Behaviorism as a learning theory
The school of adult learning theory that adopted these principles has become known as the
school of Behaviorism, which saw learning as a complex process of responses to several kinds
of distinct stimuli. Skinner always referred to it as a three-term contingency comprised
of a discriminative stimuli, or Sd
, a response, or R, and a reinforcing stimulus, or Srein
.
Conditions of deprivation and satiation, and other changes in the environment, have come
to be generally acknowledged p[' as a kind of fourth term, and are denoted as Motivating
Operations (MO) generally, Abolishing Operations (AO), or Establishing Operations (EO)
depending on whether they make a reinforcer less effective (abolishing), more effective
(establishing) and so on. Jack Michael has been instrumental in refining and exploring these
elements 4
A reinforcement is defined as a stimulus that strengthen the response, which is to say that
it makes it more probable, or alters its frequency. Spillane (2002) states, “the behaviorist
perspective, associated with B. F. Skinner, holds that the mind at work cannot be observed,