Learning: Operant Conditioning

Question 1

Thorndike’s puzzle box

Answer 1

Hungry cat in box

Food outside box

Question 2

With thorndikes puzzle box there is a lever in box which can open door

Answer 2

By chance it stepped on lever and got quicker at doing this over time

Question 3

The cat seemed to be learning something

Answer 3

But gradually so

Question 4

The cat had no sudden insight

Answer 4

Trial and error learning which had the effect of eliminating responses that didn’t work

Question 5

The thorndikes puzzle box displays

Answer 5

Instrumental learning- organisms behaviour is instrumental for outcome

Question 6

What is law of effect?

Answer 6

In a given situation, a response followed by a satisfying consequence will become more likely to occur and a response followed by an annoying consequence will become less likely to occur

Question 7

What is the basic principle?

Answer 7

Behaviour is shaped and maintained by its consequences

Question 8

What is the basic principle based on?

Answer 8

The study of the effects that patterns of rewards and costs made contingent on emitted responses

Question 9

Classical conditioning is based on

Answer 9

Elicited responses

Question 10

Radical behaviourism was explored by

Answer 10

B.F. ‘Fred’ Skinner (1904-1990) and coined the term operant conditioning

Question 11

What does operant mean?

Answer 11

A class of behaviours on which a reinforcer is made contingent

Question 12

Behaviour operates upon

Answer 12

The environment to produce a change in the environment

Question 13

Reinforcement vs punishment

Answer 13

Consequences of any unit or class of behaviours which come to affect the subsequent frequency of those behaviours

Question 14

With reinforcement, reinforcers

Answer 14

Always increase (strengthen) response rates

Question 15

Reinforcement may be

Answer 15

Positive or negative

Question 16

An example of reinforcement is

Answer 16

Getting a food pellet, removal of annoying noise

Question 17

Punishments always

Answer 17

Decrease (weaken) response rates

Question 18

Punishment also may be

Answer 18

Positive (aversive) or negative (response cost)

Question 19

An example of punishment is

Answer 19

Getting an electric shock or having sweeties taken away

Question 20

There are three parts to operant conditioning episode

Answer 20

Antecedent
Behaviours
Consequences

Question 21

Antecedent refers to

Answer 21

Stimuli which exist before the relevant behaviour

Question 22

Behaviour refers to

Answer 22

Behaviour that the animal emits

Question 23

Consequences refers to

Answer 23

Some effect that the environment then has upon the animal based upon its earlier behaviour

Question 24

A discriminative stimulus acts as s

Answer 24

Signal, in the presence of which responses are emitted or suppressed

Question 25

A discriminative stimulus is similar to

Answer 25

Pavlovian conditioned stimulus in that it acts as a predictor of environmental contingencies

Question 26

A discriminate stimulus, is dissimilar, according to skinner,

Answer 26

In that it does not elicit the response

Question 27

The discriminative stimulus acts as a signal

Answer 27

That a particular behaviour will be associated with particular consequences

Question 28

Think of discriminative stimulus as training a dog to sit

Answer 28

Use rewards

Question 29

But dog doesn’t sit down at every opportunity as

Answer 29

This doesn’t produce a reward

Question 30

There are two types of reinforcement and punishment

Answer 30

Primary and secondary

Question 31

Primary reinforcement is where

Answer 31

Stimuli which are automatically valued by the organism as they satisfy a biological need- food, water, pleasure etc

Question 32

Secondary reinforcement is where

Answer 32

Stimuli that acquire reinforcing properties through their association with primary reinforcers- e.g money, praise etc

Question 33

Secondary reinforcement is a good example of how

Answer 33

Behaviour is often a mix of classical and operant conditioning

Question 34

An example of secondary reinforcement being a good example of classical and operant conditioning is

Answer 34

In dog training, praise becomes a CS in place of UCS of food reward. This elicits the CR of salivation and excitement

Question 35

Then praise can be used to operant condition behaviour instead of

Answer 35

Food

Question 36

What is operant extinction?

Answer 36

Weakening and eventual disappearance of a behaviour that is no longer reinforced

Question 37

Resistance to extinction is the degree to which

Answer 37

Non-reinforced responses persist- can vary greatly depending on how the response was initially acquired and level of reward/punishment

Question 38

Immediate consequence to a behaviour is best

Answer 38

Especially for animal training

Question 39

A delayed consequence still works but not so strongly

Answer 39

Better with people than animals as they can understand future consequences

Question 40

Shaping is a complex or unlikely behaviour pattern that can be established in animals

Answer 40

By successive approximations to the desired response pattern

Question 41

Chaining is conditioning several behaviours to happen

Answer 41

In succession and be dependent on a prior response

Question 42

Shaping-B1-B2-B3-B4-B5-

Answer 42

Chaining

Question 43

Operant generalisation is when the response will occur

Answer 43

With other antecedents that are similar to the one that was initially present during learning

Question 44

Operant discrimination is when a response will be given to the learned antecedent

Answer 44

But not one that is markedly different

Question 45

Operant discrimination has a general use in psychology

Answer 45

It enables researchers to ascertain whether an animal can actually tell the difference between 2 types of stimuli e.g colours, faces, sizes etc

Question 46

Reinforcers occur at different

Answer 46

Frequencies in real life and this determines the strength of reinforcement

Question 47

Continuous reinforcement is when

Answer 47

Every response of the desired nature is reinforced

Question 48

Partial reinforcement is when

Answer 48

Only some of the desired responses are reinforces

Question 49

With partial reinforcement, it can be

Answer 49

Ratio- certain % of responses are reinforced

Or

Interval- certain amount of time elapses before next reinforcement

Question 50

With partial reinforcement it can also be

Answer 50

Fixed- reinforcement occurs after a fixed number of responses/ time interval

Or

Variable- reinforcement occurs after a random(ish) number of responses/ time interval

Question 51

Although continuous reinforcement is the best schedule for learning

Answer 51

It also produces the quickest extinction

Question 52

Partial reinforcement takes longer for strong learning to occur

Answer 52

But is also more resistant to extinction

Question 53

Best for fast learning and resistance to extinction is to start with

Answer 53

Continuous reinforcement and when the behaviour is well established switch to a variable schedule that gradually becomes less frequent

Question 54

Escape conditioning is when?

Answer 54

Animal learns a response that gets away from an unpleasant stimulus

Question 55

Avoidance conditioning is when some antecedent predicts the onset of the unpleasant stimulus

Answer 55

Allowing the animal to avoid it via an appropriate behavioural response

Question 56

Avoidance conditioning is very difficult to distinguish as there is no way of

Answer 56

Exposing the animal to the antecedent without the unpleasant stimulus occurring- think about phobias