Exam 1 Flashcards
Natural selection
Traits that increased the preservation of the individual will be inherited by its offspring
Silver fox experiment
Artifically selected for tameness and caused other changes like fur color, floopy ears, barking and answering to names
Reflexes
A relationship between a specific event and a simple response to that event that is involuntary
Reflex arc
The path of a neural implulse from a sensory neuron to an effector(motor) neuron by way of an interneuron
Features of reflexes
- not ever present fixtures: may be suppressed or learned
- not invariant: may change over time
Modal action patterns (MAP) AKA fixed action patterns
- a more complex process than reflexes that occurs when members of a species produce the same response to an environental stimuli.
Sign stimulus
What initiates the reaction
Ex. Red belly
Genral behaivoral trait
Tendency to engage in a certain type of behivor based on genetic variation.
Learning
A change in behaovor due to experience or a change int he environment
Behaivor
Anything a person/animal does that can be measured
Stimuli
An event that affects behaivor
Habituation
The reduction in responsivness to a stimulus with repeated presentations and requires nervous system involvment
Sensory adaptations
Decreased response to a stimulus based on repeated presentations but happens only with the senses
- Measures of learning
- error rates
- topography
- intensity
- Speed
- Latency
- Rate
- Fluency
Error rates
Number of errors made over time
Topography
Shape of learning
Latency
How long it takes to get a response after a stimulus
Fluency
The number of things that you get right in acertain amount of time
4 Sources of data
- Anecdotes
- Case studies
- Descriptive statistics
- Experimental srudies
Between subjects
Comparing between one and another group
Within subjects
Comparing within a single group in which are participants get all levels of the independent variable
Pros and cons of experiments
Pro: good internal validity
Con; lacks external validity since we dont live in an artificial environment
Lab vs field experiments
Lab: heavilly controlled
Field: natralistic environemnt
US
Naturally elicits a response without learning
UR
The response naturally following the US
CS
No associative strengh to US but developes association through repeated pairings with the US
CR
Response elicited by the CS
Autoshaping
When an organism believes it must do unnessarily to get a reward
Higher order conditioning
a strong conditioned stimulus is paired with a neutral stimulus causing the neutral stimulus to bcome a second conditioned stimulus.
Test trial
When the CS is presented without the US
3 measures of conditioned responses
- Magnitude
- Probabliity
- Latency
ITI(intertrial intervals)
Time between trials
ISI (interstimulus interval)
Time between presentation of the CS and the CR
Delayed conditoning
When the CS is presented before the US but he US is presnted while the CS is still going on
Trace conditoning
The CS is present before the US but he CS ends before the US is presented
Simultaneous conditoning
The CS and US occur at the same time
Backward
The US is presented befor the CS and it does not invoke the CR
