Hoofdstuk 8 Flashcards
Learning
Any process through which experience at one time can alter an individual’s behaviour at a future time.
Classical conditioning
A form in which organisms learn to predict events based on relationships between events. It is a form of reflex learning that does produce a new stimulus-response sequence.
Reflex
A simple, relatively automatic, stimulus-response sequence mediated by the nervous system
Habituation
A decline in the magnitude of a reflexive response when the stimulus is repeated several times in succession-> we get used to something. It does not produce a new stimulus-response sequence, but only weakens one that previously existed.
Conditioned stimulus
The introduced stimulus (the bell).
Unconditioned stimulus
The original stimulus (food placed in the mouth).
Conditioned response
The response to the conditioned stimulus (salivation).
Unconditioned response
The response to the unconditioned stimulus (salivation).
Extinction
When the conditioned stimulus is presented, but the reward is not, the conditioned response decreases and eventually disappears. But extinction does not bring the animal to the fully unconditioned state. The conditioned response is not truly lost, but is somehow inhibited.
Spontaneous recovery
Generalization
When an animal after conditioning shows a conditioned response not just to the original conditioned stimulus, but also to new stimuli that resembled that stimulus. This occurs when two stimuli are physically similar to one another, but also when they are similar in their subjective meaning to that person (humans).
Discrimination training
The abolishment of generalization. This happens when the response to one is reinforced while the response to the other is extinguished.
Behaviourism
Avoiding terms that refer to mental entities (thoughts, emotions, motives, etc) because such entities cannot be directly observed. Focusing on the relationship between observable events in the environment (stimuli) and observable behavioural reactions to those events (responses). Learning trough past experiences with the environment.
John B Watson: Did not deny the existence of mental processes, but he believed that these are too obscure to be studied scientifically; instead he argued that behaviour could be understood and described without reference to mental processes.
Why were Pavlov’s findings on conditioning practically appealing to behaviourists?
Because this shows the relationship between past experiences and learning, through an objective stimulus-response way of studying and understanding learning.
S-R theory (watson)
Conditioning produces a direct bond between the conditiond stimulus and the response.
S-S theory (Pavlov)
Learning a connection between two stimuli, through classical conditioning. It proposes that a neural bond it formed between their representations in the brain, so the two stimuli (conditioned and unconditioned) get linked together in the mind of that person. An expectancy is created.
-> most evidence for this theory.
3 conditions for conditioning
- The conditioned stimulus must precede the unconditioned stimulus.
It must precede to be able to create expectancies. - The conditional stimulus must signal heightened probability of occurrence of the unconditioned stimulus.
The link between the two must be strong; when a number of stimulus occurring without pairing increases, the conditioning is weakened. - Conditioning is ineffective when an animal already has a good predictor.
Blocking effect: the already-conditioned stimulus blocks conditioning to the new stimulus that has been paired with it.
Evaluative conditioning
Changes in the strength of liking or disliking of a stimulus as a result of being paired with another positive or negative stimulus.
Drug tolerance
The decline in physiological and behavioural effects that occur with some drugs when they are taken repeatedly.
Why is it dangerous for a drug addict to take his or her usual drug dose in an unusual environment?
Because cues in the usual drug-taking environment produce a conditioned compensatory reaction that allows the addict’s body to tolerate a large doses of the drugs-> unusual environment: no cues, the full impact of the drugs kicks in before a counteractive reaction begins (can cause death or severe illness).
Operant responses
Actions that are operated on the world to produce some effect.
Operant conditioning
The process by which people or other animals learn to make operant responses.
Law of effect
Responses that produce a satisfying effect in a particular situation become more likely to occur again in that situation and responses that produce a discomforting effect become less likely to occur again in that situation.
Reinforcer
A stimulus change that follows a response and increases the subsequent frequency of that response (Skinner preferred this term instead of reward/satisfaction).
Shaping
Successively closer approximations to the desired response are reinforced until the desired response finally occurs and can be reinforced.
Conditioned reinforcers
Stimuli that have reinforcing value because of previous learning.
What is one fundamental difference between Skinner’s theory of operant conditioning and Pavlov’s theory of classical conditioning?
In operant conditioning the individual emits, a behaviour that has some effect in the environment; whereas in classical conditioning a stimulus elicits, a response form the organism.
Fixed-ratio schedule
A reinforcer occurs after every nth response, where n is some whole number greater than 1.
Variable-ratio schedule
A fixed-ratio schedule except that the number of responses required before reinforcement varies unpredictably around some average.
Fixed-interval schedule
A fixed period of time must elapse between one reinforced response and the next. Any responses occurring before that time elapses in not reinforced.
How do variable-ratio and variable-interval schedules produce behaviour that is highly resistant to extinction?
Because reinforcement often comes after a long, unpredictable period of nor reinforcement, the human/animal learned to be persistent (resistant to extinction).
Variable-interval schedule
Like a fixed-interval schedule except that the period that must elapse before a response will be reinforced varies unpredictably around some average.
Reinforcement
The process that increases the likelihood that a particular response will occur.
Positive reinforcement
Occurs when the arrival of some stimulus following a response makes the response more likely to occur.
Negative reinforcement
The removal of some stimulus following a response makes the response more likely to recur.
Punishment
The opposite of reinforcement. The process trough which the consequence of a response decreases the likelihood that the response will occur.
Positive punishment
The arrival of a stimulus (electric shock etc), decreasing the likelihood that the response will occur again.
Negative punishment
The removal of a stimulus (taking food away etc), which decreases the likelihood that the response will occur again.
Over justification effect
The reward presumably provides an unneeded extra justification for engaging in the behaviour. The result is that people come to regard the task as something that they do for external reward rather than for its own sake. When they come to regard the task as work, they stop doing it when they no longer receive payoff for it, even though they would have otherwise continued to do it for fun.
play
Behaviour, engaged in apparently for its won sake, that serves no obvious immediately useful purpose.
What is Groos’s theory about the evolutionary function of animals’ play?
Primary purpose of playing is to provide a means for young animals to practice their instincts- their species-typical behaviour.
Symbolic play (fantasy)
An ‘’as if’’ orientation to objects, actions and other people and increases during early childhood as a result of children’s growing abilities to use symbols to represent something as other than itself.
How does exploration differ from play in its evolutionary function?
Exploration learns the human/animals about (information) and playing learns to do (skill learning).
Latent learning
Refers to learning that is not immediately demonstrated in the animal’s behaviour.
Vicarious reinforcement
The ability to learn from the consequences of other’s actions.
Emulation
Involves observing another individual achieve some goal, then receiving the same goal by their own means.
Imprinting
The very sudden and apparently irreversible nature of the learning process of seeing the first person/animal as their mother. Sight and sound are involved.
critical period
The first 5 days where imprinting can take place.
Westermarck effect
The aversion having sex with related people. This is mostly based on growing up in the same household (also seen with adoptive children, cousins, foster siblings).
Smell also plays a role.
