A Cognitive-Behavioral View of Animal Learning Plus Ethology

Reviews the book, Psychology of Learning and Behavior. 2nd ed by Barry Schwartz (1984). The author begins the second edition of this leading text by questioning whether learning theory, by focusing on environmental events, is "on the wrong track all together". What emerges is an intellectually challenging book that moves learning theory from the radical behaviorism of B. F Skinner toward a cognitive-behavioral approach seasoned with a dash of ethology. For Schwartz, behavior theory is an oversimplified parody of radical behaviorism. His sympathies clearly lie with the challengers. Unfortunately, the reader is not alerted that behavior theory is really a straw theory to be demolished in each succeeding chapter. The advantage of Schwartz's approach is that the reader is challenged with theoretical alternatives throughout the book, even though these alternatives are presented as being more sharply differentiated than is actually the case. Ethology remains concerned with an evolutionary approach to species-specific behaviors, whereas animal learning remains concerned with learning processes that are general among species. Schwartz presumes that readers will have no background in learning theory. This is a book for instructors who want to teach students how to think rather than to memorize specific facts. For the psychologist who has lost touch with learning theory since graduate school, this is a book to find out what has been going on. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved)