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B.F.
Skinner
- The main proponent.
B. F. SKINNER
1904 - 1990

SOURCE: Dr. C. George Boeree

Biography

Burrhus Frederic Skinner

 was born March 20, 1904, in the small

Pennsylvania town of Susquehanna.

 His upbringing was old-fashioned and hard-

working.

 Burrhus was an active, out-going boy who loved

the outdoors and building things, and actually
enjoyed school.
 Burrhus received his BA in English from Hamilton

 He wrote for school paper, including articles critical

of the school, the faculty, and even Phi Beta
Kappa!

 Ultimately, he resigned himself to writing

newspaper articles on labor problems, and lived
for a while in Greenwich Village in New York City
as a “bohemian.”

 After some traveling, he decided to go back to

school, this time at Harvard.
 He got his masters in psychology in 1930 and his
doctorate in 1931, and stayed there to do
research until 1936.

 Also in that year, he moved to Minneapolis to

teach at the University of Minnesota.

 There he met and soon married Yvonne Blue and

had two daughters

 In 1945, he became the chairman of the

psychology department at Indiana University.
 In 1948, he was invited to come to Harvard, where
he remained for the rest of his life.

 He was a very active man, doing research and

guiding hundreds of doctoral candidates as well as
writing many books.

 While not successful as a writer of fiction and

poetry, he became one of our best psychology
writers, including the book Walden II, which is a
fictional account of a community run by his
behaviorist principles.

 August 18, 1990, B. F. Skinner died of leukemia

after becoming perhaps the most celebrated
psychologist since Sigmund Freud.
Operant
Conditioning
- Is a type of learning in
which the organism learns
Through the consequences
of its behavior.
 The Skinner Box
- analogous to Thorndike's puzzle
box; a rat is placed in a box and
must press a lever in order to get
the food pellet ( the rat can try
many responses until it discovers
how to get the food)
 Reinforcement Punishment
Positive Positive
Positive Reinforcement Punishment
Behavior
Increases Addition Addition
pleasant pleasant
stimulus stimulus

Negative Negative
Reinforcement Punishment
Negative
Behavior Removal of Removal of
Decreases unpleasant unpleasant
stimulus stimulus
 Reinforcement

– anything that
increases the likehood
that o particular
response will be
repeated.
Positive Reinforcement
– something that when added to the
situation, the response increases even
more (i.e. reward)

100 %
Negative Reinforcement

– anything that when taken away

or removed from the situation, the
response increases even more (i.e.
punishment)
• Punishment

– is the opposite of
reinforcement. It
decrease the probability
that a response will be
repeated.
Positive punishment

– adding something (e.g. spanking)

 Negative punishment

– removing something (e.g.

allowance)
 Schedules of
Reinforcement

- Reinforcement must be
continuous in order to prevent
extinction.
Here are some reinforcement schedules:

1. Ratio Schedule – depends on the number of

responses or action that an organism makes

Fixed Ratio Schedule Variable Ratio Schedule

– reward is given for – reward is provided

every fixed or specific after making varying
number of responses an number of responses
organism makes

(e.g Buy 1 take 1 promos) (e.g slot machine)

2. Interval Schedule – made available only
after a certain time.

Fixed Interval Variable Interval

– reward is provided – reward is given after

after a certain amount of a certain time, but one
time has passed since the doesn’t know what
last reinforcement. particular time the
reinforcement will be given.

(e.g 3 – Day Sales) (e.g teacher giving bonus

points )