PEOPLE'S DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF ALGERIA

MINISTRY OF HIGHER EDUCATION AND SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH

UNIVERSITY OF 20 AOUT 1955 SKIKDAFACULTY OF LETTERS AND LANGUAGES
DEPARTMENT OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES
ENGLISH SECTION

Behaviorism Theory of Learning Language

Teacher: BOUAFIA Farouk

Presented by:
-BOUCHAR Rahma

-LARAIDJI Hamza
-YEZLI Soumaya

Plan work
I.
II.
III.
IV.

V.
VI.
VII.
VIII.
IX.

The introduction
Back ground information
Definition
The big threes experiments
a. Ivan Pavlov
b. J.B Watson
c. B.F Skinner
Principals of behaviorism
First and second language learning according to behaviorists
Counterarguments
Conclusion
References

Introduction

There are some basic theories advanced to describe how language is acquired,
learnt and taught. The behaviorist theory, Mentalist theory (Innatism), Rationalist
theory (Cognitive theory), and Interactionism are some of these theories.
Of these, behaviorism and mentalism are two main schools concerning language
learning and teaching. E ach one has a point of view towards language learning. The
paper will discuss in detail the behaviorism theory throw background information ,
definition , the big threes experiments, principles of behaviorism, the behaviorists
point of view about the first and the second language learning ,and the
counterarguments on behaviorism theory of language learning.

Back ground information

Behaviorist theory, which is basically a psychological theory in its essence,
founded by J.B. Watson, is a theory of language learning, advanced in part as a
reaction to traditional grammar. The supporters of this theory are Leonard Bloomfield,
O.N. Mower, B.F. Skinner, and A.W. Staats. Behaviorism was advanced in America as a
new approach to psychology in the early decades of the 20th-century by making a
particular emphasis on the importance of verbal behavior, and received a
considerable trust from the educational world of 1950s.
The major principle of the behaviorist theory rests on the analyses of human behavior
in observable stimulus-response interaction and the association between them. E.L.T.
Thorndike was the first behaviorist to explore the area that learning is the
establishment of associations on particular process of behavior and consequences of
that behavior. Basically, "the behaviorist theory of stimulus-response learning,
particularly as developed in the operant conditioning model of Skinner, considers all
learning to be the establishment of habits as a result of reinforcement and reward"
(Wilga Rivers, 1968, 73). This is very reminiscent of Pavlov's experiment which
indicates that stimulus and response work together. According to this category, the
babies obtain native language habits via varied babblings which resemble the
appropriate words repeated by a person or object near him. Since for his babblings
and mutterings he is rewarded, this very reward reinforces further articulations of the
same sort into grouping of syllables and words in a similar situation. In this way, he
goes on emitting sounds, groups of sounds, and as he grows up he combines the
sentences via generalizations and analogy (as in *goed for went, *doed, for did, so
on), which in some complicated cases, condition him to commit errors by articulating
in permissible structures in speech. By the age of five or six, or babblings and
mutterings grow into socialized speech but little by little they are internalized as
implicit speech, and thus many of their utterances become indistinguishable from the
adults. This, then, obviously, means that behaviorist theory is a theory of stimulusresponse psychology.
"Through a trial-and-error process, in which acceptable utterances are reinforced by
comprehension and approval, and unacceptable utterances are inhibited by the lack

of reward, he gradually learns to make finer and finer discriminations until his
utterances approximate more and more closely the speech of the community in which
he is growing up (Wilga M. Rivers, 1968; 73). To put it in other words, children develop
a natural affinity to learn the language of their social surroundings whose importance
both over language learning and teaching must never be underestimated. In this
respect behaviorist theory stresses the fact that "human and animal learning is a
process of habit formation. A highly complex learning task, according to this theory
may be learned by being broken' down into small habits. These are formed correct or
incorrect responses, are rewarded or, punished, respectively'. (Hubbard Jones and
Thornton Wheeler, 1983; 326). Thus it is clear that the acquisition of learning in
infancy is governed the acquisition of other habits.

Definition

According to Walt man (2003) Behaviorism is a theory of animal and

human learning that only focuses on objectively observable behaviors.
behaviorism described as developmental theory that measures
observable behaviors produced by a learners response to stimuli. From
those definitions of behaviorism from two experts.
I can infer that behaviorism is a theory that implies the learner responds
to environmental stimuli without his/hers mental state being a factor in
the learners behavior.
the individual learn to behave through conditioning which is divided into
two types:
Operant
Classical

The big threes experiments

The behaviorism is primarily associated with Pavlov (classical conditioning)in
Russia and J.B Watson. While , B.F Skinner in United States (operant conditioning). The
two types of possible conditioning that are classical and operant conditioning are
explained as follows.

Ivan Pavlov (1849-1936)

Ivan Pavlov is brilliant Russian Behaviorist. He studied about behaviorism
(reflexes) for thirty years and was considered to be the father of conditioning theory.
He concerned in the concept of classical conditioning behaviorism. Classical
conditioning is the process of relax learning. Moreover, the condition tends to use the
behavioral training naturally occurring stimulus is paired with a response. According to
Waltman (2003)the example of classical conditioning is Pavlov found that providing
food to a dog would set off a response by an elevated salivary flow. He controlled the
situation by ringing a bell each time food was given to the dog. He discovered that he
could make the saliva flows just by ringing the bell, although food was not supplied.

The bell , being the secondary stimulus, was so directly connected with the food or
primary stimulus that the bell brought about the salivary flow or primary response.
The relax was triggered by a new stimulus. He called this a conditioned
reflex(Rippa, 1996 as cited in Walt man(2003)). A learner behavior based on
experience became known as classical conditioning.

John B Watson (1878-1958)

John B. Watson is the important contributor to classical behaviorism . He
studied the behavior of animals. Watsons approach was influenced by Ivan Pavlov
who concerned in Classical conditioning. Classical conditioning is the process of reflex
learning. Watsons approach emphasized in the role of stimuli in producing
conditioned responses. For this reason, Watson may describe it as an S-R(StimulusResponse) called reflexes. He believed that ones surrounding and background are
much more dominant than genetics in the determination of human behavior. He
thought that ones surroundings were the main stimulus that established behavior. He
considered that if he could be in charge of a childs surroundings, he could shape the
child into any type of person he sought. In his research similar to Pavlovs experiment
with a dogs digestive. Watson trained a child to fear a rat. When the child came in
contact with the rat aloud noise was made and the child was startled. This led to the
eventual fear of furry animals. Watson believed that if he could make a child fear a
rat, then he could create any situation and response that he desired( Waltman, 2003).

B.F Skinner(1904-1990)
B.F Skinner is American behaviorist whom develop a system based on
operant conditioning. Operant conditioning is the idea that we behave the way we do
because this kind of behavior has had certain consequences in the past. In operant
conditioning there is reinforcement of the behavior by giving reward or punishment.
Positive reinforcement shows by giving reward to increase the response.
Negative reinforcement shows by giving punishment to decrease response.
the greatest contribution of B.F Skinner was known his studies of how rewards and
punishment influence behavior (Fisher, 202 as cited in Waltman: 2003). He taught that
reinforcement follows behavior. Human behavior is developed by previous situations
and reinforcements. Behavior enlarges in areas that are positively reinforced,
therefore, we should be controlling, creating events that reinforce desired behavior.
Skinner used a tool which was known theSkinner box. This box was used to observe
behavior in tested situations and for operant conditioning experiment. For example
Operant conditioning (as cited in Stranding) is the mouse pushes the lever and
receives a food reward. Therefore, he will push the lever repeatedly in order to get the
treat. It means that the mouse can response to the stimuli well so, the mouse can get
reward in the form of treat .Through his experiment he concluded that behavior could

be changed by providing reinforcement based upon the response. This experiment

was made an evidence to support that in the same manner the child learns what his
society wants him to learn

Principals of Behaviorism
Behaviorist theory dwells on spoken language .that is, primary medium of
language is oral: speech is language because there are many languages without
written. Then, language is primarily what is spoken and secondary what is
written. Thats why spoken language must have a priority.
Behaviorist theory is the habit formation theory of language teaching and
learning, reminding us the learning of structural grammar-language learning
concerns us by not problem-solving but the in-formation and performance of
habits (Nelson Brooks, 1960; 46-47). In other words, language learning is a
mechanical process leading the learners to habit formation whose underlying
scheme is the conditioned reflex .thus it is definitely true that language is
controlled by the consequences of behavior.
The stimulus-response chain is a pure cause of conditioning. Behaviorist
learning theory emphasizes conditioning and buildings from the simplest
conditional responses to more and more complex (behaviors David .Palermo,
1978;19_20) .This comes to mean that clauses and sentences are learned
linearly as longer and longer stimulus-responses and chains, produced in a left
to right series of sequence , as probabilistic incidents, which are basically
Markovs processes .Each stimulus is thus the case of a response, and each
response becomes this initiator of a stimulus, and this process goes on and on in
this way.
All learning is the establishments of habits as the result of reinforcement and
reward. Positive reinforcement is a reward while negative reinforcement is a
punishment. In a stimulus situation , a response is exerted, and if the response
is positively augmented by a reward , then the association between the stimulus
and response is itself reinforced and thus the response will very likely be
manipulated by every appearance of stimulus the result will yield conditioning.
When responses to stimuli are coherently reinforced, then habit formation is
established. It is because of this fact that this theory is termed habit formation
by reinforcement theory.

The learning, due to its socially-conditioned nature, can be the same for each
individual. In other words, each person can learn equally if the conditions in
which the learning takes place are the same for each person.

The counterarguments
The behaviorist theory believes that infants learn oral language from
other human role models through a process involving imitation, rewards, and
practice. Human role models in an infants environment provide the stimuli and
rewards, (Cooter & Reutzel, 2004). When a child attempts oral language or
imitates the sounds or speech patterns they are usually praised and given
affection for their efforts. Thus, praise and affection becomes the rewards.
However, the behaviorist theory is scrutinized for a variety of reasons. If
rewards play such a vital component in language development, what about the
parent who is inattentive or not present when the child attempts speech? If a
babys language learning is motivated strictly by rewards would the speech
attempts stop merely for lack of rewards (Cooter & Reutzel, 2004)? Other cases
against this theory include learning the use and meaning of abstract words,
evidence of novel forms of language not modeled by others, and uniformity of
language acquisition in humans (Cooter & Reutzel, 2004).

conclusion

it is clear that language learning and its development, for the behaviorists,
is a matter of conditioning by means of imitation, practice, reinforcement, and
habituation, which constitute the paces of language acquisition. It must be born in
mind that all behavioristic theories of learning are associationistic, including
Thorndike's, Guthrie's, Hull's, Skinner's, and the theory of the school of functionalism.

References
http://www.learningteaching.info/learning/behaviour.htm
Bloom, L.M. (1974). "Imitations in Language Development: If, When, and Why",
Cognitive Psychology , pp. 380-420.
Brooks, Nelson (1960). Language and Language Learning . New York: Harcourt,
Brace and World.
Clark, Herbert and Eve Clark (1977). Language and Psychology: An Introduction to
Psycholinguistics . New York: Harcourt, Brace and Jovanovich.
Jones, Hubbard and Thornton Wheeler (1983). A Training Course for TEFL . Oxford
University Press.
Palermo, David S. (1978). Psychology of Language . Dallas: Scott, Foresman and Co.
Rivers, M. Wilga (1968). Teaching Foreign Language Skills . Chicago: Chicago
University Press.
Stern, H.H. (1983). Fundamental Concepts of Language Teaching . Oxford: Oxford
University Press.