L5: LEARNING Flashcards
T/F: Can you unlearn/ or relearn something?
TRUE
What are the 3 types of learning?
- Classical Conditioning
- Operant Conditioning
- Observational Learning
Who are the two key players in the upbringing of Classical Conditioning?
Pavlov and Watson
Who are the two key players in the upbringing of Operant Conditioning?
Thorndike and Skinner
What is Learning?
a relatively permanent behaviour change that occurs through experience.
In what ways does learning occurs?
- Practice
- Experience
What can learning influence?
- influence habits (nail biting)
- influence personality traits ( shyness)
- emotional responses ( fear or not fear)
- personal preferences ( likes tacos or not)
What does most of the research conducted about learning use as a subject?
the research uses animals—animal models.
T/F: research done to animals in regards to learning also reflects that of humans
True. research shows similar results.
What is Conditioning?
the process where we learn such associations.
What is Associative learning?
where we make a connection or association between events
Two types of Conditioning…
- Classical
- Operant
What is considered Observational Learning?
watching what other people do and say.
What is majority of are learning from?
Associations.
Classical Conditioning
-we associate two stimuli and anticipated events together
Best most basic example of Classical Conditioning:
Lighting and Thunder
Operant Conditioning
- we learn to avoid acts that bring unwanted results or unpleasant results
- learn to associate a behaviour with a consequence
What has a Behaviourist learned?
they have learned what we know about learning
Whats the thought process behind the behavioural approach?
all we need to do to understand people is focus on directly observable behaviour
What do behaviourists believe?
- that knowledge is learned
-experience shapes growth
When does the learning occur in Classical Conditioning?
learning occurs when you recognize that one event predicts another
Examples of Classical Conditioning:
- cat learns to expect food at the sound of the can opener
-dogs learn that leash means going outside - child fears nurse that gives needles
Who is Ian Pavlov?
- behaviourist
- laid the foundation for classical conditioning
As a group what are:———- called
- classical conditioning
- operant conditioning
- observational learning
there all ways of learning
In Pavlov’s Classical Experiment what did he notice about his dogs?
- when he would give them food their mouths would salivate
- when he would show them food their mouths would salivate
- at the sight of the empty bowl
- or even at the sight of the dog feeder
- or the persons foot step
After observation and Analyzation of Pavlov’s dogs what did he conclude?
that these behaviours his dogs were showing were a form of learning
What is an unconditioned stimulus? Example:
- a stimulus that automatically, unconditionally, unlearned triggers a reflexive natural response
- example: meat powder (Pavlov’s dog)
What is an unconditioned response?
Example:
- unlearned naturally occurring response, reflex
- Example: Salvation (Pavlov’s dog)
Whats another word for conditioning?
learning.
What is an unconditioned stimulus?
- is a stimulus that produces a response without prior learning
- naturally has a response
What is a neutral stimulus?
Example:
- a stimulus that elicits no response before conditioning
- Example: the bell (Pavlov’s dog)
What is a unconditioned response?
- an unlearned response that is automatically elicited by an unconditioned response
-natural response
Identify: US, CS, UR, CR
Every time Robert’s wife flushes the toilet when he’s in the shower, the water becomes painfully hot. One day, as Robert is stepping into the shower, he hears a flushing sound and flinches.
US: hot water
UR: pain
CS: toilet flushing
CR: flinching
Identify: US, CS, UR, CR
Jonathan loves spicy food! Last week he ate at Tia Mexicana three times and literally perspired from the hot spices. Yesterday, as he drove past
the restaurant, Jonathan began to perspire
profusely.
US: spicy food
UR: sweating from the food
CS: seeing the restaurant
CR: profusely sweating
Who was John B Watson? What does he conclude about fear?
- known for his application of classical conditioning with fear
- he concludes that we fear what we’ve learned to fear
What was the study that John Watson conducted in regard to his theory about fear? How old was he?
Little Albert - less then one- 11 months
What did Watson do to Little Albert?
He used classical conditioning to create fear of white mice in little Albert.
Principles of Classical Conditioning: (5)
- Acquisition
- Generalization
- Discrimination
- Extinction
- Spontaneous recovery
What is Acquisition?
the period of time the condition stimulus is being learnt
For Acquisition to occur, ideally, how much time should occur between the neutral stimulus and the unconditioned stimulus?
Half a second
The more delay in time between neutral and unconditioned stimulus results in…
the less likely that the association between the two will be learned
T/F: Classical Conditioning is biologically adaptive. (why or why not)
True. Classical conditioning helps animals to survive and reproduce by responding to clues such as recognizing danger
What is Stimulus Generalization? ex?
is the tendency, once a response has been learned for similar stimuli, to elicit a similar response. Example: child fears bees, learns to feed wasps, hornets, etc.
T/F: the more similar the stimuli the more likely the response is to be generalized
True.
Why does Stimulus Generalization have an adaptive advantage?
Because it prevents learning from being tied to a specific stimulus only.
What is Stimulus Discrimination? ex?
- the process of learning to respond to specific stimuli and not respond to other similar stimuli - Ex. Cat: purania and gold fish
What is stimulus extinction? Pavlov?
- the loss of a learned response
- the diminishing of the conditioning response
- ringing the bell without the presentation of food
What is stimulus Spontaneous Recovery?
-is the process by which a conditioned response can reoccur without further conditioning, after a time delay
- especially true for smell: smell and person
What is Systematic Desensitization?
progressive technique designed to replace anxiety with relaxation
Operant Conditioning
An organism learns the association between its behaviour and its consequences, learning the consequence linked to a particular behaviour
Operant the learning occurs ———– , classical the learning occurs ———-
after, before
What did Thorndike experiment in regards to Operant Conditioning?
- studied cats
- using puzzle boxes
- Thorndike used a fish reward to try and entice cats to find their way out of the puzzle box
With Thorndike’s experiment what principle of operant conditioning did he discover? What is it? (hint: law)
- Law of effect
- the consequences of a behaviour determine whether that behaviour will be repeated or not repeated
Positive behaviours=
Negative behaviours =
+ = more likely to be repeated
- = less likely to be repeated
Example of Operant Conditioning
A child learns that when they reach up and smile someone picks them up
What was the Skinner box?
- a piece of equipment from Skinner’s Study about operant conditioning
- a box that created a controlled environment, and provided a rat with food pellets at the push of a lever
What was the most important thing to ensure no overlap with the Skinner box findings?
- There was no sound association with the presence of food
- so he sound proofed the skinner box
Whats the role of Reinforcement in respect to operant conditioning?
any event that strengthens a response, making it more likely to re occur again in the future
Positive Reinforcement vs Negative
Positive: add a desirable stimulus. ( given)
ex-receiving a pay check
Negative: remove an aversive stimulus (remove)
ex- fastening a seatbelt to stop beeping
T/F: Positive and Negative reinforcement result in a high likelihood of the positive behaviour being reinforced…
True. Negative and Positive aren’t meaning good and bad.
What is the opposite to Reinforcement?
- Punishment
What is the idea of Punishment?
An event that tends to decrease the behaviour that it follows. Weakness the response behaviour
Positive vs Negative Punishment
Positive - administering something undesired
-Example: parking ticket, spraying cat
Negative- end something that’s desired
- Example: Take away teens driving privileges
How do we distinguish between reinforcement and punishment?
Increasing future behaviour = Reinforcement
Decreasing future behaviour = Punishment
How do we tell if a reinforcement or punishment is positive or negative?
somethings given = positive
somethings taken = negative
Reinforcement tells you —– to do , punishment tells you——- to do.
what to do, what not to do
4 downfalls to using punishment:
- punished behaviour is suppressed not forgotten
- It teaches discrimination among circumstances ( knows when to act out and not)
- It can teach fear - ( negative association with the punisher)
- physical punishment may increase aggression by modelling it as a way to problem-solve - ( cycle of violence )
What are 5 conditions that must occur when administering punishment?
- the punishment needs to happen right away
- needs to happen every time the behaviour happens
- must be applied with appropriate intensity
- punishment needs to be explained
- needs to take something as apposed to giving something
What is the most common reinforcement schedule?
Partial Reinforcement - reinforcement sometimes
Whats an example of Partial reinforcement?
slot machines - rewards gamblers occasionally to keep them hopeful, less chance of extinction
4 main schedules of reinforcement
( 2 ratio, 2 interval)
- Fixed Ratio
2.Variable Ratio - Fixed Interval
- Variable- Interval
Fixed ratio
A reinforcement schedule that reinforces a response only after a specified number of responses.
Variable Ratio
A reinforcement
schedule that reinforces a response
after an unpredictable number of responses
Fixed Interval
A reinforcement schedule that reinforces a response only after a specific time has elasped
Variable Interval
A reinforcement
schedule that reinforces a response
at unpredictable times interval
Principles of Operant Conditioning:
- Shaping
- Generalization
- Discrimination
- Extinction
Operant Conditioning- Shaping - Example
- Rewarding baby steps in the direction of the behaviour that you want them to learn
- used to train animals to do tricks
Response: Classical v.s Operant
Classical- involuntary, automatic
Operant- voluntary, operates on the environment
Observational Learning
Learning new behaviours or information by watching others and imitating them
Acquisition, Shaping and modelling - match with learning type
Acquisition- Classical
Shaping - Operant
Modelling- Oberservational
What is the famous saying about observational learning?
Monkey see, Monkey do
Who is the main guy linked to observational learning?
Albert Bandura
Albert Bandura’s Social Learning Theory
We learn based on other peoples experiences
Vicarious reinforcement v.s Vicarious Punishment
Reinforcement- someone does something and gets rewarded, which makes us want to do the same
Punishment - someone does something and gets in trouble, which makes us steer clear of it
4 things that need to occur for observational learning to occur
- have to be paying attention to the model
- have to be interested in the the model
- have to be motivated to complete the action
- Be capable to use the information and do the behaviour
What are mirror neurons?
-Mirror neurons are a type of brain cell that respond when we act and when we observe someone else performing the same action.
-In other words, they “mirror” the behaviour of others, firing in the same way as if we were doing the action ourselves.
What role does media violence play in Observational learning?
It all plays a role in our behaviour.
Has heavy influence
Why can you get a raccoon to play basketball, but you can’t get chickens to play baseball?
Because of Biological effects. Any animal can’t do anything
