C3 - Learning And Memory Flashcards
What is habituation?
The repeated exposure to the same stimulus that can cause a decrease in response
A stimulus too weak to elicit a response is called?
subthreshold stimulus
What is dishabituation?
The recovery of a response to a stimulus after habituation has occurred
Is temporary and always refers to changes in response to the original stimulus, not the new one
What is associative learning?
The creation of a pairing, or association, either between 2 stimuli or between a behavior and a response
What is classical conditioning?
A type of associative learning that takes advantage of biological, instinctual responses to create associations between 2 stimuli
What is often a famous research experiment done that involves classical conditioning?
Ivan Pavlov and his experiment on dogs
Some stimuli cause an innate or reflexive physiological response - any stimulus that brings about such a reflexive response is called? And the innate or reflexive response is called?
An unconditioned stimulus
And an unconditioned response
Many stimuli do not produce a reflexive response and are known as…
Neutral stimuli
In Pavlov’s dog expirement the unconditioned stimulus, conditioned stimulus, unconditioned response, and conditioned response was what?
-The unconditioned stimulus was meat
-the conditioned stimulus was the bell
-The unconditioned response was salivation to the meat
-The conditioned response was salivation to the bell
The bell in Pavlov’s dog experiment was ultimately turned into a conditioned stimulus, but what was it at the beginning of the experiment?
Neutral stimulus
A normally neutral stimulus causing a reflexive response through association is called?
Conditioned stimulus
The process of using a reflexive, unconditioned stimulus to turn a neutral stimulus into a conditioned stimulus is called?
Acquisition
What is extinction?
The loss of a conditioned response
Can occur if the conditioned stimulus is repeatedly presented without the unconditioned stimulus
Extinction of a response is not always permanent, after some time, presenting subjects again with an extinct conditioned stimulus will sometimes produce a weak conditioned response; a phenomenon called…
Spontaneous recovery
What is generalization regarding learning?
A broadening effect by which a stimulus similar enough to the conditioned stimulus can also produce the conditioned response
What is the opposite of generalization regarding learning?
Stimuli discrimination - it is when an organism learns to distinguish between similar stimuli
What does operant conditioning study?
The ways in which consequences of voluntary behaviors change the frequency of these behaviors
What famous researcher is often associated with operant conditioning?
B.F. Skinner, who is considered one of the founders of behaviorism - the theory that all behaviors are conditioned
Almost all animals will innately search for recourses in their environment; this is what kind of behavior?
Reward-seeking behavior
What is reinforcement?
The process of increasing the likelihood that an animal will perform a behavior
What do positive reinforcers do?
Increase the frequency of a behavior by adding a positive consequence or incentive following the desired behavior
What are negative reinforcers?
They act similarly to positive reinforcers by increasing the frequency of a behavior, but they do so by removing something unpleasant
Negative reinforcement can be subdivided into…
Escape learning and avoidance learning
What is escape learning?
Describes a situation where the animal experiences the unpleasant stimulus and, in response, displays the desired behavior in order to trigger the removal of the stimulus
When does avoidance learning occur?
When the animal displays the desired behavior in anticipation of the unpleasant stimulus, thereby avoiding the unpleasant stimuli
Differences between avoidance and escape learning?
Whether the unpleasant stimuli occurs or not
Avoidance learning often develops from multiple experiences of…
Escape learning
What is a primary reinforcer?
Something that naturally satisfies a basic biological need, like food, water, or sleep
What is a secondary reinforcer also called?
Conditioned reinforcer
What is a secondary reinforcer?
A reinforcer that gains it’s value through the association with a primary reinforcer or another secondary reinforcer, it doesn’t satisfy a basic need directly but becomes reinforcing due to its link with something that does
What is a discriminative stimulus?
A type of stimulus that indicates that a reward or reinforcement is potentially available - this stimulus signals to the individual that a specific behavior, when performed in the presence of that stimulus, may lead to a positive outcome or reinforcement
What is punishment?
A way of using conditioning to reduce the occurrence of a behavior
What is positive punishment?
A way of adding an unpleasant consequence in response to a behavior to reduce that behavior
Sometimes positive punishment is referred to as
Aversive conditioning
What is Negative punishment?
Removing a stimulus in order to cause reduction of a behavior
What are 2 key factors to reinforcement schedules?
Whether they are fixed or variable and whether the schedule is based on a ratio or an interval
Reinforcement of a behavior after a specific number of performances of that behavior is what type of schedule?
Fixed-ratio (FR) schedule
Behavior being rewarded every time it is performed is what type of schedule?
A continuous reinforcement - type of fixed-ratio schedule
Reinforcement of a behavior after a varying number of performances of the behavior, but such that the average number of performances to receive a reward is relatively constant. What type of schedule is this?
Variable - ratio (VR) schedule
Reinforcement the first instance of a behavior after a specified time period has elapsed is what type of schedule?
Fixed-interval (FI) schedule
Reinforcement of a behavior the first time that behavior is performed after a varying interval of time is what type of schedule?
Variable-Interval (VI) schedule
Of all the reinforcement schedules what works fastest for learning a new behavior, and the most resistant to extinction?
Variable-Ratio (VR) schedule
What is operant conditioning in the concept of shaping?
The process of rewarding increasingly specific behaviors that become closer to a desired response
What is latent learning
the acquisition of knowledge or skills without an immediate incentive or reward, with the understanding becoming apparent when the information is needed or relevant later on. It’s like learning something without consciously realizing it until you use that knowledge.
What is the classical experiment involving latent learning?
Rats running through a maze
Many animals are predisposed to learn or not learn behaviors based on their own natural abilities and instincts, this predisposition is known as what?
Preparedness
When animals revert to an instinctive behavior after learning a new behavior that is similar, the animals have undergone what?
Instinctive (or instinctual) drift
What is observational learning?
The process of learning a new behavior or gaining information by watching others
What is the most famous and perhaps most controversial study on observational learning?
Albert Banduras Bobo doll expirement
Describe Albert Banduras bobo doll expirement?
It involved children watching an adult in a room full of toys kicking and inflatable clown toy, later the children were allowed to play in the room, many of them ignored the other toys in the room and inflicted similar violence on the bobo doll just as they had seen the adult do.
What are mirror neurons?
They are neurons located in the frontal and parietal lobes of the cerebral cortex and fire both when an individual performs an action and when that individual observed someone else performing that action
Formation of memories can be divided into what 3 major processes?
Encoding
storage
retrieval
What is encoding?
The process of putting information into memory
Information gained without any effort is what type of processing?
Automatic processing - it’s unintentional and passively absorbed
What type of processing is actively working to gain information known as?
Controlled (effortful) processing
With practice controlled processing can become…
Automatic processing
What is elaborative encoding?
Linking it to knowledge that is already in memory
What is semantic encoding?
Put into meaningful context
What is the strongest and weakest encoding?
Strongest is semantic encoding, while weakest is visual encoding
We tend to recall information best when we can put it into the context of our own lives, a phenomenon called…
The self-reference effect
What is maintenance rehearsal?
The repetition of a piece of information to either keep it within working memory, or to store it in short term.
Used to memorize information for a short period
Not as good for long term memory
What is the method of Loci?
It involves associating each item in a list with a location along a route through a building that has already been memorized
What is the Peg-Word system?
It associates numbers with items that rhyme with or resemble the numbers
What is chunking (clustering) in terms of memory tricks?
It is a memory trick that involves taking individual elements of a large list and grouping them together into groups of elements with related meaning
Following encoding, information must be ___ if it is to be remembered
Stored
What is sensory memory?
It is information in its original sensory form with high accuracy and lasts only a very short time, generally less than 1 second
What are the 2 main types of sensory memory?
Iconic memory and echoic memory
How long is short term memory(STM)?
STM fades over the course of approximately 30 seconds without rehearsal
Memory capacity is limited to what?
Approximately seven items, usually known as the 7 +/- 2 rule
STM is housed primarily where
The Hippocampus
What is responsible for consolidation of STM to LTM?
The Hippocampus
What is Working memory?
A type of memory that is closely related to STM, similarly supported by the Hippocampus, enables us to keep a few pieces of information in our consciousness simultaneously and to manipulate that information
With enough rehearsal STM moves to…
LTM
What is Elaborative rehearsal?
The association of the information to knowledge already stored in LTM
Closely tied to self-reference
Good for LTM
Memories over time are moved where?
The cerebral cortex
What are the 2 types of LTM?
Implicit (non declarative) memory, and Explicit (declarative) memory
Main difference between implicit and explicit memory?
Implicit memory does not require conscious recall, explicit memory does
What is procedural memory?
The unconscious memory of the skills required to complete procedural tasks
What is priming related to learning and memory?
Priming refers to the phenomenon where exposure to a stimulus (such as a word, image, or idea) influences the way an individual responds to a subsequent related stimulus.
What is positive priming?
When exposure to the first stimulus improves processing of the second stimulus
gets decreased response time, or decreased errors
What is negative priming?
The first stimulus interferes with the processing of the second stimulus
gets slower response times, and more errors
How can explicit memory be further divided?
Episodic memory
Semantic memory
What is episodic memory?
Refers to our recollection of life experiences
What is semantic memory?
Refers to ideas, concepts, or facts that we know, but are not tied to specific life experiences
What is autobiographical memory?
Our explicit memories about our lives and ourselves
What is flashbulb memory?
The detailed recollection of stimuli immediately surrounding, an important or emotionally arousing event
Go through all the divisions of human memory and provide key characteristics of each or memory times
STM (<1min) - working memory
Sensory memory (<1sec)
LTM (lifetime) - both explicit memory (conscious) and implicit memory (unconscious)
Implicit memory - procedural memory (skills, and tasks)
Explicit memory - both episodic memory (events, and experiences) and semantic memory (facts, and concepts)
What is retrieval?
The name given to the process of demonstrating that something that has been learned has been retained
The larger the amount of time between sessions of relearning, the greater the retention of the information later on, Ebbinghaus dubbed this phenomenon what?
The spacing effect
What is the semantic network?
A way the brain organizes memory and ideas which concepts are linked together based on similar meaning
When one node of our semantic network is activated what else is activated?
Other linked concepts around it are activated unconsciously, a process called spreading activation
What is the context-dependent memory effect?
Where Memory is aided by being in the physical location where encoding took place
What is source monitoring?
A part of the retrieval process that involves determining the origin of memories, and whether they are factual or fiction
What is state dependent memory (state dependent effect)?
A retrieval cue based on performing better when in the same mental state when the information was learned
Studies on list memorization have indicated that an items position in the list affects participants ability to recall, Ebbinghaus termed this what effect?
The Serial-position effect
Participants have much higher recall for both the first few and last few items in a list called…
First few = primacy effect
Last few = recency effect
Overtime people show strong recall for the first/last few items while recall of the first/last few items fades
First then last
What is amnesia?
A significant loss of memorized information
What is source amnesia?
Inability to remember where, when, or how one has obtained knowledge
What is Alzheimer’s disease?
A degenerative brain disorder thought to be linked to a loss of acetylcholine in neurons that link to the hippocampus, although it’s exact causes are not well understood
What is dementia?
A loss of cognitive function
What are some symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease?
Loss of cognitive function, memory loss, with atrophy of brain
Memory loss for Alzheimer’s is in a retrograde fashion meaning what?
Loss of most recent memories before distant ones
Microscopic findings in Alzheimer’s disease includes…
Neurofibrillary tangles, and B-amyloid plaques
What are B-amyloid plaques of Alzheimer’s disease?
They are incorrectly folded copies of the amyloid precursor protein, in which insoluble B-pleated sheets form and then deposit in the brain
In individuals with middle-late stage Alzheimer’s experiencing sundowning is common; what is sundowning?
An increase in dysfunction in the late afternoon and evening
What is Korsakoff’s syndrome? And some symptoms
Another form of memory loss caused by thiamine deficiency in the brain
- marked by both retrograde, and anterograde amnesia,
- another common symptom is confabulation - process of creating vivid but fabricated memories, typically thought to be an attempt made by the brain to fill in the gaps of the missing memories
What is agnosia?
A loss of the ability to recognize objects, people, or sounds, though usually only 1 of the 3
Agnosia is usually caused by what?
Physical damage to the brain such as that caused by a stroke, or a neurological disorder such as MS
What does the Ebbinghaus retention function also called the curve of forgetting show?
That for a day or 2 after learning the list, recall fell sharply but then leveled off
What is interference (AKA interference effect)?
A retrieval error caused by the existence of other, usually similar information
What is proactive and retroactive interference?
Proactive interference - old information is interfering with new learning
Retroactive interference - is when new information causes forgetting of old information
What is prospective memory?
Remembering to perform a task at some point in the future
What is reproductive memory?
Ability to recall information exactly as it was learned or experienced
What is reconstructive memory?
Process of recalling and piecing together past events based on general knowledge and expectations, often leading to the incorporation of inaccuracies or biases
What is a false memory?
A memory that incorrectly recalls actual events or recalls events that never occurred
Some psychologists believe that repressed memories can be brought back, such memories are called…
Recovered memories
What is the misinformation effect?
When exposure to incorrect misleading information after an event can lead to distorted memories of that event
What are intrusion errors?
mistakes in memory recall where incorrect information, often related to other memories, is inserted into a person’s recollection of a particular event or experience
What is the main difference between intrusion error and misinformation effect?
Intrusion errors are from internal error, while misinformation is from an outside source
What is source-making error
A memory mistake where a person misattributes the source of a memory, often confusing where, when, or how they encountered certain information or experiences
What is neuroplasticity?
The brains ability to recognize itself by forming new neural connections throughout life, allowing it to adapt to expectations, learn, and recover from injury
What is synaptic pruning?
The phenomenon that as we grow older, weak neural connections are breaking while strong ones are bolstered, increasing the efficiency of our brains ability to process information
What type of glutamate receptor has been associated with the strengthening of LTM?
NMDA receptor
The strengthening of neural connections through repeated use is known as…
Long-term potentiation
