CLA: Behaviourism

Question 1

Behaviourism

Answer 1

Children learn through positive and negative reinforcement. When a child says something right, their caregivers will praise them and when they say something wrong, their caregivers will tell them it’s wrong and correct them.

Question 2

Skinner – 1957

Answer 2

• He studied positive and negative reinforcement.
• Rat experiment – hungry rat in box ran around and eventually pushed a lever that released food and after a while the rat learnt that the lever meant food so pushed it – positive reinforcement.
• Rat placed in a box with an electric current on the floor. Accidentally knocked level which stopped the current. Eventually learnt that the level stops the current so pushed it intentionally – negative reinforcement.

Not directly related to language acquisition.
Unethical experiment

Question 3

Watson and Rayner – little Albert experiment

Answer 3

• They showed a baby different animals and its unconditioned response was not fearful. Shows him animals again but made a loud noise to scare him. Showed animals once more without a loud noise and baby was scared.
• Did this to show that children can be conditioned to think in a certain way.

Not directly related to language acquisition.
Unethical.

Question 4

Pavlov

Answer 4

• Researched amount of saliva produced by dogs.
• Introduced a bell whenever food was produced.
• Dogs then produced more saliva when the bell rang without the food.
• Response developed because of associations.

Question 5

Key theorists

(3)

Answer 5

• Skinner
• Watson and Rayner
• Pavlov