Download PDF Behavior Analysis and Learning by Cheney, Carl D., Pierce, W. David

Sinopsis

The experimental analysis of behavior is a natural-science approach to understanding behavior regulation. Experimental analysis is concerned with controlling and changing the factors affecting the behavior of humans and other animals. For example, a behavioral researcher in a classroom may use a computer to arrange corrective feedback for a student's mathematical performance. The relevant condition that is manipulated or changed by the experimenter may involve presenting corrective feedback on some days and withholding it on others. In this case, the researcher would probably observe more accurate mathematical performance on days when feedback was presented. This simple experiment illustrates one of the most basic principles of behavior—the principle of reinforcement.

The principle of reinforcement (and other behavior principles) provides a scientific account of how people and animals learn complex actions. When a researcher identifies a basic principle that governs behavior, this is called an analysis of behavior. Thus, the experimental analysis of behavior involves specifying the basic processes and principles that regulate the behavior of organisms. Experiments are then used to test the adequacy of the analysis.

Experimental analysis occurs when, for example, a researcher notices that more seagulls fly around a shoreline when people are on the beach than when the beach is deserted. After checking that changes in climate, temperature, time of day, and other conditions do not affect the behavior of the seagulls, the researcher offers the following analysis: People feed the birds and this reinforces flocking to the beach. When the beach is abandoned, the seagulls are no longer fed for congregating on the shoreline. This is a reasonable guess, but it can only be tested by an experiment. Pretend that the behavior analyst owns the beach and has complete control over it. The experiment involves changing the usual relationship between the presence of people and food. Simply stated, people are not allowed to feed the birds, and food is placed on the beach when people are not around. Over time, the behavior analyst notes that there are fewer and fewer seagulls on the beach when people are present, and more and more gulls when the shoreline is deserted. The behaviorist concludes that people regulated coming to the beach because the birds were fed, or reinforced, for this behavior only when people were present. This is one example of an experimental analysis of behavior.

Content

1. A Science of Behavior: Perspective, History, and Assumptions
2. The Experimental Analysis of Behavior
3. Reflexive Behavior and Respondent Conditioning
4. Reinforcement and Extinction of Operant Behavior
5. Schedules of Reinforcement
6. Aversive Control of Behavior
7. Operante Respondent Interrelationships and the Biological Context of Conditioning
8. Stimulus Control
9. Choice and Preference
10. Conditioned Reinforcement
11. Correspondence Relations: Imitation and Rule-Governed Behavior
12. Verbal Behavior
13. Applied Behavior Analysis
14. Three Levels of Selection: Biology, Behavior, and Culture

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