Behavioral Conditioning And Biological Preparedness

Classical and Operant Conditioning

Classical conditioning is known as the association between an involuntary response due to stimuli (Commons & Giri, 2016), An example would that since your animals know their food comes out of a specific cabinet, they will come to you whenever that cabinet is opened. This is due to them being ‘trained’ to know where their food is. Operant conditioning is the associating a voluntary behavior and a consequence (Commons & Giri, 2016). An example of this would be a rat pushing a level -as it’s the only thing in its containment chamber (most commonly known as a Skinner Box)- and receiving food. This teaches the rat that the level will being food. B. F Skinner, the inventor of the Skinner Box figured out a thing called “reinforcement learning, as I previously described with the rat (Skinner, as cited in Carter et al. , 2013).

Due to being conditioned into believing the consequences of an action will always be good, there is stereotyping involved. So, the rat mentioned previously will always push that level thinking there will be food, but it might not be food that comes out (Skinner as cited in Carter et al. , 2013) Another example of operant conditioning would be a human thinking they know what will happen if they eat their favorite food- they will get full. Ultimately, there is a stereotype that the food will not make you sick and sometimes it might (Commons & Giri, 2016).

Biological Preparedness

Biological preparedness is defined as an idea that animals are inherently inclined to form associations between certain stimuli and responses (Cummins & Cummins, 2010). This preparedness is linked as being one of the major causes for picky eaters. Those who do not like certain foods (how they taste, the texture, etc) or even those who will get sick after they eat their trigger foods. The explanation behind this reaction is evolution- we have evolved to be able to tell what we should and should not eat for survival. Although a simple piece of broccoli won’t kill anyone, their brain has been convinced otherwise. I, for one, hate vegetables. I cannot stand their texture and they taste so bitter to me. For our ancestors, bitter meant death for some (Cummins & Cummins, 2010).

Why do babies cry when they are born? How do deaf newborns babble? Well it turns out, they are programmed that way. A study done by Oller and Eilers (1988, as cited in Cummins & Cummins, 2010) was centered around deaf newborns. They babbled like hearing babies, but they were never taught those sounds. They never heard anything. The babbling eventually fades away due to lack of auditory feedback (because they can’t hear it). This study showed that we have evolved to make signals (noises) to sound others. Babbling and other noises from babies can be used to determine if there is something wrong with them. For instance, if a baby cries it could mean it is in pain, hungry or wet itself. If we did not have these cues, the babies might die from hunger or an unknown illness.

Biological and Evolutionary Predispositions

Biological predisposition is “when a subject possesses genetics that increases the likelihood of having a condition” (NIH, 2018). An example of a biological predisposition would be Schizophrenia. Schizophrenia and the link to crime issuing any studies. For instance, a study was found to show that crime is more widespread among those with schizophrenia than those who do not. This was backed up by showing that those who have the disease (and had not gone to get it treated) were more likely to commit a crime and be sentenced to prison for it instead of going into rehabilitation and treatment centers (Munkener et al. , 2003). Without the first psychiatric contact, nothing can be done for those who have committed a crime due to their illness. They are required to go to jail. The study, using a population of around 5,000 individuals determined that a shocking 41% were convicted of a crime and 17% were convicted of a violent crime. This is useful knowledge to know in the field, as those who have schizophrenia have a higher tendency to commit crime than the average population (Munkener et al. , 2003).

Another example of a biological predisposition is left-handedness. Sometimes used to determine if a suspect is the one who committed the crime, left-handedness have somewhat proven itself to be genetic. Interestingly enough, left-handedness has been linked to have correlation with stutters, dyslexia and Tourette syndrome. Left-handedness has been shown to be a polygenic trait (a trait in which multiple genes control the expression of a phenotypic trait) that is passed down from the parents of the child and that the genes that determine the left/right asymmetry of the body also have something to do with it (Agtmael, et al. , 2001).

Phobias and the Link to Classical Conditioning

The Little Albert experiment preformed by John Watson involved a child named Albert. Watson’s idea was to give Albert a phobia of rats. To do this, he introduced the child to a rat while hitting a hammer against a metal bar. Each time he did this, Albert became startled. After a few trials, Albert was now afraid of rats and similar animals and items that appeared to have similar characteristics as the rat (white and fluffy), because of classical conditioning (Carter et al. , 2013).

Field (2006) has done studies on childhood behavior and the link to phobias. According to Field, humans (and other animals) do not need to experience said fear to have the phobia. For instance, some people can have a feat of water and boats without having been introduced to that level of trauma. In addition, if one experiences trauma, the phobia can wait to manifest itself until later. Field, Argyris and Knowles (as cited in Field 2006), developed a study in which children, aged 7-9 were told about un-encountered toy monsters. Some of the children received only good verbal information about the monsters where as others received only negative information. The children that were given negative information were more afraid of said monsters. This is due to associative learning (Field, 2006).