Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Shaping sometimes fails. An oft-cited example is an attempt by Marian and Keller Breland (students of B.F. Skinner) to shape a pig and a raccoon to deposit a coin in a piggy bank, using food as the reinforcer. Instead of learning to deposit the coin, the pig began to root it into the ground, and the raccoon "washed" and rubbed the coins together.
Skinner made some very effective criticisms of traditional teaching methods. [23] His scheme of programmed instruction was to present the material as part of a "schedule of reinforcement" in typical behaviourist manner. The programmed text of Skinner's theory of behaviorism is the most complete example of his ideas in action. [24]
A central method was the [1] examination of functional relations between environment and behavior, as opposed to hypothetico-deductive learning theory [2] that had grown up in the comparative psychology of the 1920–1950 period. Skinner's approach was characterized by observation of measurable behavior which could be predicted and controlled.
B. F. Skinner was responsible for a different type of machine which used his ideas on how learning should be directed with positive reinforcement. [8] Skinner advocated the use of teaching machines for a broad range of students (e.g., preschool aged to adult) and instructional purposes (e.g., reading and music).
Shaping is a conditioning method often used in animal training and in teaching nonverbal humans. It depends on operant variability and reinforcement, as described above. The trainer starts by identifying the desired final (or "target") behavior.
The machine embodies key elements of Skinner's theory of learning and had important implications for education in general and classroom instruction in particular. [45] In one incarnation, the machine was a box that housed a list of questions that could be viewed one at a time through a small window. (see picture.)
Skinner box. An operant conditioning chamber (also known as a Skinner box) is a laboratory apparatus used to study animal behavior. The operant conditioning chamber was created by B. F. Skinner while he was a graduate student at Harvard University. The chamber can be used to study both operant conditioning and classical conditioning. [1] [2]
Notably Skinner argued that positive reinforcement is superior to punishment in shaping behavior. [8] Though punishment may seem just the opposite of reinforcement, Skinner claimed that they differ immensely, saying that positive reinforcement results in lasting behavioral modification (long-term) whereas punishment changes behavior only ...