Chapter 7 Flashcards
Learning
process by which experience produces a relatively enduring and adaptive change in an organism´s capacity for behaviour.
Learning
focuses on how an organism´s behaviour changes in response to environmental stimuli encountered during its lifetime.
Habituation
a decrease in the strength of response to a repeated stimulus
Example: living near a train track
Sensitization (dishabituation)
an increase in the strength of response to a repeated stimulus, like habituation, sensitization is also classified as a simple learning mechanism as it occurs in response to only a single stimulus.
Observational Learning
learning that occurs by observing the behaviour of a model
Example: parenting
Classical (Pavlovian) Conditioning
an organism learns to associate two stimuli such that one stimulus comes to elicit a response that was originally elicited only by the other stimulus.
Example: Pavlov’s dogs (salivation)
Example: Mouth-watering when smelling freshly baked cookies.
Acquisition
period during which a response is being learned.
Neutral stimulus
stimulus, but not one that causes the wanted result.
Reflexive
what’s done by nature.
Explained: Salivation response to food is reflexive – it is what dogs do by nature. Because no learning is required for food to produce salvation, the food is an unconditioned stimulus (UCS), a stimulus that elicits a reflexive or innate (the UCS) without prior learning.
Unconditioned Stimulus (UCS)
a stimulus that elicits a reflexive or innate response (the UCS) without prior learning.
Example: dogs producing saliva when eating (UCS = food)
Unconditioned Response (UCR)
a reflexive or innate response that is elicited by a stimulus (the UCS) without prior learning.
Example: Salivation is an unconditioned response (UCR), a reflexive or innate response that is elicited by a stimulus (the UCS) (food) without prior learning.
Conditioned Stimulus (CS)
a stimulus that, through association with a UCS, comes to elicit a conditioned response similar to the original UCR.
Example: the bell in Pavlov´s experiment
Conditioned Response (CR)
a response elicited by a conditioned stimulus.
Example: when the dog salivate to the bell, and not just food.
Extinction
a process in which the CS is presented repeatedly in the absence of the UCS, causing the CR to weaken and eventually disappear.
Example: when the dogs are stimulated with only the bell, and not food, they will after some time stop responding to the bell alone.
Spontaneous Recovery
reappearance of a previously extinguished CR after a rest period and without new learning trials.
Example: stop ringing the bell for some time, and then starting up again with it, experiencing that the dogs will salivate again.
Example: traumatic experiences – such as war
Stimulus Generalization
stimuli similar to the initial CS elicit a CR.
Example: Michelle not only being scared to drive the car she got into an accident with, but all cars.
Bit by a dog. Generalizes this to all dogs.
Better safe than sorry
Discrimination
when a CR occurs to one stimulus but no to others
Example: Michelle not being scared of all means of transportation, but only card. Or even only bigger cars, but not a small car.
Higher-order conditioning (second-order conditioning)
a neutral stimulus becomes a CS after being paired with an already established CS:
Example: Black square before Higher-order conditioning = nothing
Black square WITH bell (during Higher-order conditioning) = salivation
After Higher-order conditioning, black square alone = salivation
Exposure therapies
a patient is exposed to a stimulus (CS) that arouses an anxiety response (such as fear) without the presence of the UCS, allowing extinction to occur.
Exposure therapies represent one of Behaviourism´s important applied legacies.
Example: Peter, scared of rabbits. 17 steps from “Rabbit anywhere in the room triggers fear” to “Let rabbit nibble his fingers”
Technology today is a great help.
Acquiring and Overcoming Fear
Building on Pavlov’s discoveries, pioneering behaviourist John B. Watson challenged Freuds view of the causes of mental disorders such as phobias. There doesn’t need to be any hidden unconscious conflicts or repressed trauma. It is just the car/dog or whatever.
Aversion Therapy
attempts to condition an aversion (a repulsion) to a stimulus that triggers unwanted behaviour by pairing it with a noxious USC.
Alcohol + nauseous drug = fix for alcoholism???
Pics of kids + podophile + electric shocks = fix?
You can both condition attraction and repulsion.
Positive = marketing
Through Classical Conditioning, our bodies can learn to respond in ways that either promote or harm our health.
Example 1:
Anticipatory Nausea and Vomiting (ANV): occurs when people become nauseated and may vomit anywhere from minutes to hours before a treatment session. Chemotherapy + hospitals. Is possible to unlearn this.
Example 2: Allergic Reaction: goldfish + asthmatic attack
Example 3: The immune system. When rats drink sweetened water (neutral stimulus) that is paired with injections of a drug (UCS) that suppresses immune activity (the UCS), the sweetened water becomes a CS that supresses immune activity.
Operant conditioning
a type of learning in which behaviour is influenced by the consequences that follow it.
Classical conditioning cannot explain how animals and humans learn new patterns of behaviour, because they all involve the transfer to a new stimulus of an already existing response.
Classic conditioning cannot explain voluntarily behaviours: Cooking . Knitting, Sports etc.
Thorndike´s Law of Effect
how animals learn to solve problems
Puzzle box experiment
Animals did not attain Insight because they improved slowly and not suddenly, rather an instrumental learning process.
Insight
the sudden perception of a useful relationship that helps solve a problem.
Law of Effect
in a given situation, a response followed by a satisfying consequence will become more likely to occur, while a response followed by an annoying consequence will become less likely to occur.
Basically, Raise your hand in class.
Skinners Analysis of Operant Conditioning
built on Thorndike’s work, and was a leading person in behaviourism. Skinner coined the term, operant conditioning. He took the puzzle box to the next level and developed the Skinner box.
