Chapter 6 Learning Flashcards
Learning
A relatively permanent change in behavior brought about by experience
Classical conditioning
First type of learning to be discovered and studied within the behaviorist situation
Learning by association
Classical conditioning
Our minds naturally connect events that occur in sequence (learning that two events go together)
Classical conditioning
Learning by association
Learning process that occurs when two stimuli are paired together repeatedly
The first stimuli doesn’t evoke a natural response (it is neutral)
After enough pairing together, the second stimuli is conditioned and causes a response to happen
Ivan Pavlov
Russian physician
Studied digestive secretions of dogs
Noticed the dogs would drool in anticipation of food. They eventually salivated when they heard the researchers footsteps or saw the bowl.
The footsteps and the bowl have been classically conditioned to evoke the drooling response.
Before learning
Neutral stimulus: evokes no response before learning/conditioning
Unconditioned stimulus: naturally and automatically triggers a response
Unconditioned response: an unlearned, natural,y occurring response to an unconditioned stimulus
After learning
Conditioned stimulus: an originally irrelevant stimulus that after association with an unconditioned stimulus, comes to trigger a conditioned response. In other words, the neutral stimulus is now the conditions stimulus.
Conditioned response: a learned response to a previously natural(but now conditioned) stimulus.
Little Albert experiment
Conducted by John B Watson and Rosalie Rayner.
9 month old exposed to various animals and had no reaction
The next time, he was exposed to a white rat and Watson made a loud noise, Albert cried.
After repeated times, Albert began crying after just seeing the white rat.
Experiment was unethical and poorly constructed.
Classical conditioning
Extinction
A previously conditioned response decreases in frequency and eventually disappears
Classical conditioning
Spontaneous recovery
The reappearance of a previously extinguished response after time has elapsed without exposure to the conditioned stimulus
Extinction just SUPPRESSES spontaneous recovery
Classical conditioning
Stimulus generalization
Conditioned response follows a stimulus that is similar to the original conditioned stimulus
Operant conditioning
BF Skinner
American psychologist known for a type of behaviorism known as operant conditioning.
He looked for objective means of studying behavior
Created an apparatus known as the Skinner Box
Used the to study animals interacting with their environment. Used to teach animals to modify their behavior.
Operant conditioning
Learning in which an organism learns via the consequences of its behavior
Reinforcement
Anything that increases the likelihood of a voluntary response
Types of reinforcement
Positive: something added to increase the tendency for a behavior to reoccur.
Negative: something taken away to increase the tendency for a behavior to reoccur.
Positive reinforcement
Adding a positive or pleasant stimulus to reinforce behaviors
This means that if you engage in a certain behavior and this behavior gets something that you wanted, then you are more likely to engage in that same behavior again when you want the same outcome in the future.
Negative reinforcement
The removal of something unpleasant to increase the likelihood of future behavior
Skinner added electricity to their boxes, the only time the electricity would stop is when the mouse hit the lever.
Punishment
Punishment is given after a behavior and decreases the likelihood of it happening again.
Punishment can either be positive or negative
Punishment doesn’t guarantee that the behavior will stop in the future. It simply suppresses it.
Positive punishment
After a behavior you are given something unpleasant or bad
The easiest way to remember this is to note that an aversive stimulus is added to the situation, such as a speeding ticket.
Negative punishment
The most recognized of the two types of punishment.
A negative punishment decreases behavior by taking away something desirable as a consequence of the undesirable behavior.
Such as taking away electronics after not completely chores.
How to tell between reinforcement and punishment
Look at the consequences of the behavior.
If it most likely to make the behavior occur, it is reinforcement.
If it makes behavior less likely to occur, it is punishment.
Is it positive or negative
Positive does not mean good and negative does not mean bad.
If something is given, then it is positive.
If something is taken away, it is negative.
Schedules of reinforcement
Continuous reinforcement: behavior that is reinforced every time it happens
Partial reinforcement: behavior that is reinforced some, but not all the time.
Schedules of partial reinforcement.
Fixed rate: reinforcement is given only after a certain number of responses are made
Variable ratio: reinforcement occurs after a varying number of responses rather than after a fixed number
Fixed interval: provides reinforcement for a response only if a fixed time period has elapsed, making overall rates of response relatively low
Variable interval: time between reinforcements is around some average rather than being fixed
Albert Bandura
American psychologist who studies observational learning
Studies the consequences a model has on subjects
Conducted bobo doll experiments.
Observational learning
Learning by observing and watching others
The model: the person whose behavior is observed and imitated
Modeling: the process of observing and imitating a specific behavior
Bobo doll experiments 1961
Children watched an adult model show aggressive behavior toward a bobo doll
The findings showed that what the children saw, is what they did
When we see violence, we tend to imitate it
Vicarious learning
By watching a model, we vicariously experience what they are going through
Through this type of learning, we can anticipate the consequences if we perform a similar behavior
We are more likely to learn from models who are like us
Impacts of Bandura’s study
Behaviorists believe that learning is based only on conditioning/association or rewards/punishments
Bandura showed that learning can occur through observing and imitating someone else’s behavior without reward or punishment
This study helped transition psychology from pure behaviorism into social-cognitive learning
