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Concept
Antecedent (behavioral psychology)
Summary
An antecedent is a stimulus that cues an organism to perform a learned behavior. When an organism perceives an antecedent stimulus, it behaves in a way that maximizes reinforcing consequences and minimizes punishing consequences. This might be part of complex, interpersonal communication.
The definition of antecedent is a preceding event or a cause- in this case it is the event that causes the learned behavior to happen.
A learned behavior is one that does not come from instincts- it is created by practice or experiences. Learned behavior can be controlled by two systems- reflective or reflexive, which in turn create cognitive learning and habitual learning. Cognitive learning is influenced directly by the environment and evaluates it in order to acquire a particular behavior. An example of cognitive learning is riding a bike, where the environment (changing of the road path, weather, turns etc.) is constantly changing and you have to adjust to this.
Habitual learning is formed through conditioning, whether that is voluntary or involuntary. Classical conditioning denotes when an organism creates reflexes based on past events. A reflex is a stimulus response that happens due to a biological response and is mediated by the nervous system. Habitual learning can then be a result of this reflex happening time after time, as we get used to the stimuli- this is where the antecedent comes in.
Habitual learning uses strategies from past experiences to dictate how to behave in the present- e.g., continuing to ride a bike after initially learning how to.
Both of these learning strategies can be a result of an antecedent.
Classical conditioning was first discovered by Pavlov, who studied digestive reflexes in dogs- the results showed that different stimuli (different types of food) elicit different reflexes and responses (different compositions of saliva). He then discovered that the dogs salivated before they received the food- due to the antecedent. The antecedent became the bell that Pavlov rang before he fed the dogs, and the learned behavior became the salivation.
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Related concepts (1)
Behaviorism
Behaviorism (also spelled behaviourism) is a systematic approach to understanding the behavior of humans and other animals. It assumes that behavior is either a reflex evoked by the pairing of certain antecedent stimuli in the environment, or a consequence of that individual's history, including especially reinforcement and punishment contingencies, together with the individual's current motivational state and controlling stimuli. Although behaviorists generally accept the important role of heredity in determining behavior, they focus primarily on environmental events.