B.F. Skinner’s Language Acquisition
Burrhus Frederic Skinner was born in Susquehanna, Pennsylvania, on March 10th, 1904. His father, William Skinner, was a lawyer representing Susquehanna’s railroads. William ran for political office during several election seasons but never won a term. Grace Skinner, Burrhus Fredric’s mother, was heavily involved in Susquehanna’s community. She was a talented singer, a good homemaker, and an active community service volunteer. Grace almost died at childbirth, which was a traumatizing fact that stuck with Burrhus Fredric for most of his life. Burrhus Fredric had a younger brother named, Ebbe Skinner, who passed away at the age of sixteen due to a brain hemorrhage.
Burrhus Fredric was an intelligent student. …show more content…
Many of Skinner’s stories dealt with the psychological thought process and the challenges his characters faced. One of the biggest influences for Skinner’s transition to psychology was reading Bertrand Russell’s An Outline of Philosophy in 1927. After that, Skinner began to read John Watson’s work on behaviorism. Russell and Watson’s theories sparked Skinner’s interest in behavioral psychology. Skinner eventually went on to attend graduate school at Harvard University in 1928. He made many friends at Harvard, one of which was Fred Keller, a classmate who would eventually influence Skinner into making an experimental science out of the study of behavior. Skinner and Keller collaborated on small experiments. Keller’s impact on Skinner led to a prototype theory and experiment of operant conditioning (Skinner’s …show more content…
Operant conditioning has influenced current speech pathology. Behavior shaping is used for people with the anxiety disorder, selective mutism. It is used to target verbal behaviors and to eventually help develop normal speech. Another example of how operant conditioning has effected speech pathology is through social, practical, and verbal reinforcement for children with autism. Studies and articles have shown that operant condition has improved autistic children’s speech development and social skills by a large amount. Even a UK article said that reinforcement helped some autistic kid use a toilet. So it can even help with potty training. Skinner’s theory of operant conditioning has also influenced animal training. Show performing animals, like Shamu at sea world and dogs on television, have been shown to respond positively to obedience training through positive reinforcement. Operant conditioning is one of the key elements that are used in animal training, even to this day, Skinner's discoveries are being appreciated and utilized. In addition to animal training, operant conditioning has also had an influence on classroom educational systems. Some examples would be classroom token economies, grading systems / performance marks, and classroom management. Based on the reasons above it is clearly evident that Skinner’s behaviorist theories of operant condition and
Burrhus Frederic Skinner was born in Susquehanna, Pennsylvania, on March 10th, 1904. His father, William Skinner, was a lawyer representing Susquehanna’s railroads. William ran for political office during several election seasons but never won a term. Grace Skinner, Burrhus Fredric’s mother, was heavily involved in Susquehanna’s community. She was a talented singer, a good homemaker, and an active community service volunteer. Grace almost died at childbirth, which was a traumatizing fact that stuck with Burrhus Fredric for most of his life. Burrhus Fredric had a younger brother named, Ebbe Skinner, who passed away at the age of sixteen due to a brain hemorrhage.
Burrhus Fredric was an intelligent student. …show more content…
Many of Skinner’s stories dealt with the psychological thought process and the challenges his characters faced. One of the biggest influences for Skinner’s transition to psychology was reading Bertrand Russell’s An Outline of Philosophy in 1927. After that, Skinner began to read John Watson’s work on behaviorism. Russell and Watson’s theories sparked Skinner’s interest in behavioral psychology. Skinner eventually went on to attend graduate school at Harvard University in 1928. He made many friends at Harvard, one of which was Fred Keller, a classmate who would eventually influence Skinner into making an experimental science out of the study of behavior. Skinner and Keller collaborated on small experiments. Keller’s impact on Skinner led to a prototype theory and experiment of operant conditioning (Skinner’s …show more content…
Operant conditioning has influenced current speech pathology. Behavior shaping is used for people with the anxiety disorder, selective mutism. It is used to target verbal behaviors and to eventually help develop normal speech. Another example of how operant conditioning has effected speech pathology is through social, practical, and verbal reinforcement for children with autism. Studies and articles have shown that operant condition has improved autistic children’s speech development and social skills by a large amount. Even a UK article said that reinforcement helped some autistic kid use a toilet. So it can even help with potty training. Skinner’s theory of operant conditioning has also influenced animal training. Show performing animals, like Shamu at sea world and dogs on television, have been shown to respond positively to obedience training through positive reinforcement. Operant conditioning is one of the key elements that are used in animal training, even to this day, Skinner's discoveries are being appreciated and utilized. In addition to animal training, operant conditioning has also had an influence on classroom educational systems. Some examples would be classroom token economies, grading systems / performance marks, and classroom management. Based on the reasons above it is clearly evident that Skinner’s behaviorist theories of operant condition and