Learning: the role of experience (chapter 7)

Question 1

What is learning?

Answer 1

A process by which experience produces a relatively enduring and adaptive change in an organism’s capacity for behaviour.
Importantly, this definition specifies that learning is a change in the capacity for behaviour

Question 2

What distinction is made between learning and performance?

Answer 2

The distinction is especially important, as it tells us that changes in behaviour do not always mean that we have learned something.

Question 3

How does learning call attention to the importance of adapting to the environment?

Answer 3

Learning represents a process of personal adaption. That is, learning focuses on how an organism’s behaviour changes in response to environmental stimuli encountered during its lifetime. Although specific behaviours that each organism learns may be unique to its species. All animal species face some common adaptive challenges, such as finding food.

Question 4

What must each organism learn about their environment?

Answer 4

Because environments contain many events, each organism must learn: (1) which events are, or are not, important to its survival and well-being (2) which stimuli signal that an important event is about to occur, and (3) whether its responses will produce positive or negative consequences.
The learning processes examined in this chapter enable humans and other species to respond to one or more of these adaptive challenges

Question 5

What are the 5 basic learning processes?

Answer 5

The first two, habituation and sensitisation, are the simplest, involving changes in behaviour that result merely from repeated exposure to a stimulus.
Next, we look in depth at two types of associative learning or conditioning, which involve learning associations between events. Classical conditioning occurs when two stimuli become associated with each other (being trapped in a burning car) such that one stimulus (being in a car) now triggers a response (fear) that previously was triggered by another stimulus (being burned). In operant conditioning, organisms learn to associate their behavioural responses with specific consequences; for example, asking for a charitable donation leads to a monetary gift.
Finally, we consider observational learning, in which observers imitate the behaviour of a model; for example, children imitate choke hold performed by wrestlers on TV

Question 6

What is habituation?

Answer 6

A decrease in the strength of response to a repeated stimulus.
It occurs across species ranging from humans to dragonflies to sea snails. It is a simple form of learning in that it occurs in response to only a single stimulus (in contrast to more complex forms of learning, in which two or more stimuli are associated in some way)

Question 7

What is sensitisation?

Answer 7

An increase in the strength of response to a repeated stimulus. Like habituation, sensitisation is also classified as a simple learning mechanism as it occurs in response to only a single stimulus.
It may be referred so as dishabituation, highlighting the relationship between the two concepts

Question 8

How is sensitisation adaptive?

Answer 8

There are some aspects of the environment to which it is important for us to attend. Often, these stimuli are harmful to us in some way, and so sensitisation provides humans with a way of responding appropriately to potentially dangerous or threatening stimuli. When a stronger tactile stimulus is applied to sea snails, on repeated presentation they will withdraw more parts of their body than initially i.e. the strength of their response increases on repeated presentation of the stimulus

Question 9

What determines whether we habituate or sensitise to a stimulus?

Answer 9

Thompson (1970) proposed that both sensitisation and habituation happen at the same time, and compete to determine our behaviour. In situations where a stimulus creates more arousal, sensitisation wins. But in situations where the stimulus creates less arousal, habituation wins. Here, we can clearly see the distinction between learning and performance
The two separate systems, habituation and sensitisation, are learning, whereas behavioural performance is the net result of the two learning processes

Question 10

How do both habituation and sensitisation serve key adaptive functions?

Answer 10

If an organism responded to every stimulus in its environment, it would rapidly become overwhelmed and exhausted. By learning not to respond (habituating) to uneventful familiar stimuli, organisms conserve energy and can attend to other stimuli that are important. However, there are clearly some situations where it is not useful for us to ignore stimuli - when we are learning a lot from them or when they are a threat to our survival

Question 11

What is classical conditioning?

Answer 11

When an organism learns to associate two stimuli such that one stimulus comes to elicit a response that was originally elicited by only the other stimulus

Question 12

Who pioneered research into classical conditioning?

Answer 12

Pavolv - presented food to dogs and measured their salivary response. He noticed that with repeated testing, the dogs began to salivate before the food was presented, such as when they heard the footsteps of the approaching experimenter or when a tone was played.

Question 13

What factors influence the acquisition and persistence of conditioned responses?

Answer 13

Acquisition, extinction and spontaneous recovery, timing, generalisation and discrimination, higher order conditioning

Question 14

What does acquisition refer to?

Answer 14

The period during which a response is being learned.

Question 15

What is an unconditioned stimulus (UCS)?

Answer 15

A stimulus that elicits a reflexive or innate response (the UCR) without prior learning

Question 16

What is an unconditioned response (UCR)?

Answer 16

A reflexive or innate response that is elicited by a stimulus (the UCS) without prior learning

Question 17

What is a conditioned stimulus (CS)?

Answer 17

A stimulus that, through association with a UCS, comes to elicit a conditioned response similar to the original UCR

Question 18

What is a conditioned response (CR)?

Answer 18

A response elicited by a conditioned stimulus

Question 19

What would the tone initially be if we were trying to condition the dog to salivate to it?

Answer 19

A neutral stimulus because it does not elicit salivation

Question 20

What do we call the salivation by the dog when we place food in its mouth?

Answer 20

It is reflexive - it is what dogs do by nature

Question 21

What is it called when the tone and food are paired?

Answer 21

Each time they are paired it is called a learning trial

Question 22

What must happen during acquisition?

Answer 22

A CS typically must be paired multiple times with a UCS to establish a strong CR.
But Pavlov also found that a tone became a CS more rapidly when it was followed by greater amounts of food, so the intensity of the UCS also matters. Indeed, when the UCS is intense and aversive conditioning may require only one CS-UCS pairing

Question 23

How does the sequencing and time intervals of the CS–UCS pairing affect conditioning?

Answer 23

Learning ususlly occurs most quickly with forward pairing in which the CS (tone) appears first and is still present when the UCS (food) appears. Because UCS’s are typically very pertinent to survival, the ability to learn a forward pairing has a particular adaptive value; one learns that the CS signals the impending arrival of the UCS. Typically, presenting the CS and UCS at the same time (simultaneous pairing) produces less rapid conditioning and learning is slowest when the CS is presented after the UCS (backward pairing).

Question 24

What is forward short-delay pairing?

Answer 24

The CS is (tone) appears first and is still present when the UCS (food) appears. It is typically the most effective form of forward pairing

Question 25

What is forward trace pairing?

Answer 25

The tone sounds and then stops, and afterwards the food is presented . In forward pairing, it is often optimal for the CS to appear no more than 2 or 3 seconds before the UCS

Question 26

What happens when a CR is established?

Answer 26

It may persist for a long time, but maintenance is reliably better when occasional re-pairings of the CS and the UCS are presented.

Question 27

To summarise, when is classical conditioning strongest?

Answer 27

When (1) There are repeated CS-UCS pairings, (2) the UCS is more intense , (3) the sequence involves forward pairing , and (4) the time interval between the CS and UCS is short

Question 28

What is extinction?

Answer 28

A process in which the CS is presented repeatedly in the absence of the UCS, causing the CR to weaken and eventually disappear

Question 29

What is an extinction trial?

Answer 29

Each occurrence of the off the CS without the UCS

Question 30

What is the key to extinction?

Answer 30

The presentation of the CS without the UCS and so avoidance of the CS after an accident (e.g. avoidance of cars after a crash) gives little opportunity for the CS to occur without the UCS.
This is the unfortunate irony of phobia: people avoid he stimulus they fer, thereby depriving themselves of an opportunity to reduce their fear. Thus, the key ingredient to extinction if not the mere passage of time but repeated presentation of the CS without the UCS

Question 31

What is spontaneous recovery?

Answer 31

Reappearance of a previously extinguished CR after a rest period and without learning new trials.
Even when a CR extinguishes, not all traces of it are necessarily erased.

Question 32

What are the CRs like when spontaneously recovered?

Answer 32

Usually weaker than the initial CR and extinguishes more rapidly in the absence of the UCS.

Question 33

What important thing can spontaneous recovery tell us?

Answer 33

If a CR can suddenly reappear after extinction, then the initial learned pairing of UCS and CS must still exist. In turn, this must also mean that extinction is not a process of unlearning the CR, but rather inhibiting the CR

Question 34

What is temporal contiguity?

Answer 34

The temporal relationship between the CS and the UCS is important - the timing and order in which they are presented.
Pavlov noted that it was sufficient that the CS and UCS were presented close in time together. Where the CS is seen to predict the UCS - when the CS occurs, we can successfully predict that the UCS will occur - we say that the UCS is contingent on the CS.

Question 35

What is stimulus generalisation?

Answer 35

Stimuli similar to the initial CS elicit a CR. The greater the stimulus similarity, the greater the chance that a CR will occur

Question 36

What critical adaptive functions does stimulus generalisation serve?

Answer 36

An animal that ignores the sound of rustling bushes and then is attacked by a hidden predator (assuming it survives) will become alarmed by the sound of rustling bushes in the future. If stimulus generalisation did not occur, then the next time the animal heard rustling it would become alarmed only if the sound was identical to the one that preceded the earlier attack. through stimulus generalisation, the animal develops an alarm response to a range of rustling sounds. Some will be false alarms, but better safe than sorry

Question 37

How can stimulus generalisation be maladaptive?

Answer 37

To prevent it from running wild, organisms mist be able to discriminate between irrelevant stimuli and those that may signal danger. An animal that became alarmed at every sound it heard would exhaust itself from stress.
In classical conditioning, discrimination is demonstrated when a CR (such as an alarm reaction) occurs to one stimulus (a sound) but not to others

Question 38

What is discrimination?

Answer 38

When a CR occurs to one stimulus but not to others

Question 39

What is high-order conditioning?

Answer 39

Sometimes referred to as second-order conditioning, a neutral stimulus becomes a CS after being paired with an already established CS.
E.g. Expose a dog to repeated tone-food pairings and the tone becomes a CS that elicits a strong salivation response. Next, suppose that we present a neutral stimulus such as a black square, and the dog does not salivate. Now, we present the black square just prior to the tone, but we do not present any food. After repeated pairings of the square and the tone, the black square will become a CS and elicit salivation by itself

Question 40

What does high-order conditioning do?

Answer 40

It greatly expands the influence of conditioned stimuli and can affect what we come to value, fear, like or dislike.

Question 41

How can classical conditioning be linked to acquiring and overcoming fear?

Answer 41

The behaviourist viewpoint of phobias challenged Freud’s view and suggests that there are no hidden unconscious conflicts or repressed traumas. Instead it proposes that something may become fear-triggering CS due to a one-trial pairing with the UCS and stimulus generalisation.
Watson & Rayner (1920) - Little Albert

Question 42

Apart from Little Albert, what 2 other sources are there to suggest that at least some fears are conditioned?

Answer 42

First, laboratory experiments convincingly sjow that animals become afraid of neutral stimuli that are paired with electric shock
Second, in humans, behavioural treatments partially based on classical conditioning principles are among the most effective psychotherapies for phobias. The key assumption is that if phobias are learned, they can be unlearned

Question 43

What are exposure therapies?

Answer 43

A patient is exposed to a stimulus (CS) that arouses an anxiety response (such as fear) without the presence of of the UCS, allowing extinction to occur.
Exposure therapies are highly effective and represent one of behaviourism’s important applied legacies. More recent exposure therapies have used virtual reality to help patients to confront their fears

Question 44

What is systematic desensitisation?

Answer 44

Mental imagery, real-life situations, or both can be used to present the phobic stimulus.
In SD, the patient learns muscle-relaxation techniques and then is gradually exposed to the fear-provoking stimulus. Another approach, sometimes called flooding, immediately exposes the person to the phobic stimulus

Question 45

How can classical conditioning influence what attracts us?

Answer 45

It can influence what both attracts and pleasurably arouses us. Consider sexual arousal - a garment or scent of a partner’s perfume can become a CS for arousal. People, fish, rats and birds become more sexually aroused to originally neutral stimuli after those stimuli have been paired with a naturally arousing UCS

Question 46

What is aversion therapy?

Answer 46

Attempts to condition an aversion (a repulsion) to a stimulus that triggers unwanted behaviour by pairing it with a noxious UCS

Question 47

What have aversion therapies been used for?

Answer 47

To reduce maladapative and socially undesirable behaviours. Clinicians have attempted to treat paedophiles by pairing pictures of children with strong electric shocks, and to reduce alcoholics’ attractions to alcohol through administering them with a drug which induces severe nausea when alcohol is consumed.
However, they usually yield mix results, often producing short-term changes in behaviour which extinguish over time

Question 48

How do conditioned attraction and aversion influence our attitudes?

Answer 48

By repeatedly pairing a CS with pleasant or unpleasant stimuli, we may develop a favourable or unfavourable attitude towards that CS. Marketing experiments show that the products become conditioned stimuli that elicit favourable consumer attitudes. This is done through jingles, the workers they employ, clothing and branding.

Question 49

In what 3 ways can classical conditioning change the way our body responds in ways that either promote or harm our health?

Answer 49

Allergic reaction
Anticipatory nausea and vomiting
The immune system

Question 50

How is classical conditioning linked to allergic reactions?

Answer 50

Classical conditioning often can account for the appearance of physical symptoms that do not seem to ave a medical use. For example, by consistently pairing a neutral stimulus (e.g. a distinct odour) with a substance that naturally triggers an allergic reaction, the odour can become a CS that elicits a similar allergic response

Question 51

What is anticipatory nausea and vomiting (ANV)?

Answer 51

When patients become nauseated and may vomit anywhere from minutes to hours before a treatment session e.g. with chemotherapy and radiation therapy (which often cause nausea and vomiting)

Question 52

How is ANV a classically conditioned response?

Answer 52

Initially, neutral stimuli, such as hypodermic needles, the hospital room or even the sight of a hospital, become associated with the treatment (the UCS) and act as conditioned stimuli that trigger nausea and vomiting (the UCR). Fortunately, just as they can condition fear, psychological treatments can help patients unlearn the ANV response. The patient may first be taught how to relax physically, and then the conditioned stimuli that trigger the ANV are paired with relaxation and pleasant mental imagery

Question 53

How can the immune system be classically conditioned?

Answer 53

Affecting susceptibility to disease and fatal illness. Research found that rats drink sweetened water (a neutral stimulus) that is paired with injections of a drug (the UCS) that suppresses immune activity (the UCR), the sweetened water becomes a CS that suppresses immune activity

Question 54

How can conditioning increase immune functioning?

Answer 54

German researchers gave sweet sherbet to an experimental group of volunteers, together with an injection of epinephrine (i.e. adrenaline), which increases the activity of immune system cells that attack tumours. Compared with control groups, people receiving the sherbet-epinephrine pairings subsequently reacted to the sherbet alone with a stronger immune response.
This suggests that classical conditioning can help fight disease.

Question 55

What is the law of effect?

Answer 55

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 56

What did Thorndike conclude from his puzzle box?

Answer 56

Because performance improved slowly, he concluded that the animals did not attain insight into the solution. Rather, with trial and error, they gradually eliminated responses that failed to open the door and become more likely to perform the actions that worked. Thorndike called this process instrumental learning because an organism’s behaviour is instrumental in bringing about certain outcomes

Question 57

What us operant conditioning?

Answer 57

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

Question 58

What is a Skinner box?

Answer 58

A special chamber used to study operant conditioning experimentally - a lever on one wall releases a food pellet.

Question 59

What consequences did Skinner identify? (2)

Answer 59

Reinforcement and punishment

Question 60

What is reinforcement?

Answer 60

When a response is strengthened by an outcome that follows it.
Typically, the term strengthened is operationally defined as an increase in the frequency of the response. 
The outcome (a stimulus or event) that increases the frequency of a response is called a reinforcer. Once a response becomes established, reinforcers maintain it: the rat keeps pressing the lever because it continues to receive food

Question 61

What is punishment?

Answer 61

Occurs when a response is weakened by the outcomes.
Take the lever-pressing rat. Suppose we changed it so that when the level was pressed, a brief electric shock is delivered - not food. The electric shock represents a punisher, a consequence that weakens behaviour.
Note: reinforcers and punishers are defined in terms of their observable effects on behaviour

Question 62

How did Skinner view operant conditioning?

Answer 62

As a type of natural selection that facilitates an organism’s personal adaptation to the environment. Through operant conditioning, organisms generally learn to increase behaviours that are followed by unfavourable consequences, a pattern consistent with Thorndike’s law of effect

Question 63

What 3 kinds of events did Skinner believe formed a 3-part contingency in operant conditioning?

Answer 63

(1) antecedents, which are stimuli that are present before behaviour occurs
(2) behaviours that the organism emits, and
(3) consequences that follow the behaviours
Thus
IF antecedent stimuli are present (IF I say sit)
AND behaviour is emitted (AND my dog Rover sits)
THEN consequences will occur (THEN Rover will receive a treat)

Question 64

How is the learning which occurs different in classical and operant conditioning?

Answer 64

In classical conditioning, a pre-existing response (the UCR) is linked to a new stimulus (CS) to become the conditioned response (CR). Note: the response itself has not changed, it has just been made in a new context. In operant conditioning, new behaviours are learned in response to particular stimuli in the environment.
Secondly, there are different events involved: classical conditioning involves stimuli and response whereas operant conditioning involves a (discriminative) stimulus, a response and reinforcing/punishing event

Question 65

How do classical and operant conditioning differ on a more conceptual level (governing the learning of voluntary versus involuntary responses)?

Answer 65

Classical conditioning typically focuses on elicited behaviours: the conditioned response (e.g. salivation) is triggered involuntarily, almost like a reflex, by the conditioned stimulus (e.g. a tone). Operant conditioning focuses on emitted behaviours: in a given situation, the organism generates responses (e.g. pressing a lever) that are under its voluntary control. However, it is important to acknowledge at this stage that this distinction does not always hold up.
More recent approaches to understanding classical conditioning have argued that it can occur through voluntary cognitive processes (such as conscious expectation). Operant conditioning can be an extremely powerful learning tool.

Question 66

While they are different processes, what is important to realise about classical and operant conditioning?

Answer 66

That many learning situations involve both.

Question 67

What is discriminative stimulus?

Answer 67

Signal that a particular response will now produce certain consequences

Question 68

What do discriminitive stimuli do?

Answer 68

They set the occasion for operant responses. The sight of the teacher raising chalk to the blackboard is - in operant conditioning terms - a discriminative stimulus signalling it is time for the students to put their fingers in their ears.
They guide much of your everyday behaviour. Food on your plate, fire bells, the words people speak to you and the sight of a friend’s face are all discriminative stimuli that set the occasion for you to make certain responses

Question 69

What is operant conditioning influenced by?

Answer 69

Consequences. Two major types of reinforcement strengthen responses, and two major types of punishment weaken them. Operant behaviour is also (like classical conditioning) weakened by extinction

Question 70

What is positive reinforcement?

Answer 70

Occurs when a response is strengthened by the subsequent presentation of a stimulus.
A rat receives food pellets when it presses a lever and eventually begins to press the lever more often. The stimulus that follows and strengthens the response if called a positive reinforcer. Food, drink, comforting physical contact, attention, praise and money are common positive reinforcers

Question 71

How are rewards different to positive reinforcers?

Answer 71

Behaviourists prefer positive reinforcer because it focuses on how consequences affect behaviour. In many instances, rewards do not function as positive reinforcers. Parents may give a child a reward (e.g. new toy) for cleaning her room, but if the child does not clean her room in the future, then the toy was not a positive reinforcer for that behaviour

Question 72

What are primary reinforcers?

Answer 72

Stimuli, such as food and water, that an organism naturally finds reinforcing because they satisfy biological needs

Question 73

What are secondary (conditioned) reinforcers?

Answer 73

Stimuli that acquire reinforcing properties through their association with primary reinforcers. Money is a conditioned reinforcer.

Question 74

How do secondary reinforcers illustrate how behaviour often depends on both classical and operant conditioning?

Answer 74

Consider dog training. Correct responses, such as sitting on command, initially are operantly reinforced with food. But just before delivering food, the trainer enthusiastically says “Good dog!”. At first, this phrase is meaningless to the dog, but by repeatedly pairing it with food each time the dos sits, “Good dog!” becomes a classically conditioned stimulus that elicits excitement. Now the trainer can use the phrase “Good dog!” as a secondary reinforcer instead of always having to carry and provide food

Question 75

What is negative reinforcement?

Answer 75

A response is strengthened by the subsequent removal (or avoidance) of an aversive stimulus.
Skinner noted that when a response pays off, it is more likely to be repeated in the future. In everyday life, our behaviours pay off not only when they lead to the presentation of praise, money etc. but also when they enable us to get rid of/avoid something we find aversive e.g. taking asprin pays off because it relieves a headache

Question 76

What is a negative reinforcer?

Answer 76

The aversive stimulus that is removed (e.g. the headache)

Question 77

How is negative reinforcement different to punishment?

Answer 77

Punishment weakens a response, whereas reinforcement - whether positive or negative - strengthens a response (or maintains it once it has reached full strength)
Negative reinforcement plays a key role in helping us learn to escape from and avoid aversive situations

Question 78

What should be noted about positive and negative reinforcement?

Answer 78

The adjectives positive and negative do not mean ‘good’ or ‘bad’. Rather they refer to procedures: positive refers to presenting a stimulus; negative refers to removing a stimulus

Question 79

What is operant extinction?

Answer 79

The weakening and eventual disappearance o a response because it is no longer reinforced

Question 80

What is resistance to extinction?

Answer 80

The degree to which non-reinforced responses persist.
Non-reinforced responses may stop quickly (low resistance), or they may keep occurring hundreds or thousands of time (high resistance). It is highly influenced by the pattern of reinforcement that has previously maintained the behaviour

Question 81

What is operant extinction?

Answer 81

(Also called positive punishment or punishment by application) a response is weakened by the subsequent presentation of a stimulus.
Smacking and telling off a child for misbehaving is an obvious example, so is a child or adult’s touching of a hot iron.
the pain delivered by the burner makes is less likely that we will touch it in the future

Question 82

What can aversive punishment do?

Answer 82

It can produce rapid results, an important consideration it is necessary to stop a particularly dangerous behaviour, such as an animal or person

Question 83

What is the corporal punishment debate?

Answer 83

The use of physical (corporal) punishment in child raising is a controversial issue. Some countries have banned its use (e.g. Sweden) whereas it is still widely used in other countries (e.g. USA).
Some studies have found unfavourable associations with child corporate punishment, including decreased quality off the parent-child relationship, poorer internalisation of moral standards during childhood, increased aggressive and antisocial behaviour, poorer mental health and increased risk of being a perpetrator or victim of physical abuse.
However, is is important not to over-interpret these findings which are all correlational in nature and so, for example, perhaps corporate punishment causes children to be more aggressive or more aggressive children cause their parents to be more physically punitive.
However, longitudinal studies in Sweden found that after the ban teenage rates of theft, rape, narcotics trafficking, drug use and suicide all declined, suggesting that behaviour did not get worse as a result of the ban

Question 84

What is response cost?

Answer 84

(also known as negative punishment or punishment by removal) response is weakened by the subsequent removal of a stimulus
E.g. groundings, loss of privileges and monetary fines all work to modify behaviour

Question 85

Why do many psychologists and clinicians favour using time-out as a punishment technique?

Answer 85

Response cost (and operant extinction) often provides a good alternative to punishment as a method for reducing undesirable behaviours. Intended punishments can fail because they actually reinforced behaviour by providing attention (mild punishment can be a reinforcer in some cases). So introducing a response cost or ignoring bad behaviour altogether may in some situations be the best way to reduce behaviour

Question 86

What is shaping?

Answer 86

(also called method of successive approximations) involves reinforcing successive approximations towards a final response
E.g. To get a child to play on the monkey bars, we use a positive reinforcer: attention. Every time he stands up in the sandbox we reinforce the behaviour with attention.. Once this response is established, we reinforce him only is he stands up and walks from the sandbox towards the monkey bars. This is the second approximation. Then we only reinforce him when he stands next to the bars and, finally only when he is on the bars and moving.

Question 87

What is chaining?

Answer 87

Used to develop a sequence (a chain) of responses by reinforcing each response with the opportunity to perform the next response
E.g. suppose that a rat has learned to press the lever to receive food when a light is on. Next we place a bell nearby. By accident, the rat eventually bumps into and rings the bell, which turns on the light. Seeing the light, the rat runs to the lever. Over time, the rat will learn to ring the bell because this response is reinforced by the light turning on, which provides the opportunity to press the lever for food. As in this example, chaining usually begins with the final response in the sequence and works backward towards the first response.

Question 88

What is operant generalisation?

Answer 88

An operant response occurs to a new antecedent stimulus or situation that is similar to the original one.
E.g. A dog taught to sit by its owner might, for example, start sitting when other people give the command

Question 89

What is operant discrimination?

Answer 89

An operant response will occur to one antecedent stimulus but not to another.
Through experience, we learn to discriminate between antecedent conditions. Children learn to raid the biscuit jar only when parents are not in the kitchen, We learn to board buses and trains marked by specific symbols and avoid otherwise identical vehicles with different symbols.

Question 90

What is stimulus control?

Answer 90

A behaviour that is influenced by discriminative stimuli

E.g. the sight of a police car, or the sound of a siren, exerts stimulus control over most people’s driving behaviour

Question 91

How can the concept of operant discrimination act as a powerful tool for examining the perceptual and cognitive abilities of infants?

Answer 91

We cannot ask infants and animals to tell is if they can distinguish between different colours, sounds, faces etc. But by using a procedure called operant discrimination training, we can teach an organism, for example, that pressing a lever when a red light is on produces a food reinforcer. Now all we have to do is change the colour of the light and not reinforce any response when that light is on. If the organism learns to respond to one colour and not the other, we infer that it can discriminate between them

Question 92

What are schedules of reinforcement?

Answer 92

In daily life, reinforcement comes in different patterns and frequencies. these patterns, referred to as schedules of reinforcement, have strong and predictable effects on learning, extinction and performance.
Perhaps the most obvious way to manipulate a reinforcement schedule is to vary the length of time between response and consequence. In general, a consequence that occurs immediately after a behaviour has a stronger effect than when it is delayed. Training animals typically requires immediate reinforcement so that they associate the correct response, rather than a subsequent behaviour, with the reinforcer. However, because humans can imagine future consequences, our behaviour is less rigidly controlled by the timing of consequences than that of other species. Still, the power of immediate reinforcement helps explain why many people continue to engage in behaviours with maladaptive long-term consequences e.g. drug use and smoking

Question 93

What is continuous reinforcement?

Answer 93

Every response of a particular type is reinforced

E.g. every lever press results in a food pellet

Question 94

What is partial (intermittent) reinforcement?

Answer 94

Only a portion of the responses of a particular type is reinforced

Question 95

What are the 2 dimensions along which partial reinforcement can be categorised along and how do they work?

Answer 95

1) Ratio versus interval schedules. On ratio schedules, a certain percentage of responses are reinforced. The key factor is that ratio schedules are based on the number of responses: more responses, more reinforcement. On interval schedules, a certain amount of time must elapse between reinforcements, regardless of how many responses might occur during that interval (e.g. only reinforcing one lever press per minute, regardless of whether it is pressed 10 or 60 times). The key factor is that interval schedules are based on the passage of time.
2) Fixed versus variable schedules. On a fixed schedule, reinforcement always occurs after a fixed number of responses or after a fixed time interval. On a variable schedule, the required number of responses or the time interval between them varies at random around an average.
Combining these two dimensions creates four types of reinforcement schedules

Question 96

What is an advantage of continuous reinforcement over partial reinforcement?

Answer 96

It produces more rapid learning because the association between a behaviour and its consequences is easier to perceive.

Question 97

What is a disadvantage of continuous reinforcement over partial reinforcement?

Answer 97

Continuously reinforced response extinguish more rapidly because it is easier to perceive when reinforcement is withdrawn, as there is a sudden change between reinforcement on every trial and no reinforcement on any trial

Question 98

What is the best way to promote fast learning and high resistance to extinction ?

Answer 98

To begin reinforcing a desired behaviour on a continuous schedule until the behaviour is well established and then shift to a partial (preferably variable) schedule that is gradually made more demanding

Question 99

What does behaviour often involve regarding aversive situations?

Answer 99

Escaping from or avoiding aversive situations. Escape occurs when we take medications to relieve pain or put on more clothes when we are cold. Avoidance occurs when we put on sunscreen to prevent sunburn or obey traffic laws to avoid tickets

Question 100

What is escape conditioning?

Answer 100

The organism learns a response to terminate an aversive stimulus.
Escape behaviours are acquired and maintained through negative reinforcement. If you are cold, putting on a sweater is negatively reinforced by the desirable consequence that you no longer shiver.

Question 101

What is avoidance conditioning?

Answer 101

The organism learns a response to avoid an aversive stimulus.
We learn to dress warmly to avoid feeling cold in the first place.
Once an avoidance response is learned, it is hard to extinguish

Question 102

What is the two-factor theory of avoidance learning?

Answer 102

Both classical and operant conditioning are involved in avoidance learning.
For a rat, a warning light is initially a neutral stimulus paired with a shock (UCS). Through classical conditioning, the light becomes a CS that elicits fear. Now operant conditioning takes over. Fleeing from the light is negatively reinforced by the termination of fear. This strengthens and maintains the avoidance response. Now if we permanently turn off the shock, the avoidance response prevents extinction from taking place. Seeing the light come on, the animal will not hang around long enough to learn that no shock no longer occurs

Question 103

Why are exposure therapies for phobias so effective?

Answer 103

By preventing avoidance responses, they provide the key ingredient for extinction: exposure to the CS (car) in the absence of the UCS (pain)

Question 104

What does the two-factor theory help us to understand?

Answer 104

How many avoidance behaviours develop. However, it has trouble explaining some aspects of avoidance, such as why people and other animals develop phobic avoidance to some stimuli (e.g. snakes) more easily than to others (e.g. flowers).

Question 105

What was Skinner’s point with talks of applications of operant conditioning?

Answer 105

He set forth his utopian vision of how a ‘technology of behaviour’ based on positive reinforcement could end war, improve education and solve other social problems. To his critics, Skinner conjured up imaged of peple being manipulated like rats. But his point was that social influence is a natural part of human existence. Parents and children influence each other, as do employees and employers, teachers and students, friends and romantic partners.
To behaviourists, individual and societal problems are created by the all-too common haphazard use of reinforcement and over-reliance on punishment.
E.g. Skinner trained pigeons in WWII to direct missiles

Question 106

What was the ‘mechanical baby tender’?

Answer 106

Also known as an ‘air crib’, in his article he reports an apparatus where a baby could learn. the crib Skinner built for his daughter was designed to stimulate her, keep her safe and at a comfortable temperature - an application of Skinner’s work in the lab, transferred into his home, and applied to the development of his own daughter

Question 107

How have many of Skinner’s ideas been put into action today?

Answer 107

The effectiveness of computerised instruction rests on 2 principles championed by Skinner: immediate performance feedback, where participants are encouraged to practise and continue with the task at hand, as well as providing an immediate association between the question and their response. And self-paced learning allowing students to progress at their own speed - allowing for more support and conditioning where needed.
Educational software typically quizzes the student and provides immediate feedback. In addition, students who do not learn the material the first time can repeat steps, those who do can advance to the next set of information, exemplifying Skinner’s principle of self-paced learning.
Also been used with animals e.g. in films or police dogs

Question 108

What does operant conditioning demonstrate?

Answer 108

The environment’s power in shaping behaviour. But this does not mean we are at its mercy. It has been suggests that you can use your knowledge of learning principles to gain greater control over your own behaviour

Question 109

What is preparedness?

Answer 109

Through evolution, animals are biologically predisposed (pre-wired) to learn some associations more easily than others. In general, behaviours related to a species’ survival are learned more easily than behaviours contrary to an organism’s natural tendencies
The behaviourist assumption was wrong because it ignored a key principle: behaviour is influenced by an organism’s evolutionary history, and this places biological constraints on learning

Question 110

What is conditioned taste aversion?

Answer 110

A conditioned response in which the taste and (and sometimes the sight and smell) of a particular food becomes disgusting and repulsive.
Imagine eating or drinking something, then becoming sick and vomiting. Perhaps it is a case if the flu, or it could be food poisoning. When a food is associated with nausea or vomiting, that particular food can become a CS that triggers a conditioned taste aversion. E.g. during pregnancy many women experience nausea and vomiting, a response commonly associated with food, and they may develop aversions to foods that they associate with these symptoms

Question 111

How were taste-aversion experiments conducted?

Answer 111

They were pioneered based on 2 assumptions of classical conditioning. First, behaviourists has assumed that the CS-UCS time interval has to be relatively short: usually a few seconds. John Garcia showed that animals learned taste aversions even though the food (CS) was consumed up to several hours - or even a day - before they became ill (in this case, the UCS).
Second, he illustrated how biological preparedness influences learned aversions. E.g. Rats are biologically primed to form taste-illness associations, which means that in nature they most easily identify poisonous or bad food by its taste (or smell) whereas sounds and lights do not make rats sick

Question 112

How have psychologists applied knowledge about conditioned aversions to save animals’ lives?

Answer 112

To prevent coyotes killing farmers’ sheep, scientists laced pieces of meat with lithium chloride, a nausea-inducing drug. They wrapped the meat in meat hide and left it out for coyotes to eat. When eaten, the coyotes became ill, and developed an aversion to the meat, thereby becoming less likely to kill the sheep

Question 113

Are we biologically programmed to fear certain things?

Answer 113

Seligman (1971) proposes that like other animals, humans are biologically prepared to acquire certain fears more readily than others.
Humans develop phobias to many stimuli, but most often we dear things that seem to have greater evolutionary significance: snakes, spiders and potentially dangerous animals and places. Multiple factors may affect human fear conditioning, but one thing is clear: as with taste aversions, fear can be conditioned much more easily to some stimuli than to others

Question 114

What is S-R (stimulus-response psychology)?

Answer 114

Early behaviourists believed that learning involves the relatively automatic formation of bonds between stimuli and responses. Behaviourists opposed explanations of learning that went beyond observable stimuli and responses, They did not deny that people had thoughts and feelings, but argued that behaviour could be explained without referring to such mentalistic concepts

Question 115

How has the S-R model been challenged?

Answer 115

Some learning theorists argued that in between stimulus and response there is something else: the organisms (O) cognitive representation of the world. This came to be known as the S-O-R, or cognitive, model of learning. Today the cognitive perspective represents an important force in learning theory

Question 116

How did Kohler challenge Thorndike’s behaviourist assumption that animals learn to perform tasks only by trial and error?

Answer 116

He exposed chimpanzees to novel learning tasks and concluded that they were able to learn by insight - the sudden perception of a useful relationship that helps to solve a problem.
The apes had to solve the problem of retrieving a banana out of reach. Kohler emphasised that the apes often spent time staring at the bananas and available tools, as if they were contemplating the problem, after which the solution suddenly appeared.

Question 117

What is insight?

Answer 117

The sudden perception of a useful relationship that helps to solve a problem.

Question 118

What have behaviourists argued about insight?

Answer 118

That it actually represents the combining of previously learned responses.
Imagine a pigeon placed inside a chamber where a miniature model of a banana dangles from the ceiling, out of reach. A small box sits in the corner of the chamber. Similar to Kohler’s apes, the pigeon looks around, goes to the box and pecks the banana. Without knowing the pigeon’s behavioural history, we might conclude that this is a novel behaviour reflecting remarkable insight. But instead, the pigeon has simply combined several independent behaviours that researchers had operantly conditioned using reinforcement

Question 119

What is a cognitive map?

Answer 119

A mental representation of the spatial layout.
Consider spatial learning in rats. In a maze, a rat runs to an open circular table, continues across and follows the only path available to a goal box containing food. After 12 trials, the rat easily negotiates the maze. Next, the maze i changed. the rat runs its usual route and reaches a dead end. Tolman found that at this new point in the procedure rats returned to the table, briefly explored most of the 18 new paths for just a few inches, and then chose one. By far the largest number - 36% - chose the fourth path to the right of their original route, which took them closest to where the goal box has been. In short, the rats behaved as you would, given your advantage of seeing the maps
The concept of cognitive maps supported the belief that learning does not merely represent stimulus response associations. rather, he argued that learning provides knowledge, and based on their knowledge, organisms develop an expectancy, a cognitive representation, of ‘what leads to what’

Question 120

What is latent learning?

Answer 120

Learning that occurs but is not demonstrated until later, when there is an incentive to perform.
In other words, we may learn how to do something at one time but not display that knowledge until we perform a task at a future time

Question 121

What are expectancy models in classical conditioning?

Answer 121

Expectancy models state that the most important factor in classical conditioning is not how often the CS and the UCS are paired, but how well the CS (i.e. signals) the appearance of the UCS

Question 122

What evidence is there for expectancy models?

Answer 122

They are necessary in explaining some phenomena which had been observed in adaptations of traditional Pavlovian conditioning experiments. One important finding made by Rescorla (1968) was that the number of times a CS and US are paired together does not determine whether learning occurs. He conducted a fear conditioning experiment in which rats were in 1 or 2 conditions. Condition 1 received electric shocks (UCS), and each shock was preceded by a tone. As usual, the tone soon became a CS that elicited a fear response when presented alone. In condition 2 the rats received the same number of tone-shock pairings as condition 1 but they also received as many shocks that were not preceded by the tone. Results supported the expectancy model: the tone did not elicit a fear response for the second group

Question 123

What is blocking?

Answer 123

Obstruction of conditioning of a CR, because that response has already been conditioned to a different stimulus.
This phenomenon again demonstrates how associative learning is not simply due to the number of times which a CS and a UCS have been presented together. Rather, animals, and indeed humans, appear to examine how well the CS predicts the UCS

Question 124

Give an example of blocking —

Answer 124

Imagine you have been introduced to a new social group, a group of friends who always drink in the same pub. As a newcomer, you are trying to ascertain what relationships the group comprises. You have seem Amy arrive at the pub closely followed by Lawrence several times, and have formed to association that they are a couple. However, a few weeks later you see Amy arrive with Jane and then Lawrence. Do you then start to think that Jane and Lawrence may be an item? This seems an irrational conclusion, as you already have strong evidence that it is Amy who is seeing Lawrence

Question 125

What has the blocking effect led researchers to argue?

Answer 125

That the strength of the association formed in classical conditioning was determined by how surprising the UCS was, or how unexpected it was.

Question 126

What is the Rescorla-Wagner theory?

Answer 126

A theory of classical conditioning which states that the strength of conditioning is determined by how surprising the UCS is
If the shock is unsurprising or expected, for instance when it has already been predicted by a prior event, then it will not form so strong an association. this model was very influential as it was the first formalised model of conditioning which went beyond a simple associative explanation, like that used by the S-R theorists, by considering the mediating role of cognitive processes in the learning; in this case the expectancy of the UCS

Question 127

What is latent inhibition?

Answer 127

The weakening of classical conditioning due to the prior presentation of the CS on its own.
E.g. Showing sheep and goats either a light flash or a spinning rotor. They then trained them to expect a shock after seeing both of these. They found that the animals were slower to learn an association between the shock (UCS) and the stimulus to which they had already been exposed. So just the fact if having seen a particular CS (a light or rotor) before slowed their learning down
A way to think of it is as meaning an inhibition response that it just waiting to happen, lying dormant, but which may appear at any moment

Question 128

What might latent inhibition be due to?

Answer 128

It might be that a person experiences a stimulus and does not learn anything from it. the stimulus is perceived, but is regarded as insignificant, as unimportant and so the person does not make any learning links to it. This ‘decision’ not to learn from the stimulus may be because the person is busy doing something else at the time and so in order to carry out that task properly the need all their focus. later, the person may actually respond as if classically conditioned to the stimulus. That is to say they did indeed learn from the earlier experience of the stimulus and only now does the inhibition show itself

Question 129

In what ways does latent inhibition make adaptive sense?

Answer 129

There are lots of different stimuli in our environment all the time and it would make little sense to associate these with novel unconditioned stimuli. E.g. imagine a plate of food in front of you. The plate contains vegetables you are used to, some bread and some unidentified seafood which you have never sampled before. After eating your meal, you are violently sick. Sensibly, you develop an aversion to the novel, unidentified seafood which you have eaten. The process of latent inhibition has prevented you from forming an aversion to bread and vegetables. latent inhibition helps us to filter out spurious associations from our learning. However, it is clearly difficult for the Rescorla-Wagner model to explain. The UCS (shock) is only introduced after the pre-exposure phase. It is just as surprising to the goat whether it has been pre-exposed to CS or not. Rescorla-Wagner would therefore predict that latent inhibition should not occur, but it does

Question 130

What do attentional theories of classical conditioning explain?

Answer 130

They state that the strength of conditioning is determined by how much attention is paid to the CS during the learning episode.
they explain latent inhibition by suggesting that the effect of presenting the CS (e.g. a light) in the absence of the UCS (e.g. a shock) is to habituate the animal to the CS.
They suggest that the decreased attention towards the CS caused by habituation during pre-exposure reduces the strength of the association formed once the UCS is presented.

Question 131

What can attentional theories explain in addition to latent inhibition?

Answer 131

E.g. they explain blocking by suggesting that attention is paid to a CS when it is a good predictor of the UCS; thus because a CS (e.g. light) is already a good predictor of the UCS following phase 1 of a blocking experiment, more attention is paid to it at phase 2, at the expense of the newly introduced CS (e.g. a sound), and thus little association is formed between the sound and the UCS

Question 132

How are cognitive and behavioural learning applied in psychological therapies?

Answer 132

The use of exposre therapies (e.g. systematic desensitisation) to treat phobias is based on the knowledge that extinction of learned fear can occur when we are placed in situations where our fear is no longer associatted with the stimulus which initially caused the phobia. The ‘two-process’ theory of avoidance learning was also very important in informing why anxiety disorders persist, and how it is possible to challenge them (by preventing avoidance)
just as cognitive approaches to learning have gradually risen to the fore, so have cognitive therapies in which irrational thoughts and expectations are challenged. Indeed, the most widely used (and arguably most effective) therapies are cognitive behavioural therapies (CBT) which combine both elements for modifying both maladaptive cognitions and behaviours. The success of cognitive approaches to learned psychological disorders is another argument for the role of cognition in learning. CBT has also been successfully used as part of the rehabilitation process with criminals - the role of cognition in learning and the benefit of such work seem clear.

Question 133

What is observational learning?

Answer 133

Learning that occurs by observing the behaviour of a model.
Teachers, parents and trainers often help us to learn by intentionally demonstrating skills. But observational learning extends beyond such contexts. We also learn fears, prejudices, likes and dislikes, and social behaviours by watching others. through observation we may learn desirable responses or we may acquire undesirable ones.

Question 134

How can observational learning be highly adaptive?

Answer 134

By observing others, an organism can learn which events are important, which stimuli signal that such events are about to occur, and which responses are likely to produce positive or negative consequences

Question 135

What is the human capacity to learn by observation called?

Answer 135

Modelling and it far outstrips that of other creatures. It helps us bypass the potentially time-consuming and dangerous learning process of trial and error. For example, we would not want each new generation of brain surgeons or airline pilots to learn their craft only through trial and error!

Question 136

What is Bandura’s social-cognitive theory?

Answer 136

(also known by its former name social-learning theory) emphasises that people learn by observing the behaviour of models and acquiring the belief that they can produce behaviours to influence events in their lives

Question 137

What 4-step process foes Bandura view modelling as?

Answer 137

1) Attention: we must pay attention to the model’s behaviour
2) Retention: we must retain that information in memory so that it can be recalled when needed
3) Reproduction: we must be physically capable of reproducing the model’s behaviour of something similar to it
4) Motivation: we must be motivated to display the behaviour

Question 138

What is self-efficacy? Link to observational learning.

Answer 138

People’s belief that they have the capability to perform behaviours that will produce a desired outcome.
It is a key factor in observational learning. According to Bandura, the knowledge or capability to perform a behaviour may be acquired at one time but not displayed until a layer time when the motivational conditions are favourable

Question 139

How did Bandura demonstrate the learning-versus-performance distinction in humans?

Answer 139

In this experiment, children watched a film in which a model acted aggressively towards a ‘Bobo doll’ (a inflatable plastic clown), punching, kicking and hitting hit with a mallet. One group saw the model praised and given candy, the other group saw the model reprimanded to aggression and the control group saw no consequences for the model. After this, each child was placed in a room with various toys, including the Bobo doll. Children who saw the model punished performed fewer aggressive actions towards the Bobo doll than did the children in the other two groups.
the experimenter later offered the children attractive prizes if the could do what the model had done. All of the children quickly reproduced the model’s aggressive responses. Here, it has been demonstrated that regardless of whether the model was reinforced or punished, children has indeed learned the model’s behaviour

Question 140

What does research strongly suggest that viewing violent media does?

Answer 140

• decreases viewers’ concerns about the suffering of victims
• habituates us to the sight of violence
• provides aggressive models that increase viewers’ tendency to act aggressively

Question 141

How have psychologists used observational learning?

Answer 141

To enhance prosocial behaviour. E.g. researchers showed secondary school students an audio-visual programme that features models who donated blood. Subsequently, donations to a blood bank increased by 17%

Question 142

How has observational learning been used more ambitiously to address global social problems?

Answer 142

When a national literacy programme in Mexico failed to draw a good turnout, Sabido created a television soap opera to give the literacy programme a boost. The popular soap opera aired fro a year and featured a literate female character who, as part of the national programme, organised a self-study group for teenagers and adults who struggled with literacy. After one episode in which viewers were directly asked to enrol ‘about 25,000 people descended on the distribution centre in mexico city to get their reading materials’.
Mass media programmes incorporating social-cognitive learning principles have since tackled social problems all over the world.

Question 143

What does your ability to learn and adapt depend on?

Answer 143

Not only the networks of brain structures and circuits, but also on the brain’s own ability to adapt depends not only on networks of brain structures and circuits, but also on the brain’s own ability to adapt - to modify its structure and functioning - in response to experience

Question 144

How might learning modifications occur?

Answer 144

Through changes in the strengths of connection between nerve cells. This idea was taken a step further by proposing that these changes in connection strength may be caused by concurrent activity across a connection or synapse in the brain. This mechanism has become known as the Hebb rule.

Question 145

What are neural network (or connectionist) models?

Answer 145

Learn new information through changes in the connections between mathematically simulated neurons.
Modern-day ‘neural network modellers’ attempt to understand how learning and memory can be instantiated in the neurons and synapses in our central nervous systems.

Question 146

What do neural network and connectionist modellers usually focus on?

Answer 146

More complex forms of learning such as the ability to learn to read words. These kinds of learning require more complicated neural networks containing more nodes and more connections

Question 147

Where does learning happen in the brain?

Answer 147

No single part of the brain controls learning. E.g. the hypothalamus and neural pathways involving dopamine play a key role in regulating our ability to experience reward. Humans report pleasure when specific areas of the hypothalamus are electrically stimulated. The cerebellum plays an important role in acquiring some classically conditioned movements, such as conditioned eye-blink responses, whereas the amygdala is centrally involved in acquiring conditioned fears.
A relationship between activity in the amygdala and the orbitofrontal cortex, helps us make predictions of how rewarding stimuli will be to us

Question 148

How does learning influence brain function?

Answer 148

In new tasks, as you make the transition from inexperienced novice to experienced master, your brain us able to rely less on conscious processing and instead process more information without consciousness. As we gain experience at novel tasks, the brain’s frontal lobes - the seat of executive functions such as decision making and planning - tend to exercise less control and become less active

Question 149

How does learning alter the brain’s physical structure?

Answer 149

During countless hours of practice and performance, a violinist makes continuous, precise movements with the fingers of his or her left hand while the right hand moves the bow. This constant fingering of the strings provides a great deal of sensory stimulation to the somatosensory cortex of the right hemisphere. By using brain imaging, researchers found that the area in this brain region that is devoted to representing the fingers was larger among string-instrument musicians than among non-musicians. Moreover, the earlier in life that the musicians had started to play their instruments, the greater the size of this brain area. In contrast, the left hemisphere somatosensory area representing the right hand fingers of the musicians and non-musicians did not differ

Question 150

What is offline learning or consolidation?

Answer 150

Our ability to improve our skills while we are nit actually practising them.
A number of laboratories are now uncovering evidence that some large improvements in ability at certain learned skills such as perceptual discriminations and sequential finger movements (e.g. learning a new piece on the violin) are observable after we have been asleep. In addition, these improvements have been found to be linked to the amount of time we spend in particular stages of sleep. In particular, increased time spent in sleep stage 2 is implicated in improvements in motor skill. It seems that active processes in our brain consolidate what we have learned while we sleep

Question 151

How do the effects of learning on the brain occur and change throughout the life cycle?

Answer 151

Compared with newborn rats that grow up in standard cages, litter mates that grow up in enriched environments - with toys and greater opportunities to learn - develop heavier brains whose neurons have more dendrites and synapses and greater concentrations of various neurotransmitters. In turn, this increased brain development enables animals to perform better on subsequent learning tasks.
In humans, exposure to stimulating environments and new learning opportunities during late adulthood seems to slow declines in brain functioning, as measured by better performance on intellectual and perceptual tasks. In a sense, every day you are alive your brain adapts and continues its own personal evolution; its neural networks and patterns of activity are affected not only by your genetic endowment but by your learning experiences as well.