V-+Behaviorism

Radical behaviorism sees “learning as a more or less permanent change in behavior that can be detected by observing an organism over a period of time” (Driscoll, p34). As the proponent of radical behaviorism, B.F. Skinner defined two classes of behavior, //respondent behaviorism //and// operant behaviorism//. The former is extrinsic while the latter intrinsic. Behaviorism proposes principles to manage both kinds of behaviors. The key features of behaviorism are the //S (discriminative stimulus)-R (operant response) -S (contingent stimulus) relationship// and the functional nature of //reinforcement//. The S-R-S relationship provides the framework where all operant learning laws are derived. Contingent stimulus determines what happens to the response. The notion of reinforcement is central to radical behaviorism. The reinforcement, as a consequence of behavior, “functions to enhanced the probability of that behavior reoccurring” (Driscoll, p33).
 * 1. Define and describe the theory and its key features.**

Since there’re two classes of behavior - **Operant behavior **and** Respondent behavior**, I see behaviorism operates in two ways respectively. As for operant behavior, which is already present in the learner’s repertoire to some degree, what is learned is the frequency of the performed behavior. Therefore strengthening and weakening the response is discussed; As for respondent behavior, which does not exist in the learner’s organism repertoire, different principles are defined for acquiring new behaviors. In the following paragraphs, I’ll gave examples of my childhood experiences of learning to play the piano to explain the principles in two situations as well as how to maintain behaviors.
 * 2. How the Theory Operates**

2.1.1 Strengthening a Response: Positive Reinforcement** //Positive reinforcement “refers to the presentation of a reinforcer (satisfying stimulus) contingent upon a response that results in the strengthening of the response”// (Driscoll, p 37). When I practiced and played a piece of piano song fluently and expressively in front of my parents and got the applause and appreciation from them, I felt proud of myself and established self-esteem. Therefore, I would practice harder.
 * 2.1 Strengthening or Weakening Operant Behaviors

It’s paradoxical that a negative reinforcement can strengthen a response. Actually, it works through removing a disgusting stimulus. Though I was supposed to practice playing the piano for three hours a day, it was tough for a child to stick to that. Sometimes I was tired and sick of that and would quit for a day or two. My mother would nag and showed her disappointment to me for a whole day, which made me feel worse. To stop her from doing that, I would sit back in front of the piano, though not that willingly. Anyway, here the negative reinforcement-my mother’s complaint strengthened my response-redeeming practicing playing the piano.
 * 2.1.2 Strengthening a Response: Negative Reinforcement**

“//Punishment is the presentation of an aversive stimulus contingent upon a response that reduces the rate of that response//” (Driscoll, p40). Practice playing the piano for three hours continuously can be torturing for a kid. At times, I would take advantage of moments of going to pee or drinking juice to hang around in the bathroom or the living room for ten minutes. My mother knew my childish trick and required me to make up for the wasted time after three hours past. When I found my trick didn’t work but just to prolong the practice time, I would no longer hide myself in the bathroom or living room any more.
 * 2.1.3 Weakening a Response: Punishment**

Removing reinforcement also functions to weaken a response with the principles of **response cost** and **timeout**. When I practiced a new piece to a degree that I was able to play it pretty fluently. My mother would set a rule: I could finish the daily practice earlier as long as I played the piece with no faults for a couple of times.
 * 2.1.4 Weakening a Response: Reinforcement Removal**

Three principles are defined for teaching new behaviors: Shaping “//refers to the reinforcement of successive approximations to a goal behavior//” (Driscoll, p.44). At the very beginning, the hands and fingers’ gestures and shapes are important. Starting from pressing the central C key, my piano teacher posed my right hand in such a manner as if I were holding an apple (palm down facing the keys of the piano) and make sure my thumb was touching the central C key while the other four fingers touching one key respectively next to each other. After that, she uplifted my wrist gently and slowly to about half-a-foot height above the keyboards. Then she pressed my hand and wrist towards the key until my thumb pressed the central C key exactly. If I failed, I had to redo the past steps; otherwise, I might go on pressing the other keys. To press D key next to central C key on its left, I didn’t uplift my wrist. Instead, I lifted up my forefinger and press the D key, while my hand preserving the apple-holding pose. So it was with the other fingers working on the following keys. After a couple of times of hand-with-hand instruction, I could pose and press the keys in a decent way by myself.
 * 2.2 Teaching New Behaviors**
 * 2.2.1 Principle One: Shaping**

Chaining “//serves to establish complex behaviors made up of discrete simpler behaviors already known to the learner//” (Driscoll, p.47). When I got used to posing my hands and fingers in a natural and elegant manner as well as familiar with the keys (especially those white ones), I went on playing 4 or 8 syllables continuously. I started from the first syllable. After I played it well, I continued with the second one, the third one and so on, until I strung together the 4 or 8 syllables to play a short and simple piece.
 * 2.2.2 Principle Two: Chaining**

In this principle, the desired behavior continues to be reinforced as the discriminative cues - something besides the behavior itself - are gradually withdrawn. One thing that makes piano playing difficult but fantastic is the rising or/and falling tones, when black keys find their voice. While the symbol “#” before a note indicates the rising tone, “b” the falling tone. The two symbols are the “discriminative stimuli” in this situation. Thus, the SD for playing a rising tone is “#” while the SD for playing a falling tone is “b”. In either case, errors my cause ear-unpleasant tones and piece. As the piece I played contain more and more syllables and rising/falling tones appear repeatedly on a certain note(s). The symbols no longer show every time the note appears. Instead, it only shows at the beginning of every line of syllables. Though the SD fades, the desired behavior – playing rising/falling tone continues to be reinforced.
 * 2.2.3 Discrimination Learning and Fading**

Instruction does not only target at bringing about desired changes of behavior but also to maintain them. Reinforcement serves as a catalyst during the process and scheduled in terms of ratio, interval or regularity. I’ll continue with examples from my earlier piano-learning experience. During the first 2-3 years while I was learning and practicing playing the piano, I spent 2-3 hours practicing almost everyday. It was hard and I kind of lost my patience and persistence during the late 2nd and earlier 3rd year.
 * 2.3 Maintaining Behavior**

//Reinforcement is delivered after every desired response//. As a prompt, especially when I approached the 3rd hour of daily practicing or when I was almost able to play a new piece fluently, my mother asked me to have a break after playing a/the certain piece five times (FR5) as long as I made no mistakes (including no false key-pressing and no unexpressed emotions). After the break of about 10 minutes I started playing again.
 * 2.3.1 Fixed Ratio Schedule**

“//Reinforcement is delivered after some fixed period of time//” (Driscoll, p50). For the daily 2-3 hours practicing, I used to have a break of 10 minutes every 50 minutes (FI 45 min) of playing.
 * 2.3.2 Fixed Interval Schedule**

“////T////he time or number of responses required for reinforcement is varied from reinforcement to reinforcement////” (Driscoll, p51). These two kinds of schedules of reinforcement worked well when I practiced playing 4 or 8 syllables during the beginning period. When I learned to play a new piece containing 4 or 8 syllables, since some syllables are easier while others are harder, I started from the first syllable by practicing around 10 times (VR 10) until I controlled it and then moved to the next syllable. When I was able to play the whole short piece fluently, I took a short break of 2-3 minutes every 15 minutes (VI 15 min) playing the whole piece coherently, syllable after syllable, time after time. These two classes of schedules are the most effective and efficient, with the later one even better.
 * 2.3.3 Variable Ratio and Variable Interval Schedules**


 * 3. Demonstrate, show an example, or provide a way for your reader to see the theory in action.**

[] This is a cute example that would demonstrate how the theory works in action. The visitors are seduced to create their own avatars by following the instructions on the web page step by step. To get started, the latest version of Adobe Flash Player is required to download and installed. (Picture 1) The visitors’ “behavior” of jumping in the web page to design a manga avatar is “strengthened” through removing the “negative reinforcement” - Flash Player downloading. Then, the visitors will “design” their own avatar by selecting the options step by step from gender, face, eyes, hairs, clothes, background, etc. Every action the make, they will approach closer to a “face” being more like to their own in the real world. (Picture 2) Finally, they’ll get a cute “mangatar” that reflects their facial features like mine in Picture 3.

Behaviorism contributes to a number of instructional innovations and had a dominant position in the history of learning theories for several decades. It shed lights on classroom teaching, self-control as well as instructional system design and management in organizational environment.
 * 4. Analyze and discuss the theory’s application to instruction (i.e., its importance to learning theory, its strengths for instruction, its weaknesses for instruction, what it does well and not well)**

4.1.1 Group Contingency** In classroom management, teachers often employ the token economy as a **group contingency**. We all have such experience that stickers or toys are given as rewards if we obeyed classroom rules or did well in quizzes when we were kids. Here the stickers or toys are tokens to help teachers achieve their teaching goals and it works very well. Though, keeping a steady supply of those tokens can be money consuming and variables are suggested to keep the students in order.
 * 4.1 Classroom Teaching

Every theory helps the instruction to set goals for instructions. Behaviorism is no exception. The **three-component objective** is popular, which “states the behavior to be demonstrated, the conditions under which the behavior is to be demonstrated, and the criteria governing how well the behavior is to be performed” (Driscoll, p58). Meta-analysis of research witnessed a small positive effect of the objectives, but also noted that objectives tend to orient learners’ attention to certain information and ignore the other information.
 * 4.1.2 Three-component Objective**

It makes use of both behavior modification and instructional objectives. It “sets out the terminal behavior the student is to achieve, along with any conditions for achievement and the consequences for completion (or noncompletion) of the assigned task(s)” (Driscoll, p59). They are particularly helpful in an open educational system where students are from various grade levels. How Dr. Pat implement the task of final project presentation in ITEC 800 course is a good example. ITEC 800 students are people of all walks of life with different level of instructional and teaching experience and theoretical background (I am a green hand in every aspect). Two months before the presentation days, students are supposed to choose a theory to study and give a rough idea about their personal final project. Two weeks after that, a feedback is given to every student on his/her idea and to improve that in a one-page outline of the final project. Similarly, suggestions for improvement on the outlines are given soon so that students can work better in preparation for the final presentation.
 * 4.1.3 Contingency Contracts**

It was proposed when Keller noticed problems with group instruction in classroom. He suggested course materials be broken into units or modules, each with a specific objective. As in ITEC 800 course, Driscoll’s textbook is divided into a dozen of parts to read and feedback is required every week. PSI has the following unique features: //Emphasis on individual study// (Class meets for nearly three hours per week and students are supposed to read the textbook individually) //Self-pacing// (Due date is set for weekly assignment and it’s up to the student to hand it in earlier or later according to their readiness) //Unit mastery requirement// (Key points are listed in the assignment for the students to digest each chapter of the textbook) //Use of proctors// (Not in this case, but it’s common in elementary and secondary education period when a certain students are chosen to help the teacher to score other students’ quiz) //Supplementary instructional techniques// (Back to ITEC 800 course, Driscoll’s textbook is not read chapter after chapter in the order listed in the book. Sometimes, a chapter in the later part in the book or extra materials will jump in.) It’s for sure that preparing for PSI is time-consuming and energy consuming. Some students may be unable to meet the criterion. And self-pacing permits procrastination. Though it’s not necessarily happening in the ITEC 800 course.
 * 4.1.4 Personalized System of Instruction (PSI)**

Behaviorism contributes to the notion of teaching machines and programmed instruction. Behavioral principles are applied to teaching academic skills through programmed instruction in small steps- frames and branching. With the development of computer technology, computer-based programmed instruction allows the teaching materials to involve more complex branching sequences and graphics as well as text, which is beyond the capacity of the textbook. Though it is not portable as textbook and tends to be monologue.
 * 4.1.5 Teaching Machines to Computer-Based Instruction**

Behaviorism is one of the primary origins of performance technology and contributes “an emphasis on observable performance and the importance of incentives in shaping behavior” (Driscoll, p 62). Planning for performance improvement shape the embryonic form of the modern and popular ADDIE model in job training. Step 1: Analysis - //Determine desired performance and the gap between what is and what should be.// Step 2: Design - I//dentify appropriate rewards and incentives for performance.// Step 3: Development - //Generate a plan for communicating performance goals and implementing incentives.// Step 4: Implement - //Carry out the plan.// Step 5: Evaluate - //Evaluate results and revise as necessary.//
 * 4.2 In Organizational Systems**

As far as I understand behaviorism, it is a theory that attempts to interpret an extrinsic behavior (no matter human’s or the animal’s) from the outside reinforcements and intrinsic response contingent on the reinforcements. It also offers the paradigm for teaching and maintaining a behavior based on the S-R-S framework. I chose it to analyze because behaviorism can get its voice heard everywhere. Turning on the microwave to head a breakfast, driving to work obeying the traffic rules, having a wonderful class, and cooking a nice dinner, etc., you name it, there is a behaviorist interpretation of that. It’s too popular to be ignored and too basic to understand fully. The way that behaviorism operates supplies nice framework to implement self-control. As an ITEC student, I use computer all day long, focusing on the LCD screen for a success of hours especially when I’m doing graphic design, which is pretty harmful to my eyes. So I use the EyeGuard computer software to lock the computer for 10 minutes every 50 minutes so I have to take a break. I also try to establish good studying habit based on the variable ratio schedule rather than on fixed interval schedule. For instance, I used to have a snack, a fruit or a stretch approximately every hour while reading ITEC 800 textbook. Since it’s very challenging for me and food and relaxation are like stimulus to me. But it was not effective because I account on minutes. So I shifted to setting small goals like reading a session, taking down notes and giving an example. I would give myself a reward every time I gained the goals. Its application to performance technology in organizational systems sets profound theoretical foundations for the modern ADDIE model, which gives me an effective and systematic reference in instructional design.
 * 5. Give your personal understanding of the theory, why you chose it to analyze, what it means for you or your practice, etc.**