Learning psychology Flashcards
What is classical conditioning?
learning by association, natural reflexes are paired with a neutral stimuli
What did Pavlov do?
studied salvation in dogs. The dogs were kept in a special room to eliminate extraneous variables, the dog was strapped into a harness to restrict movement and glass tubes were attached to each side of the dogs mouth to collect saliva. The experimenter would sound a buzzer present food and measure salvation
What is an unconditioned stimulus?
Innate stimulus that causes an automatic reflex response. The food
What is an unconditioned response?
Innate response to a specific stimulus which is automatically produced. Salvation
What is a neutral stimulus?
Elicits no response. Buzzer
What is a conditioned stimulus?
A stimulus that originally produced no reflexive response. Paired with the unconditioned stimulus to produce a response. Buzzer
What is a conditioned response?
A learnt response to a stimulus. Occurs when conditioned stimulus is presented. Salvation
What is forward conditioning?
the NS/CS is presented before the UCS
What are the two types of forward conditioning?
Delayed conditioning and trace conditioning
What is delayed conditioning?
This is where the NS/CS keeps going (buzzer keeps going) when UCS (food) is introduced
Wat is trace conditioning?
this is where the NS/CS starts and ends (the buzzer is rung and then stops ringing) before the UCS (food) is introduced
What is spontaneous conditioning?
the means simultaneous presentation of NS/CS (buzzer) and UCS (food)
What is backwards conditioning?
this means that the UCS (food) is presented first and then the NS/CS (buzzer) appears. So the NS is presented after the UCS
What is extinction - classical conditioning?
If a conditioned stimulus is repeatedly presented without the US then the CS disappears (buzz without giving food the dog starts salivating)
What is spontaneous recovery?
Temporary return of an extinguished response after a day
What is stimulus generalisation - classical conditioning?
Extension of the conditioned response from the original response from the original stimulus to similar stimuli. (Use buzzer causes salivation, other things also sounding like the buzzer also results in salivation)
What is stimulus discrimination?
Conditions response to a specific stimulus
What was the aim of Pavlov’s study?
Investigate the reflex response of salivation and to see if associating a reflex with a neutral stimulus producing a conditioned reflex
What was the procedure of Pavlov’s study?
- Built a special chamber room to prevent all extraneous variables
- Baseline condition - put meat in the dog’s mouth to measure the salivation reflex
- Control condition - Pavlov presented the dog with food
- Experimental condition - Pavlov presented the dogs with a metronome, an electric buzzer and a tuning fork, the dogs did not salivate to any of these sounds
- He paired the arrival of food with the sound of the metronome
-Pavlov also investigated wether order of conditioning had an effect on learning
What were the findings of Pavlov’s study?
- In baseline condition - he found secretion began after 1-2 seconds
- In control condition - secretion started after 5 seconds and 6 drops of saliva collected after 15 seconds
- In experimental condition - when presented with metronome salivation started after 9 seconds and by 45 seconds 11 droplets of saliva produced
- Forward conditioning produced salivation but backward conditioning did not work
What did Pavlov conclude?
‘Signalisation’ in the brain links the metronome to food and gives the reflex response of salivation when the metronome is presented but food is not
What was the aim of Watson and Rayner’s study?
Demonstrate classical conditioning could be used to create an irrational fear in humans
What was the procedure of Watson and Rayner’s study?
- 1 participant named ‘Little Albert’
- First assessed at nine months and was emotionally stable and showed no fear of several objects. A white rat (NS/CS)
- They also banged a hammer against a steel bar (UCS) to make a loud noise and found a feared response: lips puckered and trembled (UCR)
- At 11 months they began the procedure - Whenever the rat was in ‘Little Albert’s’ lap Watson made a loud noise banging the steel are behind his back. This was carried out twice then 5 times the following week
-12 days after the experiment had begun they realised they could condition a boy to have a feared response to a white rat an decided to introduce other objects with white fur
What was the findings of Watson and Rayner’s study?
They could create an irrational fear in humans using classical conditioning to a specific object as well as other objects similar to it - stimulus generalisation
What was the conclusion of Watson and Rayner’s study?
A conditioned emotional response can occur in humans after only a few pairings of stimuli. The conditioned response can be transferred to similar objects
What is operant conditioning?
- learning by consequences, ‘trial and error learning’
How did Thorndike use operant conditioning?
He put a cat into a puzzle box and then recorded how long it took the time to escape. When it had escaped it was put in again and again and recorded time taken to escape. Thorndike said that operant conditioning is so named because the subject operates on the environment to produce an outcome
What was Thorndike’s law of effect?
A response that is followed by pleasant consequences becomes more probable
What was the work of Skinner?
He mainly used rats and placed them in a ‘skinner box’ the rat had to open a food tray by pressing a lever, therefore pressing the lever is reinforced by the arrival of food
What is positive reinforcement?
Something pleasant is given when a desirable behaviour is shown
What is negative reinforcement?
something unpleasant is taken away when a desirable behaviour is shown
What is punishment?
decreased likelihood of behaviour by reducing negative behaviour
What is positive punishment?
something unpleasant is given when an undesirable behaviour is sown
What is negative punishment?
something pleasant is taken away when any undesirable behaviour is shown
What are primary reinforcers?
anything that satisfies a basic need
What are secondary reinforcers?
things that are given in exchange for a primary reinforcer
What is extinction - operant conditioning?
The conditioned response is no longer reinforced the behaviour will then gradually weaken and disappear
What is stimulus generalisation - operant conditioning?
If a person or animal is reinforced for making a particular response to a certain stimulus, likely to make same response to similar stimulus
What are the two types of schedules of reinforcement?
- Interval schedules
- Ratio schedules
What are interval schedules?
- Reinforcement is provided after a period of time
- Fixed interval schedule
- Variable interval schedule
What’s a fixed interval schedule?
A reward is given after specified amount of time
Whats variable interval schedule?
Rewarding behaviour on a random length of time
What are ratio schedules?
- Reinforcement is provided after a number of correct behaviours
- Fixed rato schedules
- Variable ratio schedules
What is a fixed ratio schedules?
reinforcing a response only after a specified number of correct responses
What is variable ratio schedules?
Rewarding behaviour after a random number of correct responses
What are the six different types of observations?
- Naturalistic - in their own environment
- Controlled - ofte in a lab
- Participant - researcher is part of research
- Non-participant - observer chooses not to take part in research
- Overt - aware they are being observed
- Covert - researcher’s status not made known to the group
What is event sampling?
deciding before conducting the observation what behaviours you expect to see
What is time sampling?
deciding before conducting observation what time periods behaviours will be recorded down from
What did Bandura suggest about learning?
learning could occur via observation of others
What type of people do we observe and imitate?
role models
What makes a good role model?
- model is same sex
- model is liked, respected
- model is reinforced for behaviour
What are the four parts of the ARRM model?
- Attention - the behaviour of the role model must be noticed and watched
- Retention - the behaviour that has been observed must be remembered
- Reproduction - the previously observed behaviour will be imitated by the observer
- Motivation - we need the desire to imitate the behaviour
What are the three types of motivation?
Vicarious reinforcement - you see the role model reinforced for their behaviour and so will imitate the behaviour to receive the same positive reinforcement
Internal reinforcement- feeling a sense of pride or belonging for behaving like a role model