Focus
Associations between identifiable environmental stimuli and observable measurable behaviorsPrincipal Metaphors
- Knowledge is … repertoire of behaviors
- Knowing is … behaving (triggered by stimuli)
- Learner is … an organism
- Learning is … changes in behavior (linking stimuli to responses)
- Teaching is … training; engineering behavior (through deliberate conditioning)
Originated
late-1800sSynopsis
Behaviorisms reject the notion that knowledge is some sort of external, stable, and context-free object that exists independently of knowers, and they redefine personal knowledge as established and stable repertoires of behavior that are triggered by events in the world. As well, seeking to establish a scientific basis for their claims, they also rejected attempts to explain learning in terms of unobservable mental processes, opting instead for phenomena that can be observed and measured. Originally oriented by the metaphor of a telephone switchboard (and, specifically, the activity of linking nodes), learning was imagined in terms of establishing a network of causal relations between stimuli and behaviors – and so Behaviorisms are commonly described as systematic studies of how different categories of behavior (e.g., reflexes, or conscious action) can be affected by different influences (e.g., rewards, punishments, personal history, current motivational states), focusing mainly on environmental factors.Commentary
Originally, proponents of Behaviorisms regarded the process of creating links between environmental stimuli and the individual’s responses as predictable and mechanical – manageable through well-timed rewards and punishments. While this focus affords powerful insight into a wide swath of human behavior, it has also proven inadequate to account for such defining qualities of humanity as creativity and altruism. Some of the assumption-rooted issues with Behaviorisms are revealed by an associated discourse:- Mathematical Learning Theory (Clark, L. Hull, 1930s) – Mathematical Learning Theory is not about learning mathematics, but about describing and explaining behavior in precise, quantitative terms.
Subdiscourses:
- Mathematical Learning Theory
Map Location

Please cite this article as:
Davis, B., & Francis, K. (2020). “Behaviorisms” in Discourses on Learning in Education. https://learningdiscourses.com.
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