The techniques to cure distress in children discussion

This is a paper that is focusing on the techniques to cure distress in children discussion. The paper also provides a brief case on the a mother and child scenario for this assignment paper.

The techniques to cure distress in children discussion

Learning and Behavior
Please type your answers to the questions below. You are to work entirely alone on the exam. You may refer to your book, your class notes, or any other non-living source. Please answer all questions thoroughly and completely. Short, one paragraph answers are unlikely to earn you full credit. Each question is worth 10 points.

1. A mother left her young child playing outside in the garden and went into the house to get a cup of coffee. When the mother returned a few minutes later, she saw her young child playing with a large brown snake. Some months later, the mother took the child to a psychologist for treatment because the child was showing extreme distress at the presence of any long cylindrical object such as the hose to the vacuum cleaner. Explain what has happened (why the child is responding this way) and why it happened. In addition to your description, diagram your answer using the system and notation we learned in classical conditioning. Finally, describe a technique the psychologist might use to “cure” the child of this extreme distress.

The techniques to cure distress in children discussion

2. Secondly, compare and contrast the blocking and overshadowing effects we studied with classical conditioning. Next, using the Rescorla-Wagner theory, explain how these effects might occur with an example. Finally, explain, using the Rescorla-Wagner theory, why a dog would salivate more to the smell of food than to the sound of another dog eating food.

3.  Thirdly, describe how a psychologist could successfully treat alcohol addiction using classical conditioning. As part of your answer, diagram the process whereby the addictive behavior could be eliminated.

4. Fourthly, a psychologist has developed a treatment she believes will prevent child abuse. Unfortunately, the psychologist was unable to find enough people who abuse their children to conduct a study to demonstrate the effectiveness of the treatment. Ignoring the ethical considerations of such an experiment, design a study that would accomplish the following:
a. produce a sufficient sample of child abusers for the study
b. demonstrate conclusively a cause and effect relationship between the treatment and a reduction in child abuse