Anthony Bryant's Impending Assessment: The Classical Conditioning Theory

For assignment number two, I have chosen the classical conditioning theory. This theory “sees behavior as learned association, when a naturally occurring stimulus (unconditioned stimulus) is paired with a neutral stimulus (conditioned stimulus)” (Hutchison, p. 63). In other words, this theory focuses on the learning process of an individuals’ behavior by pairing together an environmental stimulus and a natural occurring stimulus. Classical conditioning is centered around the social behavior perspective which encompasses around the ideas that “All behavior can be defined and changed, all human behavior is learned by the same principles reinforcement, imitation, and personal expectations and meaning, and all human problems can be formulated …show more content…
502-503, 2012). This case discusses a six year old boy is raised by a father who has been arrested multiple times and a mother whose father abandoned her and her mother at age four. The case also shares that Anthony’s mother tends to care for Anthony when while Anthony’s mother hangs out with friends, attends school, and work. However, Anthony’s grandmother and parents use physical punishment in order to get him to behave. It is said that Anthony “usually obeys them before it is needed”; however, while Anthony is in kindergarten, his teacher reports that Anthony ignores his teachers and oftentimes starts fights in school (Hutchison, p. 503, 2012). This theory of classical conditioning can be applied to Anthony’s case through the fact that Anthony’s behavior at home and at kindergarten varies because of the different types of punishment. To sum up the details, Anthony is conditioned to obey his parents and grandmother because of the fear that comes with their way of physically punishing him. However, Anthony does not obey his teachers because of the lack of physical discipline that his teachers use on him and other