Chap 2

Question 1

Behavior

Answer 1

The behavior of an organism is that portion of an organism’s interaction with its environment that is characterized by detectable displacement in space through time of some part of the organism and that results in a measurable change in at least one aspect of the environment

Question 2

Behavior can be measured as

Answer 2

Temporal locus (When in time a specified behavior occurs), temporal extent (duration), and repeatability (frequency)

Question 3

Response

Answer 3

A specific instance of behavior

Question 4

Response topography

Answer 4

Refers to the physical shape or form of behavior

Question 5

Response class

Answer 5

A group of responses that produce the same effect on the environment

Question 6

Repertoire

Answer 6

Can sometimes mean all the behaviors that a person can do. It can also mean a collection of skills or knowledge a person has learned that is specific to a particular task or context.

Question 7

Stimulus events can be described in three ways

Answer 7

Formally (by physical features), temporally (by when they occur with respect to a behavior of interest), and functionally (by their effects on behavior)

Question 8

Stimulus class

Answer 8

A group of stimuli sharing a predetermined set of common elements

Question 9

Reflex

Answer 9

All organisms are brought into the world with the ability to respond in predictable ways to certain stimuli, (such as blinking in response to getting particles in eyes). This stimulus response relationship is called a reflex

Question 10

Respondent behavior

Answer 10

Behavior that is elicited by antecedent stimuli

Question 11

Habituation

Answer 11

Occurs when an eliciting stimulus is repeatedly presented and causes the strength of the response to lessen

Question 12

Stimulus-stimulus pairing

Answer 12

Pairing of unconditioned stimulus (US) with a neutral stimulus (NS)

Question 13

Respondent extinction

Answer 13

The procedure of repeatedly presenting a conditioned stimulus without the unconditioned stimulus until the conditions stimulus no longer elicits the conditioned response

Question 14

Higher order conditioning

Answer 14

Pairing an NS with a CS; produces a conditioned reflex

Question 15

Operant behavior

Answer 15

any behavior whose future frequency is determined by its history of consequences.

Question 16

Selection by consequence

Answer 16

Skinner posited that behaviors that produce the most favorable outcomes survive and lead to a more adaptive behavioral repertoire.Skinner posited that behaviors that produce the most favorable outcomes survive and lead to a more adaptive behavioral repertoire.

Question 17

Key points about consequences

Answer 17

Consequences can affect only future behavior; selects response classes, not individual responses; immediate consequences have the greatest effect; selects any behavior

Question 18

Operant conditioning occurs

Answer 18

Automatically

Question 19

Aversive stimulus

Answer 19

stimulus conditions whose termination functions as reinforcement

Question 20

Principle of behavior

Answer 20

describes a functional relation between behavior and one or more of its controlling variables

Question 21

Unconditioned reinforcer

Answer 21

A stimulus change that can change behavior without prior pairing with any other form of reinforcement or punishment

Question 22

Extinction

Answer 22

Produces a decrease in response frequency to the behavior’s prereinforcement level.