3 - Elicited behaviours Flashcards
What is an elicited behaviour?
- A behavior that is “drawn out” or bring forth of an organism by the presentation of a stimulus
- A behavior that is automatic and involuntary (reflexive)
→ p.ex: you don’t choose to be startled by a gunshot
What is a reflex? Give an example
- The most basic form of elicited behavior
- Defined as “a relatively simple, automatic response to a stimulus”
- Some reflexes only involve one gland or muscle, others are more general involving coordinated action of certain body parts
- Reflexes are adaptive, they promote survival
→ p.ex: blinking, being startled, flexion (withdrawal) - Example: The startle response—a defensive reaction to a sudden, unexpected stimulus—involves the automatic tightening of skeletal muscles as well as various hormonal and visceral (internal organ) changes
- Example: The orienting response—in which we automatically position ourselves to facilitate attending to a stimulus—can involve a relatively major body movement, such as when we automatically turn in response to an unfamiliar noise behind us
- Reflex arc: a neural pathway that controls a reflex
What is a fixed-action pattern? What puts it into motion?
- A sequence of species-specific behavior elicited by a stimulus
→ i.e. Dog play postures (head down, bum up, front legs out) in response to its owner pulling out a ball - A fixed action pattern is a fixed sequence of responses elicited by a specific stimulus
→ p.ex: V-shaped formation by birds, cats compulsively scratch the ground if they want to hide their food, dogs indicate they want to play by wagging their tails - We are often able to identify a releaser stimulus that sets the fixed action pattern into motion
→ p.ex: seeing blood (releaser) and automatically throwing up
Fixed-action patterns tend to be ___ ___ that evolved to promote survival in the animal’s natural environment (survival technique).
Adaptive response
→ The difficulty in this, is that the responses are not well suited to major changes (sudden large scale change) to the natural environment
→ the fixed action patterns can even become harmful or useless following a change
→ p.ex: deers have an inborn tendency to run in zigzag patterns because they’re trying to throw predators off and increases its chances to survive; BUT this action decreases its survival when going down a highway
What is habituation?
- Habituation is a decrease in the strength of an elicited response to a stimulus after repeated exposure to that stimulus
- The first time the stimulus is present, the response will probably be most intense, then it will gradually decrease
→ p.ex: habituation to the sound of a fan; habituation to the smell of fire; the tick of a clock - We tend to habituate to stimuli that are currently irrelevant and low-intensity
- Habituation is only temporary
- Allows you to attend to changes in the environment
What is sensitization?
- Sensitization is an enhancement of a response following the repeated presentation of a novel (usually noxious) stimulus
- Alerts us to small, possibly dangerous, changes in our environment
→ p.ex: hearing a branch snapping in the woods; smelling smoke in the middle of the night; still getting scared at every turn of a scary haunted house - We tend to become sensitive to stimuli that are extremely relevant and high-intensity
- Sensitization often generalizes to other stimuli
- Typically adaptive responses, but can be maladaptive, especially if in a stressful situation
→ p.ex: a soldier’s responses to exploding artillery shells and subsequent startling sounds
→ soldiers don’t get used to these sounds, their response remains enhanced, this contributes to the PTSD development
True or false: Effects of habituation and sensitization usually disappear when the stimulus is not presented for a period of time.
True: The strength of behaviour goes back to its original level
What is long-term habituation? Give an example.
- The response slowly decreases as a result of repeated stimulation and then slowly recovers in the absence of repeated stimulation
→ p.ex: living in an apartment next to a train, at first the response is heightened, but eventually habituation becomes long-term
What is short-term habituation? Give an example
- The response quickly decreases and then quickly recovers
→ p.ex: the sound of a fan
In general, long-term habituation tends to occur when presentations of the stimulus are ___ ___ (e.g., a train going by your apartment each morning), whereas short-term habituation tends to occur when presentations of the stimulus are ___ ___ or ___
Widely space; narrowly spaced or continuous
True or false: Sensitization rarely generalizes to other stimuli.
False: They often do generalize
- p.ex: A shell- shocked soldier is likely to jump not only in response to artillery explosions but also to any sudden stimulus
True or false: Habituation is quite stimulus-specific.
True: Such that any change in the stimulus is likely to result in the reappearance of the habituated response
In classical conditioning, ___ behaviours are paired with a new ___, which then can elicit the ___
Reflexive; stimulus; response
How did Pavlov develop his experiment?
- Studied salivation as part of the digestive process
- Presentation of different substances affect the quantity and quality of salivation
→ Meat routinely produced small amount of dry saliva
→ Sand routinely produced large amount of watery saliva - Purpose: to train a dog to salivate to the sound of a metronome
- The dog was restrained in a harness, and a tube was inserted into an incision that had been made in its cheek (the dog habituated to the tube quickly)
- The saliva would run down the tube into a container where it could be precisely measured
- Pavlov (accidentally) discovered the principles of Classical Conditioning
What are the 4 components of Pavlovian conditioning? Define each of them
1) Unconditioned stimulus (UCS or US): stimulus that unconditionally–automatically and naturally triggers a response (food)
2) Unconditioned response (UCR or UR): unlearned, naturally occurring response to the unconditioned stimulus (salivating)
→ because salivation to food occurs naturally, and does not require training
3) Conditioned Stimulus (CS): originally irrelevant stimulus that, after association with an unconditioned stimulus, comes to trigger a conditioned response (bell or metronome) (previously NS)
4) Conditioned Response (CR): learned response to a previously neutral conditioned stimulus (salivating)
True or false: The CR is similar to the UR, but usually weaker or less intense.
True
What happens during classical conditioning?
- The sound of the metronome is presented just before the food
- The dog continues to salivate in response to the food
- The sound of the metronome and the food are presented several times
- Each metronome/food pairing is a conditioning trial
→ several conditioning trials need to be done before the NS becomes established as a CS
→ Conditioning trials should be spaced (not massed) to maximize learning (like studying) - To test the level of conditioning, the NS is presented alone to see if it elicits salivation; If so, it has become a CS
→ the food and metronome have now been paired
What happens after conditioning has been successfully done?
- The sound of the metronome elicits salivation
- The food does not have to be present for the dog to salivate when it hears the sound of the metronome (to know you’ve succeeded in conditioning)
- The CR is similar to the UR, but usually weaker or less intense
→ The CR and the UR are not always so similar
What is appetitive conditioning?
- The US is an event that is usually considered pleasant and that an organism seeks out
→ Examples: food, water, sexual stimuli, addictive drugs
What is aversive conditioning?
- The US is an event that is usually considered unpleasant and that an organism usually avoids
→ Examples: an electric shock, a painful bite, and an unpleasant odour - Usually occurs rapidly and often requires only a single or a few pairings (of the NS and US) to be strongly conditioned
- To survive, we have evolved in such a way as to quickly learn to dislike those events that cause pain or illness
What is context fear conditioning?
- Type of aversive conditioning
- If given a shock (US) while in a certain box (NS), the animal will quickly learn to fear that box (CS)
- Measuring the level of fear can be problematic when studying fear in animals (difficult to record)
-
Conditioned suppression (or conditioned emotional response) helps resolve this issue
→ the rat is first trained to engage in a behaviour (pressing a lever to get food)
→ when a steady rate of lever pressing is established, a fear stimulus is introduced when the lever is pressed (tone will play, then a shock)
→ the rat will become upset and stop pressing the lever
→ when the tone plays, fear is initiated in the rat
Explain how the conditioned response and the unconditioned response are not always so similar with an example of snakes.
The snake is neutral, but after being bitten the man experiences pain; after conditioning, the man associates the bite with the snake, thus feeling fear
___ conditioning accounts for many of our fears and anxieties
Aversive
True or false: Aversive conditioning can be beneficial and problematic.
True:
→ When the fear is appropriate—as in learning to fear a snake that has bitten us—such conditioning is beneficial.
→ When the fear is inappropriate—as when we begin to fear all snakes – conditioning can be problematic
What is excitatory conditioning?
- The NS is associated with the presentation of a US
- The excitatory CS is usually labeled a CS+
- Not always ‘positive’, or appetitive/pleasurable
- Examples:
→ the metronome is associated with the presentation of food
→ the context is associated with the delivery of shock
What is inhibitory conditioning?
- Conditioning in which the NS is associated with the absence or removal of a US is known as inhibitory conditioning
→ p.ex: if a vicious dog always bites you, except for when the owner is present
→ the owner is a safety signal which is the absence of a bite - The result of this is that the CS comes to inhibit the occurrence of a certain response
→ although a dog is an excitatory CS for fear, the owner is an inhibitory condition for fear; this fear will be suppressed when the owner is present - These are used by psychologists to manage phobias in patients
What are the types of temporal factors in conditioning?
- Delayed conditioning
- Trace conditioning
- Simultaneous conditioning
- Backwards conditioning
What is delayed conditioning?
- The onset of the NS precedes the onset of the US, and the two stimuli overlap
- Example: a tone is played, and ends just after the onset of the shock
→ the onset of the tone precedes the onset of the shock, the tone is still on when the shock is presented - Best arrangement for conditioning, especially when the interstimulus interval (ISI) (the time between the onset of the NS and the onset of the US) is relatively short
What is trace conditioning?
- The onset AND offset of the NS precede the onset of the US
- NS and US do not overlap
- The organism has to “remember” the occurrence of the tone (“memory trace”) to be able to associate the NS and the US
→ because the tone is no longer present when the shock occurs - The time between the offset of the NS and the onset of the US is called the trace interval
- Can be almost as effective as delayed conditioning if the trace interval is relatively short (no more than a few seconds)
→ if the trace interval is longer than that, conditioning is unlikely to occur
→ Example: a tone is played and ends, just before the shock is delivered
What is simultaneous conditoning?
- The onset of the NS and the US are simultaneous
- Example: a tone and a shock are turned on at the same time
- This procedure usually results in poor conditioning because the NS is no longer a good predictor of the US when they happen simultaneously
→ the rat won’t know what’s hurting him, the shock or the tone
What is backwards conditioning?
- The US is presented first and the NS is presented later
→ the NS is essentially nothing to the rat, it’s just a stimulus that is there - Example: the rat receives a shock and then hears a tone
- This is the least effective procedure for conditioning
→ especially true for conditioning of an excitatory response like salivating - In some cases it might be achieved, as when the NS is a biologically relevant stimulus for fear
→ p.ex: instead of using a tone as a NS for shock, we use the sight of a snake (because the rat already has a negative connotation of the snake)
→ Example: the tone essentially predicts the removal of shock (safety signal)
What is opponent process theory?
- Richard Solomon (1980) theory of motivation/emotion views emotions as pairs of opposites
→ happy-sad
→ fear-relief (p.ex: before vs. after an exam) - Every process that has an affective balance (p.ex: something pleasant) is followed by a secondary, “opponent process” (p.ex: something unpleasant)
→ This opponent process sets in after the primary process is quieted; With repeated exposure, the primary process becomes weaker while the opponent process is strengthened - An emotional event elicits two competing processes:
→ an emotional event elicits a response (a-process) which then elicits a compensatory response (b-process) that serves to counteract the a-process, then back to baseline (homeostasis)
Explain opponent theory using an example of drug addiction.
- Drug addiction is the result of an emotional pairing with pleasure and the emotional symptoms associated with withdrawal
→ at the beginning of substance use, there are high levels of pleasure and low levels of withdrawal
→ but as time passes, as the level of pleasure decrease, the withdrawal symptoms increase, which explains the tolerance increase - Drug addicts, before becoming addicted, experience the euphoria of a drug with few negative consequences. Over time, however, they develop a tolerance for the drug, requiring increasing doses to get the same high.
→ this dynamic explains tolerance, with the increase of the amount of drug that is needed to over pump the opponent process which is also increasing in strength
→ with repeated stimulation, your baseline (homeostasis) can shift
Explain a-process and b-process from the opponent process theory.
- a-process correlates with the occurrence of an emotional event
- a-process and b-process are hedonistically opposite from each other (i.e. pleasurable vs. unpleasurable).
- b-process is slow to increase, and slow to decrease
- With repeated presentations of the emotional stimulus, the b-process increases in strength and duration
What is tolerance?
- Decreased sensitivity to a drug’s effect following repeated administration of drug
- Over time it takes more drug to get the same effect
Withdrawal symptoms are ___ reactions in the body that oppose the primary effects of the drug; Therefore they are the ___ of the effects of the drug
Compensatory; opposite
→ For example, one effect of heroin is euphoria which is replaced with dysphoria on withdrawal of the drug
What is metabolic tolerance?
- Reductions in amount of drug reaching the site of action
- Liver begins to produce more enzymes to metabolize drugs you take often
What is functional tolerance?
- Reduced reactivity to drug at site of action
- Over time receptors begin to change in number to accommodate the drug effect – as your body seeks to maintain a homeostasis
Explain how tolerance can be conditioned.
- Drugs can be a Unconditioned Stimuli (UCS)
- Producing Unconditioned Response (UCR)
- Neutral stimuli (NS) (places, noises, smells) paired with the Drug become Conditioned Stimuli (CS)
- Over repeated trials, you associate the CS with the effects of the UCS
–> Thus the place where you go to do drugs will be associated with the feeling you get when doing drugs
When talking about conditioned tolerance, what is situational specificity?
- If you often use a drug in a particular situation/context your brain begins to anticipate the drug in that context and develops a “conditioned” tolerance dependent on that context
- Change of context can lead to accidental overdose due to loss of tolerance
→ this is why, the best way to get an addict to stop consuming, they need to be removed from their environment, BUT, if they then consume drugs in a different unfamiliar environment, it can lead to an overdose because it’s harder for them to regulate as they usually would
