Psychology Essay: Conditioning.

How will you use the material on conditioning to improve your own life? Your parenting of children? Managing of others?

As I'm hoping to get into the marketing/advertising field with my Web Graphic Design degree, learning about conditioning will really benefit me in my professional life, as consumer advertising relies on the principles of classical conditioning to create loyalty to a particular brand or product. It fascinates me how powerful advertising really can be; I've learned that when well-known brands are shown to subjects, their brains register a spike in overall activity and specifically higher levels of activity in the pleasure centers of the brain.

I'm very interested in learning which imagery, music and sound effects will encourage positive emotions in a target audience. I've learned that humor, in particular, often conveys a sense of belonging or shared experience, so this is a very effective means of reaching people. Successful advertising campaigns also generate strong emotions that have to do with basic human needs, such as belonging and love; this is often more effective than even repetition or relevance.

Learning about operant conditioning made me think more on the type of parent that I would like to become. The textbook brought out that affirming and encouraging positive behavior with recognition, praise and rewards is more effective than punishment without reinforcement; also, the re-framing threats of punishment into positive statements of choice is an effective technique. For instance, "No games until you do your homework!" could be restated as, "You may play games after you finish your homework." I can say from experience that this is effective, as well; for instance, when asked do to something like chores or to work on my homework, my grandmother tended to use the latter technique, whereas my mother relied more on threats and negative reinforcement. Generally speaking, the former technique would create a desire to please, and the latter technique created a desire to rebel - needless to say, the former technique was the more effective one.

The lessons about observational learning, modeling and mirroring [the process of observing and repeating a behavior] also stressed, to me anyway, the importance of being a good example for others, especially one's children. Higher primates - including children - have mirror neurons in certain areas of their brains. Mirror neurons fire when a physical action is performed, and the same neurons fire when a subject observes another performing the same task. A common example of this is when teenagers manage to drive a car without formal instruction.

As sort of a side point, I also really liked this:

"Children should be allowed the freedom to discover their own worlds instead of learning them from books alone. Children's playfulness and sense of exploration should be encouraged to nurture their natural predisposition to learn by discovery."

The information I read in operant conditioning could also be applied to the managing of others; effectively disciplining your employees and acknowledging their hard work is equally important. I like how the textbook emphasized that affirming and encouraging positive behavior with recognition, praise and rewards is more effective than punishment without reinforcement. Who wants to work in a place where they do not feel valued or appreciated? As a manager, you need to know how to properly motivate your workers to work for you; the 'atmosphere' within the workplace, and the quality of the work done, will be much better if you know how to create a feeling of loyalty within your workers.