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Personality Theorists
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2. SIGMEUND FROID
Freud went on to develop theories about the unconscious mind and the mechanism of
repression, and established the field of verbal psychotherapy by creating psychoanalysis, a
clinical method for treating psychopathology through dialogue between a patient (or
"analysand") and a psychoanalyst. Though psychoanalysis has declined as a therapeutic
practice, it has helped inspire the development of many other forms of psychotherapy, some
diverging from Freud's original ideas and approach. Freud postulated the existence of libido (an
energy with which mental process and structures are invested), developed therapeutic
techniques such as the use of free association (in which patients report their thoughts without
reservation and make no attempt to concentrate while doing so), discovered the transference
(the process by which patients displace on to their analysts feelings based on their experience
of earlier figures in their lives) and established its central role in the analytic process, and
proposed that dreams help to preserve sleep by representing as fulfilled wishes that would
otherwise awake the dreamer.
PSYCHOSEXUAL DEVELOPMENT-
Freud advanced a theory of personality development that centred on the effects of the sexual
pleasure drive on the individual psyche. At particular points in the developmental process, he
claimed, a single body part is particularly sensitive to sexual, erotic stimulation. These
erogenous zones are the mouth, the anus, and the genital region. The child's libido centers on
behaviour affecting the primary erogenous zone of his age; he cannot focus on the primary
erogenous zone of the next stage without resolving the developmental conflict of the
immediate one.
A child at a given stage of development has certain needs and demands, such as the need of
the infant to nurse. Frustration occurs when these needs are not met; Overindulgence stems
from such an ample meeting of these needs that the child is reluctant to progress beyond the
stage. Both frustration and overindulgence lock some amount of the child's libido permanently
into the stage in which they occur; both result in a fixation. If a child progresses normally
through the stages, resolving each conflict and moving on, then little libido remains invested in
each stage of development. But if he fixates at a particular stage, the method of obtaining
satisfaction which characterized the stage will dominate and affect his adult personality.
The Oral Stage
The oral stage begins at birth, when the oral cavity is the primary focus of libidal energy. The
child, of course, preoccupies himself with nursing, with the pleasure of sucking and accepting
things into the mouth. The oral character who is frustrated at this stage, whose mother refused
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3. to nurse him on demand or who truncated nursing sessions early, is characterized by
pessimism, envy, suspicion and sarcasm. The overindulged oral character, whose nursing urges
were always and often excessively satisfied, is optimistic, gullible, and is full of admiration for
others around him. The stage culminates in the primary conflict of weaning, which both
deprives the child of the sensory pleasures of nursing and of the psychological pleasure of being
cared for, mothered, and held. The stage lasts approximately one and one-half years.
The Anal Stage
At one and one-half years, the child enters the anal stage. With the advent of toilet training
comes the child's obsession with the erogenous zone of the anus and with the retention or
expulsion of the faeces. This represents a classic conflict between the id, which derives pleasure
from expulsion of bodily wastes, and the ego and superego, which represent the practical and
societal pressures to control the bodily functions. The child meets the conflict between the
parent's demands and the child's desires and physical capabilities in one of two ways: Either he
puts up a fight or he simply refuses to go. The child who wants to fight takes pleasure in
excreting maliciously, perhaps just before or just after being placed on the toilet. If the parents
are too lenient and the child manages to derive pleasure and success from this expulsion, it will
result in the formation of an anal expulsive character. This character is generally messy,
disorganized, reckless, careless, and defiant. Conversely, a child may opt to retain faeces,
thereby spiting his parents while enjoying the pleasurable pressure of the built-up faeces on his
intestine. If this tactic succeeds and the child is overindulged, he will develop into an anal
retentive character. This character is neat, precise, orderly, careful, stingy, withholding,
obstinate, meticulous, and passive-aggressive. The resolution of the anal stage, proper toilet
training, permanently affects the individual propensities to possession and attitudes towards
authority. This stage lasts from one and one-half to two years.
The Phallic Stage
The phallic stage is the setting for the greatest, most crucial sexual conflict in Freud's model of
development. In this stage, the child's erogenous zone is the genital region. As the child becomes
more interested in his genitals, and in the genitals of others, conflict arises. The conflict, labelled
the Oedipus complex (The Electra complex in women), involves the child's unconscious desire
to possess the opposite-sexed parent and to eliminate the same-sexed one.
In the young male, the Oedipus conflict stems from his natural love for his mother, a love which
becomes sexual as his libidos energy transfers from the anal region to his genitals. Unfortunately
for the boy, his father stands in the way of this love. The boy therefore feels aggression and envy
towards this rival, his father, and also feels fear that the father will strike back at him. As the boy
has noticed that women, his mother in particular, have no penises, he is struck by a great fear that
his father will remove his penis, too. The anxiety is aggravated by the threats and discipline he
incurs when caught masturbating by his parents. This castration anxiety outstrips his desire for
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4. his mother, so he represses the desire. Moreover, although the boy sees that though he cannot
posses his mother, because his father does, he canposses her vicariously by identifying with his
father and becoming as much like him as possible: this identification indoctrinates the boy into
his appropriate sexual role in life. A lasting trace of the Oedipal conflict is the superego, the
voice of the father within the boy. By thus resolving his incestuous conundrum, the boy passes
into the latency period, a period of libidal dormancy.
On the Electra complex, Freud was more vague. The complex has its roots in the little girl's
discovery that she, along with her mother and all other women, lack the penis which her father
and other men posses. Her love for her father then becomes both erotic and envious, as she
yearns for a penis of her own. She comes to blame her mother for her perceived castration, and is
struck by penis envy, the apparent counterpart to the boy's castration anxiety. The resolution of
the Electra complex is far less clear-cut than the resolution of the Oedipus complex is in males;
Freud stated that the resolution comes much later and is never truly complete. Just as the boy
learned his sexual role by identifying with his father, so the girl learns her role by identifying
with her mother in an attempt to posses her father vicariously. At the eventual resolution of the
conflict, the girl passes into the latency period, though Freud implies that she always remains
slightly fixated at the phallic stage.
Fixation at the phallic stage develops a phallic character, who is reckless, resolute, self-assured,
and narcissistic--excessively vain and proud. The failure to resolve the conflict can also cause a
person to be afraid or incapable of close love; Freud also postulated that fixation could be a root
cause of homosexuality.
Latent Stage
The resolution of the phallic stage leads to the latency period, which is not a psychosexual stage
of development, but a period in which the sexual drive lies dormant. Freud saw latency as a
period of unparalleled repression of sexual desires and erogenous impulses. During the latency
period, children pour this repressed libidal energy into asexual pursuits such as school, athletics,
and same-sex friendships. But soon puberty strikes, and the genitals once again become a central
focus of libidal energy.
The Genital Stage
In the genital stage, as the child's energy once again focuses on his genitals, interest turns to
heterosexual relationships. The less energy the child has left invested in unresolved psychosexual
developments, the greater his capacity will be to develop normal relationships with the opposite
sex. If, however, he remains fixated, particularly on the phallic stage, his development will be
troubled as he struggles with further repression and defenses.
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5. THE ID, EGO AND SUPEREGO
ID
According to Freud, we are born with our Id. The id is an important part of our personality
because as newborns, it allows us to get our basic needs met. Freud believed that the id is based
on our pleasure principle. In other words, the id wants whatever feels good at the time, with no
consideration for the reality of the situation. When a child is hungry, the id wants food, and
therefore the child cries. When the child needs to be changed, the id cries. When the child is
uncomfortable, in pain, too hot, too cold, or just wants attention, the id speaks up until his or her
needs are met.
The id doesn't care about reality, about the needs of anyone else, only its own satisfaction. If you
think about it, babies are not real considerate of their parents' wishes. They have no care for
time, whether their parents are sleeping, relaxing, eating dinner, or bathing. When the id wants
something, nothing else is important.
EGO
Within the next three years, as the child interacts more and more with the world, the second part
of the personality begins to develop. Freud called this part the Ego. The ego is based on the
reality principle. The ego understands that other people have needs and desires and that
sometimes being impulsive or selfish can hurt us in the long run. Its the ego's job to meet the
needs of the id, while taking into consideration the reality of the situation.
SUPEREGO
By the age of five, or the end of the phallic stage of development, the Superego develops. The
Superego is the moral part of us and develops due to the moral and ethical restraints placed on us
by our caregivers. Many equate the superego with the conscience as it dictates our belief of right
and wrong.
In a healthy person, according to Freud, the ego is the strongest so that it can satisfy the needs of
the id, not upset the superego, and still take into consideration the reality of every situation. Not
an easy job by any means, but if the id gets too strong, impulses and self gratification take over
the person's life. If the superego becomes to strong, the person would be driven by rigid morals,
would be judgmental and unbending in his or her interactions with the world.
DEFENSE MECHANISMS USED BY THE EGO
DENIAL
Denial is characterized by having a conscious awareness at some level, but simply denies the
reality of the experience by pretending it is not there. An example: a person who faints at a
horrible real-life occurrence, such as the death of a loved one. Or, that same person might
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6. intellectually know that a person has died but refuses to ―accept it‖ while she may still wait for 5
o‘clock, the usual time her husband came home from work. On a lighter note, a student may
refuse to pick up her final grade from a difficult class because she knows it is not an acceptable
grade. She simply denies the reality of the grade. As a defense mechanism, denial becomes more
difficult to maintain as one matures. Its use requires much energy and the mind looks at other
possibilities of defense.
REPRESSION
This is the cornerstone of Freud‘s theory. The unconscious purpose of repression operates in a
person who is not able to recall a threatening situation or may completely forget that an abusive
person ever was a part of his/her life. To repress a particular event or person is also called
motivated forgetting. Phobias can be examples of repression because the person has an
unreasonable fear but may have no idea how it originated.
DISPLACEMENT
Displacement means the reassignment of some kind of aggression to a scapegoat to relieve the
tension of the situation. If a man has had a gruelling day at work, he may go home and alleviate
his tension by kicking the dog, or shouting at his wife. The dog and the wife are safe
substitutions for his release. Or, a woman may be attracted to her supervisor at work, but because
she cannot satisfy that impulse, instead, she can safely relate sexually with her own husband.
REGRESSION
Regression involves a movement back in developmental time to when a person felt safe and
secure. Often, that is childhood. This explains why an older child will suddenly begin again to
wet the bed or suck his thumb when the new baby comes home. Or, why a college student, away
from home for the first time, will want to bring her teddy bear with her. Conversely, that same
college student would exhibit regression by throwing a tantrum. A person who has suffered a
difficult divorce or death of a spouse may want to revisit the home of his/her childhood – those
tender years before pain overruled all other feelings.
SUBLIMATION
Sublimation is the driving force behind human aggression. A successful football linebacker may
have a huge amount of anger that becomes useful when he is playing the game. That same person
could direct his energies into a trade such as butcher in a meat market. A person with a great
need for order and security may become a business person or a scientist. Freud perceived a great
deal of sublimation operating in the literary and art worlds.
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7. RATIONALIZATION
This defense simply involves making excuses to defend the behavior, or defend how you might
feel about it. If a woman has been rejected from a man she might admire, she can rationalize that
he is ―no good, anyway.‖ If the car that you had been wanting is no longer available, you might
rationalize, or ―talk yourself into‖ the fact that you really didn‘t like it that much anyway.
Another example: saying, ―Well, everybody else does it‖ when perhaps, referring to a behavior
like parking in no-parking zones, or cheating on your tax reports.
PROJECTION
Projection is attributing your own unacceptable impulses to someone else. The impulses are still
judged unacceptable but they belong to someone else, not you. At that point you are free to
criticize that person for having such terrible impulses. The final result is that you no longer feel
threatened and you can maintain your self-esteem by ignoring an objectionable aspect of
yourself.
REACTION FORMATION
This defense goes a step further than projection to the point of not even acknowledging
unwanted impulses or thoughts and convincing yourself you are not one of ―them‖ who do
engage in those patterns. For instance, because a person totally rejects the idea of war, he may
become a pacifist. Because he is afraid of war, he is changing his hatred of war into exactly the
opposite – a love for peace. Freud called this ―going overboard.‖ Imagine, Freud going
overboard! One example might describe a man who is secretly gay, but engages in many
heterosexual affairs in deliberate attempts to disguise his homosexuality. He feels his secret is
safe, cloaked in his outrageous promiscuous behaviour.
CARL JUNG
In 1907, Carl Jung met Sigmund Freud in Vienna. Jung had been interested in Freud‘s ideas
regarding the interpretation of dreams. Likewise, Freud took an interest to Jung‘s word
association task that he used to understand the unconscious processes of patients. In fact, Freud
invited Jung along for his now-famous appearance at the Clark conference in 1909, Freud‘s first
trip to America.
After some argument over the validity of psychoanalysis, Jung and Freud went their separate
ways, and Jung went on to develop the analytical psychology, which differentiated the personal
unconscious from the collective unconscious, which reflects the shared unconscious thoughts
among humans. Another notable contribution to psychology involves Jung's personality theory,
which was particularly notable due to its definitions of introversion and extroversion.
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8. Jung’s Introversion and Extroversion Attitudes
The first of Jung‘s general psychological types was the general attitude type. An attitude,
according to Jung, is a person‘s predisposition to behave in a particular way. There are two
opposing attitudes: introversion and extroversion. The two attitudes work as opposing, yet
complementary forces and are often depicted as the classing yin and yang symbol.
The introvert is most aware of his or her inner world. While the external world is still perceived,
it is not pondered as seriously as inward movement of psychic energy. The introverted attitude is
more concerned with subjective appraisal and often gives more consideration to fantasies and
dreams.
The extrovert, by contrast, is characterized by the outward movement of psychic energy. This
attitude places more importance on objectivity and gains more influence from the surrounding
environment than by inner cognitive processes.
Clearly, it is not a case of one versus the other. Many people carry qualities of both attitudes,
considering both subjective and objective information.
Jung’s Four Functions of Personality
For Carl Jung, there were four functions that, when combined with one of his two attitudes,
formed the eight different personality types. The first function — feeling — is the method by
which a person understands the value of conscious activity. Another function — thinking —
allows a person to understand the meanings of things. This process relies on logic and careful
mental activity.
The final two functions — sensation and intuition — may seem very similar, but there is an
important distinction. Sensation refers to the means by which a person knows something exists
and intuition is knowing about something without conscious understanding of where that
knowledge comes from.
The Eight Personality Types Defined by Carl Jung
Jung developed a theory of eight different personality types. Jung's personality types are as
follows:
Extroverted Thinking – Jung theorized that people understand the world through a mix of
concrete ideas and abstract ones, but the abstract concepts are ones passed down from
other people. Extroverted thinkers are often found working in the research sciences and
mathematics.
Introverted Thinking – These individuals interpret stimuli in the environment through a
subjective and creative way. The interpretations are informed by internal knowledge and
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9. understanding. Philosophers and theoretical scientists are often introverted thinking-
oriented people.
Extroverted Feeling – These people judge the value of things based on objective fact.
Comfortable in social situations, they form their opinions based on socially accepted
values and majority beliefs. They are often found working in business and politics.
Introverted Feeling – These people make judgments based on subjective ideas and on
internally established beliefs. Oftentimes they ignore prevailing attitudes and defy social
norms of thinking. Introverted feeling people thrive in careers as art critics.
Extroverted Sensing – These people perceive the world as it really exists. Their
perceptions are not colored by any pre-existing beliefs. Jobs that require objective review,
like wine tasters and proofreaders, are best filled by extroverted sensing people.
Introverted Sensing – These individuals interpret the world through the lens of subjective
attitudes and rarely see something for only what it is. They make sense of the
environment by giving it meaning based on internal reflection. Introverted sensing people
often turn to various arts, including portrait painting and classical music.
Extroverted Intuitive – These people prefer to understand the meanings of things through
subliminally perceived objective fact rather than incoming sensory information. They
rely on hunches and often disregard what they perceive directly from their senses.
Inventors that come upon their invention via a stroke of insight and some religious
reformers are characterized by the extraverted intuitive type.
Introverted Intuitive – These individuals, Jung thought, are profoundly influenced by
their internal motivations even though they do not completely understand them. They
find meaning through unconscious, subjective ideas about the world. Introverted intuitive
people comprise a significant portion of mystics, surrealistic artists, and religious
fanatics.
Applying Jung’s Orientations to a Complete Personality
A person is not usually defined by only one of the eight personality types. Instead, the different
functions exist in a hierarchy. One function will take have a superior effect and another will have
a secondary effect. Usually, according to Jung, a person only makes significant use of two
functions. The other two take inferior positions.
In his 1921 work, Psychological Types, Jung compared his four functions of personality to the
four points on a compass. While a person faces one direction, he or she still uses the other points
as a guide. Most people keep one function as the dominant one although some people may
develop two over a lifetime. It is only the person who achieves self-realization that has
completely developed all four functions.
ALFRED ADLER
I found the theoretical tenets given by Alfred Adler very practical and easy to understand. His
theories are not concentrated on one concept like Freud‘s sexuality or Jung‘s mythology. I could
relate to his believe that all people need not behave in a certain way under certain circumstances,
nothing about human personality is necessary. Some people do discard his theory of ―striving for
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10. perfection‖ as it is not a measurable aspect but it is not necessary that all the concepts a theory
uses must be measurable. I like Alfred Adler as I can find sense in his theories.
Theoretical Tenets and their implications to self growth and interpersonal relations:
He advocated that there is a single motivation force behind all our actions and behaviours
and that is ―striving for perfection‖. We all have desires and we tend to fulfil them and
get close to perfection. The word ‗Perfection‘ is considered to have negative connotations
as many philosophers think that people spend a miserable life trying to be perfect but
Adler takes the positive side of it and he gave many phrase like aggression drive,
compensation etc before coming down to this phrase.
He followed ―holism‖ approach which says that an individual needs to be understood
taking into account the physical and social environment he lives in.
In contrast to Freud, he saw motivation as a way to move towards future instead of past
being the driver of the present. This is called Teleology which took away the necessity
out of things as talked about earlier.
He gave the birth order theory, which says that the youngest child is more likely to be
pampered and the first child is likely to be more authoritative whereas the second child is
likely to have more social interest.
The ways in which we can use these insights in an organization:
Adler‘s social interest theory needs to be kept in mind while we formulate policies for the
employees in an organization. Every individual has a sense of caring for the family, for
community, for society, for humanity and for life. They have a need to be useful to others. An
individual cannot be seen in isolation (holism), he cannot be expected to just work without
fulfilling his social needs. He needs to be motivated to draw him towards the goals of the
organization. Almost all individuals have some of the other inferiority in them so as HR
professionals we need to understand their competencies so that they can compensate for the
inferiorityby performing well in something else. While recruiting people, we may keep in mind
the psychological types given by Adler and look for the ‗socially useful type‘ people as they
would have high chances of performing well.
CARL RODGER
Rogers maintains that the human "organism" has an underlying "actualizing tendency", which
aims to develop all capacities in ways that maintain or enhance the organism and move it toward
autonomy. This tendency is directional, constructive and present in all living things. The
actualizing tendency can be suppressed but can never be destroyed without the destruction of the
organism .The concept of the actualizing tendency is the only motive force in the theory. It
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11. encompasses all motivations; tension, need, or drive reductions; and creative as well as pleasure-
seeking tendencies. Only the organism as a whole has this tendency, parts of it do not.
Self-Actualizing Tendency
A distinctly psychological form of the actualizing tendency related to this "self" is the "self-
actualizing tendency". It involves the actualization of that portion of experience symbolized in
the self (Rogers, 1959). It can be seen as a push to experience oneself in a way that is consistent
with one's conscious view of what one is (Maddi, 1996). Connected to the development of the
self-concept and self-actualization are secondary needs (assumed to likely be learned in
childhood): the "need for positive regard from others" and "the need for positive self-regard", an
internalized version of the previous. These lead to the favoring of behavior that is consistent with
the person's self-concept (Maddi, 1996).
Organismic Valuing and Conditions of Worth
When significant others in the person's world (usually parents) provide positive regard that is
conditional, rather than unconditional, the person introjects the desired values, making them
his/her own, and acquires "conditions of worth" (Rogers, 1959). The self-concept then becomes
based on these standards of value rather than on organismic evaluation. These conditions of
worth disturb the "organismic valuing process", which is a fluid, ongoing process whereby
experiences are accurately symbolized and valued according to optimal enhancement of the
organism and self (Rogers, 1959). The need for positive self-regard leads to a selective
perception of experience in terms of the conditions of worth that now exist. Those experiences in
accordance with these conditions are perceived and symbolized accurately in awareness, while
those that are not are distorted or denied into awareness. This leads to an "incongruence"
between the self as perceived and the actual experience of the organism, resulting in possible
confusion, tension, and maladaptive behavior (Rogers, 1959). Such estrangement is the common
human condition. Experiences can be perceived as threatening without conscious awareness via
"subception", a form of discrimination without awareness that can result in anxiety.
Fully Functioning Person and the Self
Theoretically, an individual may develop optimally and avoid the previously described
outcomes if they experience only "unconditional positive regard" and no conditions of worth
develop. The needs for positive regard from others and positive self-regard would match
organismic evaluation and there would be congruence between self and experience, with full
psychological adjustment as a result (Rogers, 1959). This ideal human condition is embodied in
the "fully functioning person" who is open to experience able to live existentially, is trusting in
his/her own organism, expresses feelings freely, acts independently, is creative and lives a richer
life; "the good life" (Rogers, 1961). It should be noted that; "The good life is a process not a state
of being. It is a direction, not a destination (Rogers, 1961, p.186)". For the vast majority of
persons who do not have an optimal childhood there is hope for change and development toward
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12. psychological maturity via therapy, in which the aim is to dissolve the conditions of worth,
achieve a self congruent with experience and restore the organismic valuing process (Rogers,
1959).
The self-concept includes three components:
Self worth (or self-esteem) – what we think about ourselves. Rogers believed feelings of self-
worth developed in early childhood and were formed from the interaction of the child with the
mother and father.
Self-image – How we see ourselves, which is important to good psychological health. Self-
image includes the influence of our body image on inner personality. At a simple level, we might
perceive ourselves as a good or bad person, beautiful or ugly. Self-image has an affect on how a
person thinks feels and behaves in the world.
Ideal self – This is the person who we would like to be. It consists of our goals and ambitions in
life, and is dynamic – i.e. forever changing. The ideal self in childhood is not the ideal self in our
teens or late twenties etc.
Conditional positive regard is where positive regard, praise and approval, depend upon the child,
for example, behaving in ways that the parents think correct. Hence the child is not loved for the
person he or she is, but on condition that he or she behaves only in ways approved by the
parent(s). At the extreme, a person who constantly seeks approval from other people is likely
only to have experienced conditional positive regard as a child.
Congruence
A person‘s ideal self may not be consistent with what actually happens in life and experiences of
the person. Hence, a difference may exist between a person‘s ideal self and actual experience.
This is called incongruence. Where a person‘s ideal self and actual experience are consistent or
very similar, a state of congruence exists. Rarely, if ever does a total state of congruence exist;
all people experience a certain amount of incongruence.
The development of congruence is dependent on unconditional positive regard. Carl Rogers
believed that for a person to achieve self-actualization they must be in a state of
congruence.According to Rogers, we want to feel, experience and behave in ways which are
consistent with our self-image and which reflect what we would like to be like, our ideal-self.
The closer our self-image and ideal-self are to each other, the more consistent or congruent we
are and the higher our sense of self-worth. A person is said to be in a state of incongruence if
some of the totality of their experience is unacceptable to them and is denied or distorted in the
self-image. Incongruence is "a discrepancy between the actual experience of the organism and
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13. the self-picture of the individual insofar as it represents that experience." As we prefer to see
ourselves in ways that are consistent with our self-image, we may use defense mechanisms like
denial or repression in order to feel less threatened by some of what we consider to be our
undesirable feelings. A person whose self-concept is incongruent with her or his real feelings
and experiences will defend because the truth hurts.
B.F.SKINNER
Skinner believed that the best way to understand behavior is to look at the causes of an action
and its consequences. He called this approach operant conditioning. Skinner coined the term
operant conditioning; it means roughly changing of behavior by the use of reinforcement which
is given after the desired response.
Skinner’s Main Ideas-
Operant conditioning A type of learning in which future behaviour is determined by the
consequences of past behaviour. In general, if a behaviour results in something that the organism
finds pleasant,it is likely to be repeated. Conversely, if behaviour is followed by unpleasant
consequences, then it is unlikely to be repeated.
Reinforcement A reinforcement is a consequence that strengthens a behaviour or makes it likely
to be repeated. Note that reinforcement is not always the same as a reward. A reward is an
example of positive reinforcement (the presentation of a pleasant stimulus). However,behaviour
can also be strengthened if it leads to the removal of something unpleasant(negative
reinforcement). The term reinforce means to strengthen, and is used in psychology to refer to
anything stimulus which strengthens or increases the probability of a specific response.
Punishment A punishment is a consequence that weakens a behaviour or makes it less likely to
be repeated. It can involve the presentation of an unpleasant stimulus or the removal or a
pleasant one (sometimes these are referred to as positive and negative punishment).
Shaping A process used to teach complex behaviours. A complex behaviour is broken down into
a series of simple behaviours. These are taught one by one using reinforcement and punishment
and gradually combined to create the desired complex behaviour. Shaping is frequently used to
teach tricks to animals.
Stimulus control The process by which a person or animal learns that a particular behaviour
only brings reinforcement under particular conditions.
Operant Conditioning
Skinner called learning from consequences ‗operant conditioning‘ because it is based on how
organisms operate on their environment. Essentially, Skinners theory is that the likelihood of
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14. future behaviour is determined by the consequences of past behaviour. In common with Watson,
Skinner did not think it necessary to speculate on what went on in people‘s
minds. He believed that the environment and behaviour were all that was necessary to an
understanding of psychology.
In operant conditioning, schedules of reinforcement are an important component of the learning
process. When and how often we reinforce a behavior can have a dramatic impact on the strength
and rate of the response.
A schedule of reinforcement is basically a rule stating which instances of a behavior will be
reinforced. In some case, a behavior might be reinforced every time it occurs. Sometimes, a
behavior might not be reinforced at all. Either positive reinforcement or negative reinforcement
might be used, depending on the situation. In both cases, the goal of reinforcement is always to
strengthen the behavior and increase the likelihood that it will occur again in the future.
Certain schedules of reinforcement may be more effective in specific situations. There are two
types of reinforcement schedules:
1. Continuous Reinforcement
In continuous reinforcement, the desired behavior is reinforced every single time it occurs.
Generally, this schedule is best used during the initial stages of learning in order to create a
strong association between the behavior and the response. Once the response if firmly attached,
reinforcement is usually switched to a partial reinforcement schedule.
2. Partial Reinforcement
In partial reinforcement, the response is reinforced only part of the time. Learned behaviors are
acquired more slowly with partial reinforcement, but the response is more resistant to extinction.
There are four schedules of partial reinforcement:
Fixed-ratio schedules-are those where a response is reinforced only after a specified number of
responses. This schedule produces a high, steady rate of responding with only a brief pause after
the delivery of the reinforcer.
Variable-ratio schedules-occur when a response is reinforced after an unpredictable number of
responses. This schedule creates a high steady rate of responding. Gambling and lottery games
are good examples of a reward based on a variable ratio schedule.
Fixed-interval schedules-are those where the first response is rewarded only after a specified
amount of time has elapsed. This schedule causes high amounts of responding near the end of the
interval, but much slower responding immediately after the delivery of the reinforcer.
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15. Variable-interval schedules-occur when a response is rewarded after an unpredictable amount
of time has passed. This schedule produces a slow, steady rate of response.
Skinner identified three types of responses or operant that can follow behavior.
Neutral operants: responses from the environment that neither increase nor decrease the
probability of a behavior being repeated.
Reinforcers: Responses from the environment that increase the probability of a behavior
being repeated. Reinforcers can be either positive or negative.
Punishers: Response from the environment that decrease the likelihood of a behavior
being repeated. Punishment weakens behavior.
Positive reinforcement strengthens a behavior by providing a consequence an individual finds
rewarding. For example, if your teacher gives you rs 5 each time you complete your homework
(i.e. a reward) you are more likely to repeat this behavior in the future, thus strengthening the
behavior of completing your homework.
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