behavior change

Examples of behavior change in the following topics:

• Stages of Changing Unhealthy Behaviors

  • The transtheoretical model of behavior change, based on five stages of change, assesses a person's readiness to stop an old, unhealthy behavior and act on a new, healthy behavior.
  • The transtheoretical model of behavior change assesses an individual's readiness to act on a new healthier behavior, and provides strategies to guide the individual through each stage of the behavior-change process.
  • At the precontemplation stage, an individual may or may not be aware of a problematic behavior, and generally has no desire to change their behavior.
  • In the action stage, people have changed their behavior and need to work hard to keep moving ahead.
  • The stages-of-change model explains behavior change as a process rather than a discrete decision.

• Classroom Importance

  • Behavioral change occurs for a reason; students work for things that bring them positive feelings, and for approval from people they admire.
  • They change behaviors to satisfy the desires they have learned to value.
  • They generally avoid behaviors they associate with unpleasantness and develop habitual behaviors from those that are repeated often (Parkay & Hass, 2000).
  • The entire rationale of behavior modification is that most behavior is learned.
  • If behaviors can be learned, then they can also be unlearned or relearned.

• Introduction to Animal Behavior

  • Behavior is the change in activity of an organism in response to a stimulus and can be grouped as innate or learned.
  • Behavior is the change in activity of an organism in response to a stimulus.
  • Behavioral biology is the study of the biological and evolutionary bases for such changes.
  • In contrast, learned behaviors are flexible, dynamic, and can be altered relative to changes in the environment.
  • Learned behaviors, even though they may have instinctive components, allow an organism to adapt to changes in the environment and are modified by previous experiences.

• Behavior Modification

  • Behavior modification strategies (positive and negative) decrease unwanted behavior and help employees to show suitable workplace behavior.
  • Behavior modification strategies are systematic antecedents and consequences to change the undesired behavior.
  • Two related terms are behavior therapy and applied behavior analysis.
  • Emphasizing the empirical roots of behavior modification, some authors consider it to be broader in scope and to subsume the other two categories of behavior change methods.
  • Since techniques derived from behavioral psychology tend to be the most effective in altering behavior, most practitioners consider behavior modification along with behavior therapy and applied behavior analysis to be founded in behaviorism.

• Operant Conditioning

  • Operant conditioning is a form of learning in which a person changes his behavior because of the results of his behavior.
  • According to this theory, a person changes his behavior because of the results of his behavior.
  • Extinction: no event follows; the behavior has no consequences.
  • This will increase the frequency at which the behavior occurs.
  • This will increase the frequency at which the behavior occurs.

• Reinforcement Theory

  • Learning is the function of change in overt behavior brought about by these positive or negative reinforcements.
  • Any external events that lead to an alteration or change in behavior in this way are referred to as stimuli.
  • The change in behavior induced by a stimulus is a response.
  • Skinner to mean "the changing of behavior by the use of reinforcement given after the desired response. " Skinner identified three types of responses or operant that can follow behavior.
  • This flowchart compares the processes of increasing behavior rates through reinforcers and decreasing behavior rates through punishers.

• Behavior Therapy and Applied Behavioral Analysis

  • Behavior therapy is based on the idea that maladaptive behavior is learned, and thus adaptive behavior can also be learned.
  • Behaviorism focuses on learning that is brought about by a change in external behavior, achieved through a repetition of desirable actions and the rewarding of good habits and the discouragement of bad habits.
  • Operant conditioning is a type of learning in which an individual's behavior is modified by its consequences; the behavior may change in form, frequency, or strength.
  • They outline behavior-change goals, reinforcements, rewards, and penalties for not meeting the terms of the agreement.
  • Some have argued that certain types of behavior therapy may make a patient too dependent on external rewards rather than internal motivation to change.

• What is Behaviorism?

  • Behaviorism is primarily concerned with observable and measurable aspects of human behavior.
  • In defining behavior, behaviorist learning theories emphasize changes in behavior that result from stimulus-response associations made by the learner.
  • Behavior is directed by stimuli.
  • In assuming that human behavior is learned, behaviorists also hold that all behaviors can also be unlearned, and replaced by new behaviors; that is, when a behavior becomes unacceptable, it can be replaced by an acceptable one.
  • In education, advocates of behaviorism have effectively adopted this system of rewards and punishments in their classrooms by rewarding desired behaviors and punishing inappropriate ones.

• The Behavioral-Science Approach

  • Behavioral science uses research and the scientific method to determine and understand behavior in the workplace.
  • Organizational development is an ongoing, systematic process of implementing effective organizational change.
  • Organizational development is considered both a field of applied behavioral science that focuses on understanding and managing organizational change as well as a field of scientific study and inquiry.
  • It uses components of behavioral sciences and studies in the fields of sociology, psychology, and theories of motivation, learning, and personality to implement effective organizational change and aid in the development of employees.
  • The study of human behavior in the context of organizational change is an integral part of empowering organizations to grow, adapt, and learn to capture competitive advantage.

• Shaping

  • Instead of rewarding only the target, or desired, behavior, the process of shaping involves the reinforcement of successive approximations of the target behavior.
  • The method requires that the subject perform behaviors that at first merely resemble the target behavior; through reinforcement, these behaviors are gradually changed, or shaped, to encourage the performance of the target behavior itself.
  • Then, the trainer rewards a behavior that is one step closer, or one successive approximation nearer, to the target behavior.
  • As the subject moves through each behavior trial, rewards for old, less approximate behaviors are discontinued in order to encourage progress toward the desired behavior.
  • In this way, shaping uses operant-conditioning principles to train a subject by rewarding proper behavior and discouraging improper behavior.