Learning from B.F Skinner and Jean Piaget The psychological studies of B.F Skinner and Jean Piaget in the field of learning revolutionized the understanding of learning processes, and undoubtedly paved the way for future psychologists. The findings of B.F Skinner and his theory on operant learning expanded the horizons of his generation. Jean Piaget also constructed the basis by which we evaluate the logical capabilities of youth, and he developed a theory of schemas. Both of these eminent psychologists have left a mark on the field of learning, and while both are dissimilar, they have common themes and continuities that cannot be overlooked. Burrhus Frederic Skinner was born on March 20, 1904, to William Arthur Skinner (a lawyer) and Grace Madge Burrhus, born with an aptitude for mechanical toys and gadgets. In his adolescence he showed interest in works by Charles Darwin and Francis Bacon. In his early adult life he attended Hamilton College in Clinton, New York where he studied English language and Literature, during his time at University he was heavily engaged in the campus magazine, and was known for his hand in pranks. After graduation he was exposed to Behaviorism by the literary magazine Dial, and read further into Conditioned Reflexes by Ivan Pavlov, he soon realized that he was interested in human behavior and was convinced by a close friend that science was the next big thing, he decided to engage in work in psychology. He enrolled at Harvard in 1928, and began experimenting on animals in a lab at the school, after he earned his Ph.D Skinner remained at harvard, continuing his research in the lab. In a number of papers during the 1930’s skinner emphasized the distinction of Respondent behavior, also known as conditioned reflexes, and Operant behavior, which is commanded by the consequences the behavior produces, these could either increase or decrease the probability of the behavior. After publishing an account of a society that was in harmony with nature, and employed the use of positive reinforcement instead of punishment, the novel known as Walden Two created controversy when it was criticised for the idea of a deliberate design of a culture. The idea of a community created with complete control was a foreign concept at the time. After the publication of his novel he studied the behavior of rats inside what would soon be known as a “Skinner Box”, which borrowed heavily from Thorndike’s Puzzle Box. The Skinner box tested the learning abilities of a rat based on its ability to pull a lever to either dispense a pellet of food, or to stop the electrically charged floor from shocking the subject. The pellet dispenser and electrical shock were the experimental proof for his theory of reinforcement, the reinforcers are responses from the environment that increase the probability of a behavior being repeated. The food pellet being a positive reinforcers that encourages the pull of the lever with a reward, whereas the electrical shock was a negative reinforcers where it encourages the pull of the lever by relieving the subject of a negative stimulus. His theory of operant conditioning was heavily influenced by Thorndike's work, not to discredit Skinners work in the field, operant conditioning is commonly applied in learning, from getting a gold star for answering a question correctly to getting a good grade on an assignment to get the nagging mother off your back. Skinners work has intentionally and unintentionally been applied to learning since humanity invented the pencil and paper. Jean Piaget was born on August 9, 1896, in Neuchatel Switzerland born to Rebecca Jackson and Arthur Piaget, his father was a medieval literature professor with very passionate dedication to his studies, a trait that young Jean soon picked up on. Piaget had an intense interest in the sciences and by would spend hours at the local museum observing mollusks. By the time he was in his teens his papers on mollusks were being widely published. After high school he went on to study zoology at the university of Neuchatel, he received his Ph.D in natural sciences. He went on to study psychology under Carl Jung at the university of Zurich, where he developed a deep interest in psychoanalysis. Over the next year he studied abnormal psychology in paris. In 1920 Piaget evaluated the results of standardized tests that were meant to measure a child's intelligence and draw connections between a child's age and his mental state, for Piaget this opened his eyes to children's learning habits, here he learned that children did not lack mental reasoning, instead the lacked experience to properly answer question. In the following years he dedicated his career to child psychology, and he theorized the four stages of mental development, first being the sensorimotor stage, the preoperational stage, the concrete operational stage, and the formal operational stage. This theory revolutionized the way learning for youth was perceived, his theories on schemas would explain that children are not unintelligent, but simply lack the proper schemas, or the proper experience to answer many of the questions. Piaget and Skinner both created valid theories that impacted the way we consider learning. The two core building blocks of their theories were quite similar. Both Piaget’s Schemas, and Skinners reinforcers rely on the building of experience to learn. Piaget’s main claim was that children are not mentally incompetent, but that instead, they lacked the experience to build schemas and answer questions. Skinner's operant conditioning instead relies on experience of positive or negative reinforcement and punishment as experience to encourage the subjects to learn new behaviors. Both psychologist also view the process of learning as developmental, between the 4 stages of piaget and skinners strong beliefs of developmental learning, it is clear that the two share some similarities. Another critical similarity was that they neither of them majored in psychology as an undergraduate. Despite their similarities they had radically differing theories on learning and psychology as a whole. Skinner was a true behaviorist and Piaget believed in the mind as a studyable entity that should be utilized. Skinner actually even created extremist behaviorism, which is a far cry from the beliefs of Piaget. Skinner also saw human development as a continuous process in which behavior were responses to experience and adaptation to the environment. Piaget on the other hand took a cognitive approach and was concerned with the evolution of mental structures. Where skinner saw development in quantitative terms, piaget held that development occurred in stages in which qualitative changes enabled the individual to construct his or her actions of words in stages. One of the main works of Piaget was his theory on the stages of development. In his theory he outlined that intellectual growth happens in stages, the first stage is the sensorimotor stage, in this stage the brain only can react to simple sensory stimuli, these infants lack object permanence, which is the ability to understand object continue to exist when out of sight of the infant. From ages 1-7 children are in the preoperational stage in this stage children do not think in logical operations, and they are lack theory of mind, they cannot comprehend the perspectives of others, it could be said that they lack empathy, another concept they lack is conservation, that is that just because objects change shape in arrangement it does not signify amount. They also are egocentric, they cannot understand that others experience similarly to their own. From age 7-11 children are in the preoperational stage, here they understand conservation of objects, and understand reversible operations. The last stage is from ages 11 onwards, it is the process that deals with the abstract and hypothetical situations, it demands logical, deductive reasoning. this stage is reached before adolescence and research shows that some do not reach it at all. This focus on children and their development sets Piaget apart from Skinner, as Skinner believed that changes did not occur in stages. While both Piaget and Skinner where the two most influential human developmental theorists of the twentieth century, their stances on development and their effects on learning differed, despite many similarities that would allow them to be grouped together. Their work in the field of psychology will last millennia.