Limitations
One of the biggest limitations to behaviorism is its inability to allow learners to develop a higher level of skills such as problem solving or decision making. Behaviorism is objective and not subjective; facts and standardized procedures are examples of “objective knowledge”. Therefore, it does not account for other types of learning, especially for learning that does not utilize punishment and reward.
Learning Scenario
For my learning scenario I will be teaching a social worker on the process of clinical documentation in the agency’s electronic health record. This specific social worker has received several infractions from the state which have resulted in several paybacks. Behaviorism will be utilized as the primary learning theory as the new process can only be completed one way (objective).
During the facilitation process of the lesson, I will incorporate Gagne’s 9 events of instruction.
I would first gain the learner’s attention by stating a fact to gain the their attention. The fact will include a specific dollar amount that was paid back to the state due to their inability to properly follow the agency’s clinical documentation process.
The learner will be introduced to the objective of the lesson. This will be kept short in a way learners understand the purpose and importance of the lesson.
The learner will be stimulated to access what they already know. They will be asked what they know about infractions resulting in paybacks and its impact on the agency and their job security.
The learner will then be taught the clinical documentation process. As the instructor I will be assessing and verifying the learner’s understanding of the material by asking questions throughout the lesson and providing feedback. Positive feedback will be given when the learner has grasped the information correctly.
After the lesson has been taught, the learner will be given a case study and asked to perform the clinical documentation process independently. The leaner will be provided with immediate feedback.
After the lesson, social workers will be asked to complete the new clinical documentation independently over the next week and their supervisors will check their work to ensure the retention of new information. The learner will also be given a job aid to utilize when completing the clinical documentation process.
This work is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0