Chapter 7: Learning Flashcards
Learning
Based on experience; something that changes in the organism and changes that are relatively permanent
REVIEW: Behaviourism
John Watson - focussing on what people did
BF Skinner
Reinforcement of consequences
Classical conditioning (John Watson)
When a neutral stimulant produces a response after paired with a stimulus that naturally produces a response
Unconditioned Stimulus (US)
Dog gets food
Unconditioned response (UR)
Dog gets food, goes over and eats it
Neutral stimulus
Human rings a bell when giving food
Acquisition phase
Ring bell, gets food
Conditioned stimulus
Condition to do. Ring bell, dog should drool
Conditioned response
Dog drools when hearing bell
Second ordered conditioning
Show dog a ball, ring a bell, and give food. Adds another condition
Extinction
Gradual elimination of learned response when conditioned stimulus is repeatedly presented without the unconditioned stimulus
Spontaneous recovery
Tendency of learned behaviour to recover from extinction after a test period
REVIEW!
Perceptual constancy
Chair tunes blue, still recognize it is blue
Generalization
When the conditioned response is observed even though the conditioned stimulus is slightly different from the original conditioned stimulus used during acquisition
Change the bell and dog still drools, just does not drool as much
Emotional response
Can be learned much faster than any other response
Little Albert (Watson)
Classical conditioning of a baby to fear rabbits
Watson went into advertising
Used emotional responses to sell products
Examples, baby’s on toilet paper, animals on diapers
Rescorla and Wagner
Classical conditioning occurs because of expectations
Conditioning is easier when it is _____
Unfamiliar
Because familiar stimuli already have expectations attached
Evolutionary elements of classical conditioning
Normally takes several pairings of conditioned stimulus with us to establish learning but food: tastes takes once
Examples of evolutionary elements of classical conditioning
Eat a whole bag of bits and bites, get super sick, never eat it again
Biological preparedness
Attribute to new thing
Prepared to be easily conditioned for survival
Side effects to chemotherapy
Nausea and vomiting
Although chemo makes you sick, people think it’s the food
Operant conditioning
Views people as active, as operating on environment
Definition of operant conditioning
Consequences of an organisms behaviour determines whether the organism will repeat that behaviour in the future
Edward Thorndike
Law of effect: recorded behaviour is likely to occur
BF Skinner: rats in box
Forget:
Reinforcer, Punisher, positive, negative
Reinforcement
Increases frequency of a behaviour
Positive
Decreases frequency of a behaviour
Negative
Remove stimulus
Positive reinforcement
Done something, affects increased behaviour
Negative reinforcement
Take something away, behaviour is there
Positive punishment
Apply something to decrease frequency
Negative punishment
Removed something, decrease frequency
The key is the amount of time between behaviour and reinforcer or punishment
The more space between the consequences, the less powerful the reinforcer or punishment
Basic principles of operant conditioning
Behaviour is under discriminative stimulus control
Extinction burst
With holding reinforcement from previous reinforced behaviour
Schedules of reinforcement
Classical conditioning: pattern of reinforcement
Operant conditioning: pattern of reinforcement
Fixed interval
Are specific amount of time must elapse before the reinforcer is presidented
Example: exam schedule done once month ahead of time; it is fixed
Variable interval
Amount of time between behaviour and reinforcer will vary trial to trial
Walk into doctor: is it 5 mins or 4 hours
Fixed ratio
Reinforcement is provided for a specific amount of repeated behaviours
Buy 10 coffee’s get one free
Variable ratio
Reinforcement is provided following a behaviour without consistency
Slot machines, you might win, might lose
Pattern of _______ differs for different types of ______
Responding, reinforcement schedule
Fixed interval
Responding increases as reinforcement time nears
Fixed ratio
Activity slows after reinforcement, then picks up again
Variable interval
Steady, consistent responding
- hard to get shorted but one behaviour starts
- vey hard to extinguish
Variable ratio
High rates of responding, hard to extinguish
Variable patterns of reinforcement =
Intermittent reinforcement effect
Shaping
Process of learning/ training behaviour through operant conditions.
Reinforcing of successive steps to a final desired behaviour
Underlying brain mechanism
Pleasure centre of your body (Limbic system)
Limbic system consists of
Hippocampus, hypothalamus, amygdala
All run on dopamine
Dopamine is more associated with _____ than with _______
Craving, liking/ active pleasure
Dopamine causes you to seek out _____ things and activities
Pleasurable
Opioid system makes you feel ____. It’s a balance between the two
Pleasure
Craving / seeking =
Dopamine
Satisfying / pleasure =
Opioid
If opioid system is stronger than dopamine
Narcotic / opioid = induces lethargic euphoria
Dopamine is stronger than opioid
Craving not getting satisfied
Dopamine loop
Observational learning
Learn by watching the actions of others
Albert Bondura
Bobo doll, children kick the shit out of the doll, by things they’ve seen around them
Diffusion chain
Individual learns behaviour by watching someone else
Displays that behaviour
Becomes a model of that behaviour for someone else
Watch someone perform a motor skill,
You can perform that motor skill
Implicit learning
Learning that takes place without awareness, natural happens
Techniques for learning
Distributed vs mass practice
Distributed
Study over the course of days / x amount of time
Mass practice
Cramming
Stupid who don’t cram know how much more?
17%
Habituation
Living by an airport. Over time the stimulus goes away
Sensitization
Presentation of a stimulus leads to an increased response to a later stimulus
House gets broken in to, at night your scared of sounds now
Latent learning
Something is learned but does not show it
Rat in box does maze quickly after food comes about
Cognitive map
A mental representation of the physical features
