Behaviorism and Cognitive Development

Introduction

A theory is a keen and rational method of generalizing thinking and the consequences of a person’s thoughts. It involves development of body of knowledge. Behaviorism as a theory involves the study of human and animal behaviors to understand them better. It assumes that behavior is as a result of different stimuli in the environment. On the other hand, Piaget’s theory of Cognitive development entails the study of mental processes from childhood to adulthood. This paper will analyze how Watson’s theory of behaviorism and Piaget’s theory of Cognitive development would explain Tom’s personality.

As a first born in his family, it was expected that Tom would receive the best treatment full of love from his young parents. However, his father was an irresponsible drunkard who worked as a constructor. Tom’s mother on the other hand was a housewife. A big portion of his father’s money would be spent on alcohol thus living in poverty.  His parents always disagreed on everything especially where money was involved leading to fights. This made Tom’s mother bitter and she became extremely harsh to Tom. Small mistakes such as pooping on himself would make the mother to spank him. At the age of two, Tom was sleeping alone in his own room and this made him volatile and he developed nyctophobia, extreme fear of darkness, even at his adolescent stage. He had changed from being the excitable kid who could laugh at anything to being always nervous. Years passed and Tom’s parents gave birth to a baby girl. Surprisingly, Tom was not excited on seeing his sister as many children as is the case for many children.  He was now old enough to join preschool and his parents admitted him to the nearest local school. Tom had a dream of working hard and changing the life of his family. At grade 5, Tom’s behaviors started deteriorating. He could beat up his sister at the slightest misunderstanding and this would make his parents to punish him. However, he seemed to enjoy this and never stopped. The teachers started noticing his negative behaviors. He had become arrogant towards his fellow students in class calling them inferior. His friends had also distanced themselves from him due to his bossy nature. He never accepted defeat in all the games they played together. It would always end with a fight. His teacher’s attempts to change him were in vain. His mother tried to talk out her son into knowing what the problem was but Tom could not open up to her. Years later when Tom joined High school, he was the poorest performing student in class. His class teacher, Madam Allison, started having interest in him and wanted to know why he was always volatile in class and why he performed so poorly. Her approach to Tom was unwelcomed at first but with persistence, she got him to open up. Tom explained his fears and background challenges to Madam Allison and he admitted that being violent makes him feel better about himself. He also said it is the only time he gets to feel wanted as fighting others draws more attention to him. Madam Allison took it upon herself to help Tom overcome his fears. He started giving him extra assignments and correcting his mistakes. He could ask Tom questions in class and when he answered correctly, the other students would clap for him. The teacher also promised to reward him if he performed well in his term paper.  Tom performed really well in his final exams and he had improved from a D plain to B. His behavior had also changed and he was friendlier to his classmates. When he went home for holidays, his mother could not hide the joy of seeing her son’s transformation. He was now more passive and could relate well with his younger sister without violence.

John B. Watson’s theory of behaviorism is an approach of learning which studies an individual’s change in behavior.  The changes in what people do or say. Behaviorism theory explains that peoples’ behaviors are stimulated by the environment or past experiences. The theory’s arguments are based on environmental factors although it recognizes hereditary factors. Watson believes in the power on punishment and reinforcement in changing behaviors. Behaviorism uses operant conditioning to be more effective. Operant conditioning focuses on how a certain behavior’s outcomes affect the behavior when done repeatedly (Spielberger & DeNike, 1966). Certain outcomes tend to make some behavior happen more frequently. If one complements a small child for feeding on his own, he or she is more likely to repeat it again. The original research of operant conditioning was not experimented with people but using animals. One of the researchers of this model was B.F. Skinner, a Harvard professor. Skinner observed many parallels of this model in animals and human beings. Skinner experimented the behavior on a laboratory rat. He put the rat in a cage containing a tray and a level. At the early stages of experiment, the rat would sniff and move around the cage randomly. But later, it happened to come closer to the lever and pressed it. The lever released a small amount of food which the rat would hurriedly eat. Consequently, the rat would spend more time at the lever pressing and thus getting more food (Hall & Lindzey, 1957). The rat was now aware that the outcome of pressing the lever was to get more food.  The food pellet was the reinforcement while the pressing of the lever was the operant. The effects of this model to motivation are very complex. It encourages both intrinsic and extrinsic motivation at the same time. Intrinsic motivation is when the reinforcement for an activity is the activity itself while extrinsic is when the reinforcement comes from the consequences of certain activities. However, extrinsic motivation is more noticeable than intrinsic motivation. Watson could explain Tom’s behaviors in different ways: Tom’s violent behavior had resulted from the fact that he never got enough attention from his parents and the only time he got to be noticed was when he fought other kids. This is why he could not stop the behavior even after being punished severally. Second, Tom could have attained his arrogant behavior from his father because he was always rude to his mother and Tom never experienced him as a sober dad. This is because, kids tends to take their parents as their first role models and they copy most of the observable traits. A child’s personality lies within themselves where it is unobservable (Staats, 2003). Thirdly, Tom’s change of behavior and academic improvement while at high school came as a result of positive reinforcement from Madam Allison. The fact that she promised to award him on improvement and encouraged him to be active in class had a big impact on Tom. The feeling that came with being appreciated encouraged him to do better.

Another important theorist is Jean Piaget. His theory, cognitive development, explains how children develop their own mental view of the world. He disregarded the idea that on is born intelligent and argued that children cognitive development is as a result of environmental influences and biological maturation. Children experience difficulties in comparing their model of the world with the real world. The goal is to explain the process by which an infant, and then a child grow into someone who can reason and make his own judgments. Piaget’s theory has three component: Schema, adaptation and the stages of development (Wadsworth, 1996). Schema are a representation in the form of a model or way in which a child organizes knowledge. This enables children to create their own model of the world when they are young and they store this mental representations and use them when needed. Piaget’s understanding of the development of one’s mental processes is the increased number of schemata a person had learned and its complexity. Piaget believed that infants have their own schema when they are born even before experiencing the outside world, for example, sucking reflex, grasping reflex, and diving reflex, among others. Piaget viewed intellectual development as a process of adaptation of the world. When a child’s schema can be able to explain what it sees around it, then this state is called equilibrium. Adapting to new changes using an existing schemata is called assimilation. On the other hand, accommodation is the changing of schemata which cannot be used to deal with new situations. There are several stages of development. First, the Sensorimotor stage which is between birth and age two. It is when a child can create a mental representation of an object and know that it still exists even when it’s hidden. Second stage is Pre-operational stage which is between ages two to age seven. This stage is where a child can make one thing stand for something else other than the thing itself. It is egocentric and the child doesn’t accept other peoples’ opinions. Third stage is the Concrete Operational Stage which ranges between ages seven to age eleven. At this stage, a child work things out through thinking rather than trying to do things physically. A child is able to conserve information and understand that quantities remain the same even when appearance changes (Feldman, 1994). Last stage is the Formal Operational Stage (eleven years and above). People have the ability to think critically and test new information during this time. According to Piaget, Tom’s mean behavior developed when his mother used to spanks him during toilet training. This is the reason he was not excited when his little sister was born because he felt she would take what was his and it resulted to him being violent to her in order to get over his fears. Secondly, Tom’s picture of the lonely and dark nights he spent alone were stuck to his mind and this gave him darkness phobia. He was still afraid of the dark even in high school. This shows that kids can recall memories and their experiences at young age. Thirdly, Tom’s change in behavior while at high school was as a result of his ability to distinguish between bad and good. With the help of Madam Allison, Tom realized that his unpleasant behaviors would not help him in life and he had to change and improve on his academics in order to fulfill his dream of helping his family. It was his decision to work hard and change. The teacher only acted as a guide. This is because, at the age of fifteen, a person can be able to make rational decisions and test those decisions. Lastly, Tom’s secretive behavior resulted from lack of a good company when he was young. His mother had instilled fear in him due to her harsh nature. He grew up with the idea that everyone is inapproachable and that is the reason it was so hard for him to open up to his mother and to Madam Allison in her first attempt to interrogate him.

There are several similarities between Watson and Piaget’s theories in explaining Tom’s behavior. One, they both use subjective metaphors. Behaviorism uses the metaphor of stimuli-response while Cognitivist uses the processing of information as a means of explaining how human beings perceive the world around them (Wadsworth, 1996). Madam Allison’s advice to Tom is the stimuli which causes change in Tom’s life. Similarly, Tom uses the advice because he understand his family’s situation and his goals to help them. Secondly, both theories view human actions and mental organization as determined by the environmental experiences (Hall & Lindzey, 1957). Watson says that Tom behavior is affected by his family’s irresponsibility. Similarly, Piaget shows Tom’s fear to have resulted from his experiences as a young boy due to the harsh environment subjected to him.

These theorists also have their differences. One, Watson argues that change of behavior is as a result of a measurable experience while Piaget argues that change is behavior is as a result of the change in a child’s mental organization and presentation due to their experiences. Watson claims that Tom’s behavior is as a result of having his drunk father as his role model while Piaget argues that Tom change of behavior was as a result of the harsh treatment from his mother, for example, poor toilet training. Secondly, in behaviorism practice and constant repetition is considered to be of significant importance while the other theory does not support the necessary of the two elements (Feldman, 1994). Tom’s violent behavior persisted because of experiencing his violent father for so many years while his secretive behavior was as a result of the times his mother neglected him and even after she changed, he did not change. Thirdly, according to Smith and Woodward (1996), in behaviorism, people are only passive and responds to stimuli while in cognitive development, people decide on what to do with the information and stores it for future use. The teacher took it upon herself to help Tom and she could give him assignment and correct them. Tom stored that information and used in his exams for improvement and to make a positive change.

Conclusion

Theories play an important role in explaining the human behavior. Cognitive development theory is very important as it studies a child’s development in all stages. It is therefore advisable for new parents to be educated of this stages in order to know things to do to a child and those to avoid in order to prevent the consequences negative actions by parents have on children especially those who are raised in abusive backgrounds. Behaviorism should also be emphasized on in order to rectify the behaviors of already affected children.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

References

Feldman, D. H. (1994). Beyond universals in cognitive development. Westport: Ablex

            Publishing.

Hall, C. S., & Lindzey, G. (1957). Theories of personality. US: John Wiley & Sons Inc.

Spielberger, C. D., & DeNike, L. D. (1966). Descriptive behaviorism versus cognitive theory in

            Verbal operant conditioning. Washington: American Psychological Association.

Staats, A. W. (2003). A psychological behaviorism theory of personality. Handbook of

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Smith, L. D., & Woodward, W. R. (1996). B. F. Skinner and behaviorism in American culture.

            United States: Lehigh University Press.

Wadsworth, B. J. (1996). Piaget's theory of cognitive and affective development: Foundations of

            constructivism. England: Longman Publishing.