An Evaluation of Cognitivism versus Behaviorism - Essay Example

? An Evaluation of Cognitivism versus Behaviourism: In Favour of Cognitivism An Evaluation of Cognitivism versus Behaviorism: In Favour of Cognitivism Over the years many different fields of inquiry around the globe have made an attempt to understand the mystery of the mind. All of these efforts are an attempt to answer such questions as to what the human mind is, and the nature of how people see, remember, perceive and even think. Other questions pertain to the ways in which human beings are more adept and intelligent than other animals. These questions gave birth to psychology as a field of inquiry; the study of the mind, feelings, thoughts and behaviours of individuals. Since the study of the mind has never been straightforward for psychologists, two broad theories have developed; cognitivism and behaviourism. Psychologists have divided opinion on the two theories, as some are in favour of cognitivism and oppose the arguments of behaviourism. On the other hand, some psychologists have sided with the argument put forward by behavioral psychology in the study of the mind, and rejected the premise of cognitive psychology. This paper will discuss cognitivism and behaviourism with a view to exploring the arguments in favour of cognitive psychology. Behavioral psychology is based on the premise that all behaviours are learned. Mills (2000, p.2-11), noted that behaviourism is associated with learning research, which seeks to relate environmental events to responses. The main point of concern for behaviourists is the adaptation of the organisms to the environment (Mills, 2000, p.2-11). For this reason, behaviourists argue that evolutionary theory is what should be used to address long-term questions, while learning is used to solve more pressing questions. Behavioural psychology suggests that there is a useful possibility of translating mental sentences into actual sentences that appeal only to behaviour and other events that are observable (Sun, 2008, p. 16). With regards to language, behaviourism suggests that meanings in language can be researched through study of verbal behavior, particularly in regard to how humans learn language (Ninness, McCuller & Ozenne, 2000, p.16-44). The theory also suggests that philosophical questions such as human knowledge should be naturalised. In this regard, it postulates epistemological questions. Behaviourism lacks an acknowledgement of various aspects of the human mind such as why people differ in terms of perception, attention, learning, memory, concept formation, judgment, problem-solving, and language processing. It is here that cognitive psychology comes in. Cognitive psychology is the scientific study of mental processes, such as how human beings think, remember, perceive, learn, reason and understand. Cognitive psychologists are mostly interested in the processes by which patterns and objects are recognized, remembered, attended to, imagined and elaborated linguistically (Sun, 2008, p.3). Cognitive psychology uses simulation and experimentation as research tools. The results of the predictions of the models are then compared to human behaviour. In practice there are three approaches used in cognitive psychology. These include experimental, computational and neural cognitive psychology. Cognitive psychology seems a superior theory as to the study of the human mind compared to behaviourist theory. For instance, it offers a better explanation as to how people perceive things in the environment. Through cognitive psychology, an individual is able to understand how people construct subjective interpretation of information from the environment (Frischer, 2011). Frischer also notes that the theory suggests that perpetual systems are made up of separate senses such as visual, somatosensory and auditory and processing modules such as motion and form. All of these aspects represent stimulus information. Cognitive psychology has therefore played a major part in providing an explanation as to how these separate modules and representations interact and are incorporated into coherent concepts. The study has been achieved empirically using brain imaging and psychophysical methods. In most cases, these methods involve computations based on physiological concepts (Frischer, 2011). Behaviourism, on the other hand, is not scientific in nature and as such is based on observation, which lacks empirical proof therefore cannot be relied upon in an attempt to study diverse perceptions of the human mind. How people pay attention varies from one person to another. Some people are not able to stay attentive for long while others can easily do so. The other question pertains to how attention improves performance of an individual and how lack of attention hinders an individual’s performance. Getting an answer to this question has been a long-standing issue in psychology. Even behaviourists could not come up with a concrete answer to this question. It was not until the introduction of cognitive psychology that people were able to understand why people pay attention in different ways (Frischer, 2011). Cognitive psychology explains this through brain imaging technology which reveals the effects of attention on activation during early visual cortices (Eysenck & Keane, 2005, p.12-66). Through this method, people are able to understand the networks of attention control. Behavioural theory does not provide an in-depth explanation with regard to attention, and cannot therefore be relied on. This is because purely relying on someone’s observable behaviour is not enough when explaining how people pay attention. It is argued that learning improves the organism’s response to its natural environment. Behaviourists have not come up with a clear explanation to prove this. However, through cognitive psychology, the phenomenon can be understood better. For instance, cognitive psychology attempts to study the kinds of new information acquired and the various conditions under which such messages are acquired (Eysenck &, Keane, 2005 p.12-66). The study of learning always starts with an analysis of learning processes in animals, that is, contingency, habitual, instrumental, conditioning and process to learning (Frischer, 2011). This shows that without cognitive or conceptual study, it would be difficult to understanding the learning processes. Cognitive study of learning puts emphasis on automatic influences of an individuals prior experience on performance and the nature of knowledge (Eysenck & Keane, 2005, p.12-66). This has been proven using computational approaches and brain imaging technology employed by cognitive psychologists. This appears more credible than behaviourist’s arguments. For instance psychologists who use brain imaging approaches have been able to investigate the role of different brain systems such as the temporal lobe system for episodic and the duty of perpetual system in explaining implicit learning (Eysenck & Keane, 2005, p.12-66). Human beings memorize events differently. Some people have very sharp memories while others have short memories. For example, within the institutions of learning, one will notice that a teacher may explain something once and some students just memorise it easily while others will require the teacher to keep repeating the same thing for them to grasp it. This shows that human memory is very fragile. This, therefore, requires an in-depth explanation. The study of fragility and capacity of human memory is considered to be one of the most developed facets of cognitive psychology (Eysenck & Keane, 2005, p.12-66). In this regard, cognitive psychology provides an explanation as to how memory is acquired, kept, and retrieved (Eysenck & Keane, 2005, p.12-66). Memory domains are categorized into memory categories for facts, skills, procedures, working and short –memory capacity (Goldestein, 2007, p.42-125). The experimental approaches developed by cognitivism have identified dissociable types of memory. These are, squire and Zola, procedural and episodic, and capacity processing systems which include short-term, and working memory (Goldestein, 2007, p.42-116). Brain imaging experiments have identified different brain regions which are active during storage or retrieval from certain distinct processing systems. This empirical study can, therefore, be relied on as opposed to behavioural research which argues based on learning and changes within the environment. Understanding human judgment and behavior is not easy. It is for this reason that some psychologists argue that human judgment and decision-making is ambiguous (Eysenck & Keane, 2005, p.12-66). Human voluntary behaviour requires judgment and choice. Behaviourists have based their arguments on rational models in an attempt to study human judgment and behaviour. However, this has no credible proof since in-depth analyses have figured out a number of failures postulated by rational models due to limitations in human beings information processing. This can only be solved using scientific approaches employed by cognitive psychology. For instance, Eysenck & Keane (2005), noted that computational approaches use dynamic systems in analysing judgment and choice. This has been proven in cognitive neuroscience. Human reasoning is also another point of interest among psychologists. This is the process by which arguments are evaluated and it differs from one person to another. Some individuals have a high reasoning capacity while others, low. Initially, investigations of reasoning mostly focused on the extent to which human beings rightly applied the philosophically concocted rules of inference in arriving at a solution to particular problem (Goldestein, 2007, p.6-25). These are the facets that behavioural psychology was based on. However, human reasoning is affected by fallacies, holistic judgments and representativeness of concrete evidence to prove the point (Eysenck & Keane, 2005, p.12-66). This can only be elaborated on using computational approaches adopted by cognitive psychology. Understanding how humans pursue goals through problem-solving is a point of interest to psychologists. This can only be understood using cognitivist theories of problem-solving which involve the study of how people pursue goal directed behaviors (Frischer, 2011). In this case, cognitive psychology suggests that problem solving involves memory, perception, attention and execution of functions. This can be verified using scientific approaches such as brain imaging technology. This suggestion by cognitive psychology appears more credible than those of behaviourists. Through cognitive psychology, individuals are able to understand language processing. For instance, cognitive psychology focuses on language acquisition, comprehension, production and psychology of reading (Frischer, 2011). This is more comprehensive and credible compared to suggestions put forward by behaviourists. With regard to language processing, behaviourists suggest that the meaning of a language can be researched through the study of verbal behaviour (Goldestein, 2007, p.42-125). This argument cannot be proven. With regard to cognitive psychology, computation models have been made to investigate things to do with thr lexical system, semantic representation and parsing systems. In conclusion, cognitive psychology is a superior approach to understanding human behavior and psychology compared to behaviourism. This is mainly due to the fact that it employs the use of scientific tools in the study of mental processes such as how human beings think, remember, perceive, learn, reason and understand. The scientific approaches such as the use of computational models and brain imaging technology are much more credible methods which can be empirically proven. References Eysenck, M.W. & Keane, M.T. (2005). Cognitive Psychology: A Student’s Handbook. New York: Psychology Press. Frischer, L. (2011). Cognitive Theory. Retrieved from http://phobias.about.com/od/glossary/g/cognitivethedef.htm Goldestein, E.B. (2007). Cognitive Psychology: Connecting mind, research and everyday experience. New York: Cengage Learning. Mills, J.A. (2000). Control: A History of Behavioral Psychology. New York: New York University Press. Ninness, H., McCuller, G., & Ozenne, L. (2000). School and behavioral psychology: applied research in Human-Computer interactions, Functional Assessments and treatment. Massachusetts: Springer. Sun, R. (2008). The Cambridge Handbook of Computational Psychology. New York: Cambridge University Press. Read More