Learning and Memory Flashcards
Learning
refers specifically to the way in which we acquire new behaviors
Stimulus
anything to which an organism can respond
Habituation
repeated exposure to the same stimulus can cause a decrease in response
Dishabituation
recovery of a response to a stimulus after habitation has occurred
What is associative learning?
creation of a pairing, or association, either between two stimuli or between a behavior and a response
What is classical conditioning?
a type of associative learning that takes advantage of biological, instinctual responses to create association between two unrelated stimuli
What is an unconditioned stimulus?
any stimulus that brings about a reflexive response
What is an unconditioned response?
any innate or reflexive response from a stimulus
What is a conditioned stimulus?
a normally neutral stimulus that, through association, now causes a reflexive response
What is a conditioned response?
a response that is produced due to a conditioned stimulus; a conditioned response is typically innate and was previously the unconditioned response but when paired with the new stimulus, it becomes conditioned
What is acquition?
the process of taking advantage of a reflexive, unconditioned stimulus to turn a neutral stimulus into a conditioned stimulus
What is extinction?
when the organism stops responding to the conditioned stimulus because it was used unpaired with the unconditioned stimulus too much
What is spontaneous recovery?
the reappearance of the conditioned response after extinction after some time
What is generalization?
when the organism begins to associate other similar stimulus with the conditioned stimulus and react the same way with the same conditioned response
What is discrimination?
when organisms can distinguish between two similar stimuli
What is operant conditioning?
links voluntary behaviors with consequences in an effect to alter the frequency of those behaviors
What is Behaviorism?
It’s a theory that all behaviors are conditioned and B.F. Skinner is the father of this theory
What is reinforcement?
the process of increasing the likelihood that an individual will perform a behavior
Positive Reinforcers vs Negative Reinforcers
Positive Reinforcers - increase behavior by adding a positive consequence or incentive following the desired behavior
Negative Reinforcers - increase behavior by removing something unpleasant
What are two types of negative reinforcement?
Escape learning - reduce the unpleasantness that is already there
Avoidance learning - prevent the unpleasantness from happening
What is punishment?
uses conditioning to reduce the occurrence of a behavior
Positive punishment vs Negative punishment
Positive punishment - adds an unpleasant consequence in response to a behavior to reduce that behavior
Negative punishment - reduction of a behavior by taking away a stimulus
What are the reinforcement schedules?
Fixed-Ratio (FR) - reinforce a behavior after a specific number of performances of that behavior
Variable-Ratio (VR) - reinforces a behavior after varying number of performances with the average is constant
Fixed-Interval (FI) - reinforce the first instance of a behavior after a specified time period has elapsed
Variable-Interval (VI) - reinforce a behavior after varying intervals of time
What is shaping?
the process of rewarding increasingly specific behaviors
What is latent learning?
learning that occurs without a reward but that is spontaneously demonstrated once a reward is introduced
What is instinctive drift?
difficulty in overcoming instinctual behaviors
What is observational learning?
process of learning a new behavior or gaining information by watching others
What is encoding?
refers to the process of putting new information into memory
What is autonomic processing?
the act of gaining information without effort
What is controlled/effortful processing?
active memorization
What is the self-reference effect?
the tendency to recall information best when we put into the context of our own lives
What is maintenance rehearsal?
the repetition of a piece of information to either keep it within working memory or store it in short and long term memory eventually
What is the method of loci?
associated each item on a list with a location along a route that has already when memorized
What is the peg-word system?
associate numbers with items that rhyme with or resemble the numbers
What is chunking?
involves taking individual elements of a large list and grouping them together into groups of elements with related meaning
Describe sensory memory
First and most fleeting (under a second); consists of iconic (visual) and echoic (auditory) memory
Describe short term memory
Memories can here after sensory; also short, about thirty seconds. Has the capacity to hold about seven items; housed primarily in the hippocampus and will help consolidate into long term memory
What is working memory?
enables us to keep a few pieces of information in our consciousness simultaneously and to manipulate that information; related to short term memory and also depends on the hippocampus
What is elaborative rehearsal?
the association of the information to knowledge already stored in the long term memory
What is long term memory?
an essentially limitless warehouse for knowledge that we are then able to recall on demand
What are the two types of long term memory?
Implicit/Nondeclarative/Procedural - consists of skills and conditioned responses
Explicit/Declarative - consists of those memories that require conscious recall
What are the two types of explicit memory?
Semantic - facts
Episodic - experiences
What is retrieval?
the name given to the process of demonstrating that something that has been learned has been retained
What is recognition?
the process of merely identifying a piece of information that was previously learned
What is relearning?
the idea that you relearn things much faster the second time around
What is the spacing effect?
the longer the amount of time between session of relearning, the greater the retention of information later on
What is a semantic network?
a network of concepts in our long term memory that are linked together based on similar meaning
What is spreading activation?
when one concept is retrieved, it unconsciously activates others around it
What is priming?
recall is aided by first being presented with a work or phrase that is close to the desired semantic memory; spreading activation heavily influences this
What are three other retrieval clues?
(1) Context effects
(2) State-dependent memory
(3) Serial position effect
What is Alzheimer’s disease?
which is a degenerative brain disorder thought to be linked to a loss of acetylcholine in neurons that link to the hippocampus; marked by progressive dementia and memory loss. Neurofibrillary tangles and beta-amyloid plaques are found in Alzheimer’s patients.
What is Korsakoff’s syndrome?
memory loss caused by thiamine deficiency; has both retrograde and anterograde amnesia and confabulation
What is confabulation?
the process of creating vivid but fabricated memories a
What is agnosia?
the loss of the ability to recognize objects, people, or sounds
What is interference?
a retrieval error caused by the existence of other, usually similar information
What are the two types of interference?
Proactive - old information is interfering with new
Retroactive - new information is interfering with old
What is prospective memory?
remembering to perform a task at some point in the future
What is source-monitoring error?
involves confusion between semantic and episodic memory; remembers details of an event but confuses the context under which those details were gained
What is neuroplasticity?
As our brains develop, neural connections form rapidly in response to stimuli
What is synaptic pruning?
weak neural connections are broken while strong ones are bolstered
What is long-term potentiation?
the stimulated neurons becoming more efficient at releasing neurotransmitters and receptor sites increasing
