Individual Differences in the Perspectives of Social Learning and Behaviorism

Credit: Brett Jordan 

Social learning and behaviorism and its main tenets

The behaviorism and SL approaches help in many ways to understand ID. Some characteristics when it comes to studying ID focus mainly on behaviorism and cognition, which play a part in SL (Funder, 2019). This approach looks into how an individual’s personality is affected and built by behavior and how the society in which SL can affect and build our personality. Behaviorists state that a personality is shaped and built upon behavior and SL (Funder, 2019). As a result, psychologists can observe a person’s behavior to understand an individual’s personality to a certain extent, since other factors can also affect an individual’s personality (Funder, 2019). SL and behaviorism state that individuals can be good at managing certain situations or tasks but would not be good at all situations and tasks, which makes them different from one another (Krahé, 1992).

SL and behaviorism as a whole consist of five main tenets since it is one of the oldest and most studied approaches in psychology (Mazur, 2014). The first tenet is that behavior is conditioned by our environmental stimuli, which leads to changing or creating new behaviors by pairing stimuli and responses. The second is that behavior is reinforced by rewards and punishments in our environment, which make a certain behavior change or keep improving. The third tenet is that while a certain stimulus results in a certain behavior, when it tends to occur repeatedly time and again, it makes an individual get used to it and makes it a part of the system, ignoring the stimulus. The fourth is that when it comes to SL, the main tenet is that behaviors are learned by observing others in the environment, which can change or improve a certain behavior. The fifth is that cognition too plays a part in learning behaviors (Mazur, 2014).

Strengths and weaknesses of the approach to ID

A main strength of the approach is that both behaviorism and social learning can be observed, and it is easier to scientifically study the effect on ID (Funder, 2019). Since behaviors are a part of our personality, the behaviorism and SL approaches affirm that our behaviors can be changed to a certain extent, resulting in an individual’s personality changing to a certain extent. Another strength is that since the approach helps to study scientifically, it also helps to back up the information and data collected on personality with regards to the approach statistically and about reality (Funder, 2019).

A main weakness of behaviorism is that all behavioral studies are conducted on animals and not humans, which makes it difficult to study human personality using those studies (Funder, 2019). A weakness of SL is that some studies prove that all behaviors are not learned, hence our personalities are not completely learned by others (Krahé, 1992). Behaviorism ignores the facts of thinking, emotions, and motivation, hence only focusing on what is observable from the external environment and not the internal environment (Funder, 2019).

Applications of the approach with regards to ID in society

There are many applications of this approach to understanding ID within society. One application would be in a clinical setting to understand how behavioral patterns differ among the sixteen personalities in society and how those behavioral patterns change in individuals with personality disorders (Koerner et al., 1996). With the use of this approach, it is easier to observe and diagnose an individual with a personality disorder and to create treatments for those individuals in society (Koerner et al., 1996).

Another application is in a school setting, where most of the personality starts building up in an individual (Rawlings et al., 2017). It is because, according to social learning, children learn by observing other peers and building their personalities. This is also known as peer learning. In peer learning, children learn from their peers in class by observing their achievements, how they are good at certain tasks, and how they face life. As for the SL and motivation theory, children try to achieve what they are achieving in class by observing, and they are motivated to achieve these goals. According to the SL theory, the role models in this application are other peers, and by the end of the day, individuals develop new behaviors and ways to learn, which help them build who they are and achieve their goals in life. This application is valid across all societies, and there are many studies conducted on personality and how children learn in school that found that peer learning plays a major role in the process of learning and building new skills like confidence in public speaking, etc., that shape their personalities (Rawlings et al., 2017).

These studies use SL and behaviorism as approaches to understanding the relationship. A strength of peer learning is that it is supported by theories about SL and personality, and there are many studies to back up this (Rawlings et al., 2017). A weakness is that it ignores the fact that a child’s personality can also be shaped by their parents and other family members, and peer learning also ignores the fact that individuals are unique and the way of learning could differ in many ways and not merely from peer learning (Rawlings et al., 2017).

Another application is in a forensic setting where police are taught about personality and mainly use social learning and behaviorism as an approach to studying personalities that are there (Mehta et al., 2020). This helps police detect certain behaviors and personality traits, which helps them narrow down the list of suspects by their personalities. Facial expressions are part of behavior that is expressed by individuals and relates to an individual’s personality. This helped build up the lie detector to identify liars. According to forensic psychologists, an individual’s personality is expressed by their behavior, which can help catch the criminal by studying their behavior and personality (Mehta et al., 2020).

Finally, this approach can be used in an organizational setting to recruit employees for a job and can be used alongside personality to screen whether that individual has the potential for the job (Mehta et al., 2020). For example, an individual with a personality that motivates and can lead other individuals in an organization would be better suited to a manager post than an individual who is more sensitive and nervous when facing a given task and communicating within an organization. The strength of using this approach in both situations is that in a forensic setting, it is easier to catch the criminal by observing them, and in an organizational setting, it helps to recruit the right individual efficiently rather than wasting time and money. A weakness is that forensic psychology could be misled by a person’s behavior and social status, while in an organizational setting, it could also mislead the organization by observing an individual’s personality because every individual is unique in their way, which can be beneficial for an organization in many ways (Mehta et al., 2020).

Credit: Дмитрий Хрусталев-Григорьев 

Palov’s CC theory and Skinner’s OC theory support the main tenets of the approach: that behavior can be conditioned by pairing stimulus with a response and that behavior can be reinforced by either rewards or punishments (Mazur, 2014). Sokolov’s theory on habituation supports the tenet that if a certain stimulus followed by its response occurs more often, the stimulus is ignored. Finally, Bandura’s theory on SL supports both the tenets that behavior is learned by observing others in the environment and that cognition plays a part in learning as well. There are other theories brought up by other psychologists within the approach that also support the main tenets of the approach (Mazur, 2014). Maslow’s motivation theory also supports the tenet that behavior can be reinforced (Navy, 2020).

Strengths and weaknesses of the conflicting theories within the approach

There are many strengths and weaknesses when it comes to this approach since it is an old one that many psychologists have discovered. A strength of both CC and OC is that they focus on and help change destructive behaviors. CC also helps to improve positive feelings in individuals and towards other individuals (Rehman et al., 2017). OC theory can help to understand behavioral changes in real-life situations (Staddon & Cerutti, 2003). Habituation assists individuals in tuning out stimuli that are not crucial to them and instead focuses more on stimuli that are crucial to them (Mazur, 2014). SL helps to understand the role of society in learning behavior, which helps to explain how an individual’s behavior could change as an individual’s environment changes (Johnson et al., 2017). The motivation theory helps understand the role of motivation in an individual’s achievements and how to direct individuals to achieve certain goals in life (Navy, 2020).

A weakness of CC is that it does not take free will into account. CC also ignores the fact that individuals are unique in their way (Rehman et al., 2017). In OC, an individual could pretend to have changed their behavior to get the reward without actually changing, which affects their personality. (Staddon & Cerutti, 2003). A weakness of habituation is that habituation and learned helplessness are both similar, which in many situations confuses individuals in understanding that certain behavior is a result of habituation or learned helplessness, which confuses them in understanding personality. A weakness of SL is that it ignores the fact that there could be unexpected obstacles that an individual might face while observing or imitating another individual, which could result in the individual giving up observing or imitating another individual, which would not affect personality completely. (Johnson et al., 2017). An individual’s motivational factor can change throughout a lifetime, which changes their motivation, and that is not considered in motivation theory (Navy, 2020).

How do these theories support ID?

When it comes to understanding personality, these theories speak for themselves since behavior is a main characteristic of personality (Funder, 2019). According to CC theory, an individual’s personality can be shaped by pairing a stimulus with a response, which becomes a part of the individual’s personality. OP theory says that an individual’s personality can be reinforced by reinforcing the individual’s behavior, which shapes the individual’s personality. In habituation theory, an individual can build their personality by tuning out or ignoring certain stimuli that are unnecessary for that individual and instead focusing on stimuli that are necessary to build their personality (Funder, 2019).

On the other hand, SL theory promotes behaviors being learned by other individuals. It helps us to understand how an individual’s environment, like society, affects an individual’s personality and how different environments lead to changes in an individual’s personality (Funder, 2019). The motivation theory says that individuals are motivated to achieve a certain goal, which helps to build their personalities (Navy, 2020).

Research on personality using the approach

There are many research studies conducted on personalities using this approach since it helps study. A study was conducted by González-Rodríguez et al. on schizotypy, which is a combination of personality traits that are similar to those of an individual with schizophrenia with regards to SL (González-Rodríguez et al., 2021). The study consisted of 85 undergraduate students from the University of Almeria, but when the study was conducted, there were only 72 participants because 13 participants withdrew from the study since they did not prefer a model to receive electric shocks (González-Rodríguez et al., 2021). Of the 72 participants, 34 were males and 38 were females, and all of them did not have a history of any psychological disorders. The Bioethics Committee in Human Research of the University of Almeria approved the study to be conducted. The instruments used in this study were the schizotypy personality questionnaire (SPQ), which included 74 dichotomously answered questions with yes scoring 1 and no scoring 0, with a total mark range of 0–74. (González-Rodríguez et al., 2021).

The social fearing task (SFT), which was a video of a male model receiving electric shocks on a screen, was shown, and finally, skin conductance responses (SCRs) were used during both stages of the study to measure fear conditioning (González-Rodríguez et al., 2021). All this was conducted with participants individually in a quiet room. From the results, Rodriguez et al. concluded that in the learning phase, participants who scored low in the cognitive-perceptual variable of the SPQ displayed higher SCRs when they saw the unconditioned stimulus (US) than when they saw the conditioned stimulus minus (CS−) during the learning stage. Participants who scored higher introduced no distinction in their SCRs toward the two improvements that can be tracked down in schizophrenia. There were many limitations of the study, but some were that no hypothesis was made at the start, more information on participants could have been noted, and the study does not include participants from a clinical population (González-Rodríguez et al., 2021).

Another study is by Lungu, who studied how punishments develop a personality in children and whether punishment has a positive or negative impact on personality (Lungu, 2018). The research was done in conjunction with the University of Timisoara, which proved the study. The study included 50 participants who were master’s students at the university. Interviews were the method of gathering data. The interview consisted of questions about their childhood, how their parents and school punished them in the past when they did something wrong, and how those punishments affected them and their personalities. After analyzing the data from the interviews, Lungu’s hypothesis, which was that punishment impacts an individual’s personality, was supported.

Lungu concluded that children who were punished more had more discipline, and through punishment, children tended to learn what was good for them and what was not (Lungu, 2018). Some participants have even stated, “Beating made me a real man,” which showed that the way they perceived the world and behaved had been impacted by punishment in the past. Lungu also stated that long-term punishment more often becomes habitual, which does not have an impact on their personality. A limitation of the study was that it did not look at how rewards play a part in personality and that punishment could have positive or negative reinforcement for an individual (Lungu, 2018).

Both of these studies help to understand how SL and behaviorism via OC affect personality. It further shows how this approach helps to understand and study what personality is, its importance in an individual and a society, and the result of habituation in punishment too. At last, these studies supported the tenets of the approach and showed how close the approach is to personality.

Credit: Joshua Fuller

References

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