Covert behaviors are learned via different or the same  principles as overt behaviors?

Why is it important to study covert behavior in human beings?

*Almost became a chemist because there was a need during WWII.

*Studied with Kurt Lewin, the famous gestalt psychologist.

*Became a clinical psychologist

*Served as a psychologist in the U.S. Army and Air Force

4 variables that allow us to predict a person’s behavior in any given situation:

Behavioral potential:

The likelihood a behavior (or emotion) will occur in a particular situation.

What determines the strength of it?

Expectancy:

Person’s assessment of the likely outcome of their behavior.

Generalized expectancies: applied to novel situations. What is the most studied generalized expectancy?

Reinforcement Value:

The value that the potential reinforcers for the behavior hold for the person.

The Psychological Situation:

A person's needs and goals relevant to this particular situation.

Needs and Goals: Need is "a group of behaviors which are related in the sense that they lead to the same or similar reinforcements" (needs are specific to situations)

Most are social in origin, that is their fulfillment depends upon the interpersonal context.

3 Components of needs:

*Studied with Kenneth Spence, behavioral theorist

*Became a clinical psychologist

*Works on building bridges between learning theory and cognitive psychology, and between empirical personality research and clinical practice

Added the "cognitive" to behavioral

Expectations and beliefs important

Expectations and beliefs affect overt behavior as much as situational factors

Internal factors and external events all interact to produce behavior. Behavior is the result of an interacting system of influences.

In turn, behavior affects external & internal factors.

How?

Bandura’s 4-step model of observational learning – what has to happen in order for Person B to imitate the behavior of Model A?

1. Attend

What is attending?

What affects attending?

Something novel about the modeled behavior

The viewer’s mental state (e.g., frustrated people will imitate angry behavior)

2. Remember

The modeled behavior has to have had an impact

The person has to practice – engage in mental rehearsal, voluntarily or not.

Repeated exposure makes it easier to remember

3. Enactment

Requires cognitive organization (mental rehearsal) of the behavior

More likely if they witnessed reinforcement for the model’s behavior

4. Expectation (of reinforcement for the behavior)

Person must expect the behavior to lead to a reward for her or him (we discriminate!)

More likely if I perceive myself as similar to the model who was reinforced.

Children seem to learn from observing adult behavior and mimicking it (e.g., language).

There is a difference, however, between learning and performance.

What is that difference?

Does not look for underlying traits and motives

Looks for controlling conditions - in person and in environment.

Specific behaviors, rather than total personality.

Self-monitoring: Person observes own behavior or emotional responses.

Baseline and change.

    Direct observation of environmental contingencies, controlling conditions.

Behavioral approaches to change reject the psychodynamic, trait and phenomenological approaches to assessment and treatment.

Inspire clinicians and their clients to focus on change.

CHANGING EMOTIONAL REACTIONS (Classical conditioning applications)

Overcoming anxiety.

J. Wolpe devised a technique called systematic desensitization. Based on classical conditioning principles.

3 steps:

1) Establish an anxiety stimulus hierarchy.

2) Relaxation training

3) Associate the feared stimulus and the competing response (relaxation), thereby conditioning new associations. Use imagery to desensitize.

Adding modeling & observational learning: Bandura & his colleagues added: modeling & observational learning techniques

Used videos, still using a hierarchy (from mild to intense). This called vicarious conditioning.

Aversive therapy: Also classical conditioning. For getting rid of undesirable behavior. Pair aversive images with images of undesirable behavior (e.g., smoking, overeating).

CHANGING BEHAVIOR BY MODIFYING CONSEQUENCES (Operant conditioning applications)

Steps (define each):

1) Identify target behavior.

2) Establish a baseline through monitoring.

3) Change contingencies.

4) Continue monitoring for change.

5) Don’t stop with removing reinforcements for undesirable behavior. Continue by ?

Stimulus control. If a certain set of conditions are frequently associated with a problem behavior, person can learn to control/change those stimulus conditions.

Biofeedback. Uses the principles of operant conditioning to help people control their physiological reactions.

Therapeutic communities: Uses principles of reinforcement to teach desirable behaviors & extinguish undesirable ones. Includes token economies.

Contingency contracting: Client makes a deal with self (or therapist) to associate positive contingencies with desirable behavior, and negative ones with undesirable behavior.

Multimodal behavior therapy. A number of problems are multifaceted, and require a variety of approaches. Behavioral treatment techniques can be very flexible, combining principles of classical, operant, and observational learning to create the best combination of interventions for a particular problem or set of problems.

1. Foundation in empirical research

2. Successfully applied to mental health practice.

3. Useful with challenging populations

4. Shorter treatment

1. Fails to account for human complexity

2. Conditioning is a limited learning paradigm & sometimes difficult to implement.