invatand prima parte - J

Question 1

What is learning?

Answer 1

It is a way in which we change our behaviour in response to a certain experience.
The change is enduring (not temporary) although it can be undone - we can unlearn through extinction.
It is a way to adapt to our environment.

Question 2

Why do we learn?

Answer 2

It is vital for survival that we have the capacity to learn in order to change our behaviour in an adaptive way.
It is important to know which events are and are not important for survival and well being.
We learn to know which stimuli signal an important event and whether its responses will have positive or negative consequences.

Question 3

Which participants do we use to study learning?

Answer 3

We use naive participants like animals and babies because they have less pre-existing knowledge that might affect they way they learn a new task.

Question 4

What is habituation?

Answer 4

It is one basic principle of learning.
Habituation is a decline in the tendency to respond to a stimulus that is presented repeatedly.
Learning that there is no consequences (positive or negative) of a stimulus leads to habituation.

Question 5

Study of habituation?

Answer 5

Checker board study: babies looking time goes down the more often they have seen the checkerboard stimulus.
Changing stimulus (a sun), makes the looking time go back up.

Question 6

What is sensitisation?

Answer 6

When you increase your response to a stimulus. This stimulus is often harmful.
Purpose: It is a way of responding appropriately to potential dangerous stimuli.

Question 7

Study of sensitisation?

Answer 7

Eric Kandel: sea snail study
Touching with a stimulus they siphon of a snail will lead to a response in the snail to retract its gill as a form of protection.
Doing it multiple times, the snail will stop responding as it learns that it’s nothing harmful.

If you then give a shock, the snail will respond again. Next time you touch it, it gives you a stronger response.

Question 8

How do we know whether to habituate or sensitise?

Answer 8

Groves and Thompson

Arousal is what determines whether we habituate or sensitise to a stimulus.
High arousal is usually associated with threatening situations.

Less arousing stimulus = decrease in behaviour
More arousing stimulus = increase in behaviour

Question 9

What is associative learning?

Answer 9

It is a more complex form of learning.
We learn that different events in the world tend to go together
We learn associations between different events in the world.

Question 10

What is classical conditioning?

Answer 10

It is a learned association of 2 stimuli so that one elicits a response that was originally elicited only by the other.

Question 11

What is one experimental example of classical conditioning?

Answer 11

Pavlov
Teaching a dog that a NS consistently goes with something that is meaningful to the dog then they learn that those 2 events go together and it starts to show the response that it normally shows for the UCS if it is shown the now CS.

Question 12

What are the different types of classical conditioning?

Answer 12

1. Simultaneous conditioning: CS and UCS at the same time: what Pavlov did
2. Delay conditioning: CS first , then UCS, with overlap: show them light, then picture of bowl of food
3. Trace conditioning: CS first, the UCS, without overlap: get the light, goes off then there is a gap then you get the food
4. Higher-order conditioning: CS1 paired with UCS, then CS1 paired with CS2, then CS2 becomes paired with UCS: pair light with food then you pair light with bell then the bell will trigger the response
5. Temporal conditioning: only UCS at regular intervals, time becomes the CS: you give food at regular intervals

Question 13

What is operant conditioning?

Answer 13

A type of learning in which behaviour is influenced by the consequences that follow it.

Question 14

Experimental example of operant conditioning

Answer 14

Thorndike

Gave cats a puzzle box where it needs to learn to pull the label which opens the box where there is some food.
Cats tended to solve the problem in a trial and error way.
Cat tried different things and realised that certain things have successful outcomes and other things have unsuccessful outcomes.
They repeated behaviours that have successful outcomes.

Question 15

What is Thorndike’s law of effect?

Answer 15

If a response leads to a satisfying consequence - it is more likely to occur
If a response leads to an annoying consequence - it is less likely to occur.

Learning through consequences of voluntary response enables organisms to effectively act upon their environment.

Question 16

What is another experimental example of operant conditioning?

Answer 16

Skinner
You can teach animals complex behaviours if you reward behaviours that you want to keep and punish behaviours that you want to lose.
The rat gets food when he presses the lever so he will keep pressing the lever for a desirable outcome.

Question 17

What is the 3 part contingency?

Answer 17

Skinner suggested that there are 3 part contingency:

1. Antecedent stimulus - the possibility of getting some food
2. The response that the animal produced
3. Consequences - if the consequence is positive the behaviour will be more likely to occur

The relationship between the response and the consequence is called contingency, because the consequence is contingent on the response to the antecedent.

Question 18

What are the different types of operant conditioning? Positive reinforcement and positive punishment

Answer 18

Positive reinforcement: the behaviour is followed by a positive stimulus, that increases the likelihood of behaviour.

Positive punishment: the behaviour is followed by an aversive stimulus, reducing the frequency of that behaviour.

Question 19

What are the different types of operant conditioning? Negative reinforcement and negative punishment

Answer 19

Negative reinforcement: avoiding a negative outcome.

Negative punishment: the behaviour is followed by the removal of a positive stimulus, reducing the frequency of that behaviour.

Question 20

What is extinction?

Answer 20

A type of operant conditioning.
The behaviour is no longer consistently followed by a stimulus, reducing the frequency of that behaviour.
If there is a long period in which the behaviour is not consistently linked with the outcome with which it was paired, extinction happens.

Question 21

What did we first think about how learning happens in the brain?

Answer 21

We first thought that learning was associated with the formation of new cells.

Question 22

What do we now know about how learning happens in the brain?

Answer 22

Ramon y Cajal

Learning is about connection of existing units.
Cajal showed that if neurones tend to be active at the same time in the learning process, they will strengthen their connections.

Question 23

What did Hebb do?

Answer 23

Hebb formulated Cajal’s ideas into theoretical biological mechanisms dubbed “Hebbian Learning”
Cells that fire together, wire together.
If cells become active in the same situation, or in response to the same stimulus, they tend to connect and they increase their connection strengths.
When activation of neurone A causes activation of neurone B, the connection strength between A and B increases.

Question 24

What is LTP?

Answer 24

Long term potentiation

During learning, the number of receptors in the post synaptic cell increase.
As a result of learning, the number of receptors in the post synaptic cell change, which makes the connection between neurones stronger.

Question 25

Could long-term potentiation be the neural basis of classical conditioning?

Answer 25

1. Initially CS alone will not activate UCR (synapse too weak)
2. Over time: Pairing of CS, UCS and UCR means that both neurones fire simultaneously and synapse is strengthened.
3. Finally, CS is strong enough to activate impulse in UCR.