Report On The Theory Of Learning

Write a report on the theory of learning.

Discussion

Giuliana Rancic is an Italian American TV personality she was talking about and African American singer and actress named Zendaya. Giuliana Rancic on fashion police stated that she did not liked the hair of the actress when the actress showed up in dreadlocks. Rancic said that the hair of Zendaya looked like it is a weed and smelledlike patchouli oil. The viewers took the comment as a racist comment and later on Rancic apologized. Zendaya herself went through the comments of Rancic on the Instagram and replied that the comments of Rancic was outrageously offensive and largely a stereotype. The star of the Disney channel then tried to connect the dots bigger picture of racism that was prevalent and the individual micro aggression during the time. Zendaya highlighted that at that time period African Americans were already experiencing criticisms in the society. The people in the society chose to judge people based on the curls on their hair. Zendaya said that she wore such a hair in locks on the Oscar because the she wanted to show the positive light and also to remind the people that the colour of the hair is also good enough. After a few days, Rancic issued an apology on the E News. Rancic replied that that the she wants to apologize for the comments she had made on the fashion police regarding the Zendaya’s hair. Rancic said that she did not intended to hurt the feelings of anybody and she learnt that her intent does not matter at all. Thus, she wants to say that she is sincerely sorry if Zendaya and anybody else got hurt. She even continued that the entire situation has been a learning experience for me she had learned a lot from the incident regarding the stereotypes and clichés and the damage she has been responsible for (abcnews.go.com, 2018).

Rancic’s behaviour interested me because the she commented something which later on magnified into a racist comment and she stereotyped Zendaya for dawning dreadlocks that were seen majorly in the African Americans. This study will include the description of the learning theory that fits best with the person’s behaviour especially in this case; describing the theory of emotion that best justifies and applies to the selection; if the person is experiencing any mental disorder or a personality disorder due to which the person is exhibiting such a behaviour, or else how stress played a role in the act by relating the behaviour with the theory of stress; how other could have influenced the behaviour of the person and a description of the social psychological phenomenon that describes the situation best (abcnews.go.com, 2018).

The Theory of Learning

The theory of learning that suits the incident best is the Behaviourism theory of learning or the behaviourist approach. This approach explains that the learning is based on the changes in the environment and when a person experiences the changes directly. The principles of this theory can be explained by the operant conditioning and classical conditioning. This method refers to a psychological approach that emphasizes on the objective and the scientific approachesof investigation. The approach emphasizes only on the observable stimulus-response behaviours. This approach states that all the behaviours are learned through an active interaction with the environment (Schunk, 2012). Considering the case of Rancic, she went on to pass the racist comments on the dreadlocks of Zendaya. One of the biggest issues if the prevalence of racism within the white Americans regarding the African Americans. This incidents of racism were already in the within the minds of the white Americans. The white Americans were already having the feelings of hatred regarding the African Americans. This external environment compelled Rancic to act in a way which others were also acting (Watson, 2017).

The assumptions that were considered for this study are as follows:

• All the behaviour is learned from the environment- environment plays a role in influencing the behaviour of a person. Humans learn behaviour through the classical and operant conditioning.
• Psychology should be considered as a science- this means that the theories are entirely obtained from the controlled and careful observation.
• Behaviourism is basically linked with the behaviour that are observable and it is opposed to the events that are opposite to the internal events like the emotion andthinking. The behaviourists accept the fact that the existence of the emotions and the cognitions can be studied also by scientifically and objectively (Olson, 2015).
• There is a very little difference that exists between the other animals and the humans. The fundamental fact is that there is no qualitative distinction between the animals and the humans.
• Behaviour is the result of response-stimuli- all the types of behaviour can be reduced to a much simple version of response-stimuli reaction (Ertmer& Newby, 2013).

The theory of emotion which is applicable in this scenario is the two factor model theory developed by Schachter and Singer. This theory states that emotion comes from the combination of cognition and state of arousal that best suites the situation a person is in. For example, the theory of emotion highlights that when the when people becomes aroused, such people look for cue as why they feel the way they do. The two major parts of emotion are cognitive label and the physical arousal. It has been noted by Schachter and Singer that physical arousal played a key role in the development of the emotions. However, it has been mentioned that the arousal remains the same for every type of emotion. This theory can be explained through an experiment that was conducted by Schachter and Singer (Seth, 2013). A total of 184 male recipients were injected with epinephrine. It is a hormone that increases the heartbeat, and elevates the rate of breathing and trembling. All the participants were told that they were injected with a drug so that their eyesight cam be tested. Whereas, the other group was not mentioned about the possible side effects that the injection can cause to the participants, while the other group was not mentioned about it. The participants were then kept in a dark room, and it was hypothesized that the participants that knew the side effects will either feel angry or euphoric. While the participants that do not know the side effects of the drug will either feel angry or happier. The respondents that felt euphoric were able to interpret the side effect of the drug to be happiness. While the respondents that were angry were able to predict the feelings as anger. It was hypothesized by Schachter and Singer that if people experiences an emotion for which they do not have any explanation then such people label such feelings as feelings at the moment (Zaki, Davis &Ochsner, 2012).

Theory of Emotion

Stress is an important and interesting subject since the time immemorial and it is not just limited to what happens to the body during a stressful environment, but it also takes into account of the psyche of an individual. The theory of stress is an amalgamation of the theories of emotion that are proposed by the Schachter and Singer, Cannon and Brad, James and Lange. The Schachter and Singer argued that the understanding of an emotion requires both the emotional arousal and the cognitive arousal when a person experiences an emotion.Schachter and Singer proposed that attribution or the process where the brain tries to identify a stress stimulus that produces an emotion. The theory describes that the humans become aware of the situation that leads to an emotional response. When the reason seems to be unobvious then humans look for the environmental clues for the exact interpretation of the emotion (Hyland &Boduszek, 2012). Rancic is to be emotionally attached with the other white Americans that have hatred towards the African Americans and pass the racist comments against them. This is a natural tendency within the whites and it compelled Rancic to pass racist comments when she saw Zendaya dawning the dreadlocks. The dreadlocks are naturally seen among the African Americans and thus it is easy to designate them. This emotion of Rancic along with the other whites created a complex mix of emotion and stress.

The emergency theory of Cannon-Bard explains that the emotion is a result of stress and it can occur even when the bodily changes are not present. It can be also said that the Rancic faced a lot of stress when she was criticized by many regarding the racist comments and stereotyping the act of Zendaya. The stress acted as an emotion or feeling of remorse for Rancic and it can be argued that the emotional response to the stress is a not due to psychological response and it rather occurs as a simultaneously (McCarty, 2016).

Since the colonial period there has been a widespread occurrence of Racism. Socially and legally all the major privileges are sanctioned for the white Americans whereas it is denied to all the other races. A majority of the Americans have revealed that racism is still major problems in America and it is a prominent thing in the politics and the society. It has been seen that about 64 percent of the Americans have said that racism is a major problem in the American society. The pluralities of the America have mentioned that the in America the race relations are getting worse and the reason is that very little attention is paid to the racial and race issues. Overall, a whopping 30 percent of the of the plurality think that race is still the biggest source of divide in America. Racial tensions can be effectively tied to the bigger national events and the studies have indicated that there is a huge difference between the everyday experiences. It has been noted that the racial discrimination is felt not just in the public places but in other areas as well. About a quarter of the Americans have said that the they have experienced discrimination in the workplaces due to the discrimination which is based on their race (Walker, Spohn&DeLone, 2012). While it has been found that the blacks are likely to experience the more racial discrimination in comparison to the other racial subgroup. 48 percent of the African Americans have revealed that they have experienced the workplace discrimination in comparison to the 14 percent of the whites and the 36 percent of the Hispanics. As high as 72 percent of the Americans have issues of racial discrimination against the Blacks and this has been a serious problem for America. This has been complemented by the 81 percent of the Hispanics and 89 percent of the Blacks. While 30 percent of the Americans have mentioned that it is not a serious problem and 68 percent of the Americans have mentioned that it is a serious issue. Majority of the people think that white people have the larger amount of benefits in comparison to the black people. When questioned, 84 percent of the Blacks have mentioned that white people receive a great deal of benefits. 71 percent of the Hispanics have mentioned that white receives a lot of benefits (nbcnews.com, 2018).

Conclusion

Thus, from the above discussion it can be concluded that behaviourist theory, two factors theory of emotion and the theory of stress framed by Schachter and Singer, Cannon and Brad, James and Lange played a role in defining the behaviour of Giuliana Rancic, who made racist comments on Zendaya. It has been found that the racism played a key role in shaping the behaviour of Rancic which compelled her to make racist comments on dreadlocks of Zendaya. I believe the action of Rancic is an action of both the nature and nurture. The society in which Rancic is brought up has serious discriminative issues against the people of black communities. Since the colonial period there has been a widespread occurrence of Racism. Socially and legally all the major privileges are sanctioned for the white Americans whereas it is denied to all the other races. A majority of the Americans have revealed that racism is still major problems in America and it is a prominent thing in the politics and the society.

Reference

abcnews.go.com. (2018). Giuliana Rancic 'Didn't Intend to Hurt Anybody' With Zendaya Hair Critique. Retrieved from https://abcnews.go.com/Lifestyle/giuliana-rancic-publicly-apologizes-offensive-zendaya-comment/story?id=29213927

Ertmer, P. A., & Newby, T. J. (2013). Behaviorism, cognitivism, constructivism: Comparing critical features from an instructional design perspective. Performance Improvement Quarterly, 26(2), 43-71.

Hyland, P., &Boduszek, D. (2012). A unitary or binary model of emotions: A discussion on a fundamental difference between cognitive therapy and rational emotive behaviour therapy. Journal of Humanistics and Social Sciences, 1(1), 49-61.

McCarty, R. (2016). The alarm phase and the general adaptation syndrome: two aspects of Selye’s inconsistent legacy. In Stress: Concepts, Cognition, Emotion, and Behavior (pp. 13-19).

nbcnews.com. (2018). Poll: 64 percent of Americans say racism remains a major problem. Retrieved from https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/poll-64-percent-americans-say-racism-remains-major-problem-n877536

Olson, M. H. (2015). Introduction to theories of learning. Routledge.

Schunk, D. H. (2012). Learning theories an educational perspective sixth edition. Pearson.

Seth, A. K. (2013). Interoceptive inference, emotion, and the embodied self. Trends in cognitive sciences, 17(11), 565-573.

Walker, S., Spohn, C., &DeLone, M. (2012). The color of justice: Race, ethnicity, and crime in America. Cengage Learning.

Watson, J. B. (2017). Behaviorism. Routledge.

Zaki, J., Davis, J. I., &Ochsner, K. N. (2012). Overlapping activity in anterior insula during interoception and emotional experience. Neuroimage, 62(1), 493-499.