Lecture 17 - Learning & Attention Flashcards
Lashley ‘jumping stand’
Lashley believed that subjects can only attend to one property/feature at a time.
The jumping stand showed simultaneous discrimination; rats are placed on a pedestal and have to choose to jump onto two different platforms.
Define intra-dimensional shift, positive or negative shift?
The same attribute or dimension is still relevant, but the way it has been used has changed.
You get a positive transfer because you are able to learn about this shift a lot quicker.
Define extra-dimensional shift, positive or negative transfer?
Multiple stimuli are present simultaneously and the subject must select the stimuli that matches the currently relevant rules. The rules may have alternated though.
ED you get a negative transfer because they have to change what information is relevant.
Define easy-to-hard effects
Initial training on easy discrimination results in better performance on the hard discrimination, because subjects learn to attend to the important features.
Define overtraining reversal effects and explain why this happens
Overtraining actually makes it harder to learn.
Overtraining keeps strengthening attention to the relevant dimensions long after the discrimination is acquired. On reversal, the overstrained group has stronger attention to the relevant dimension than the control group. In the overstrained group, the new S-R associations are learned quickly, before the animal stops attending to the relevant dimension.
What is the two-stage theory of learning?
Stage 1 - selective attention
- the organism analyses the stimulus on various dimensions
Stage 2 - S-R learning
- values on the analysers become the basis of S-R learning through consistent reinforcement
Define learned irrelevance
I correlated presentations of CS and US lead to retardation in later conditioning.
Mackintosh (1975) thoughts on selective attention
Informative stimuli gain attention when they correctly predict meaningful outcomes. Conversely, redundant or irrelevant cues lose attention.
His model explains latent inhibition.
Learned predictiveness
Cues that reliably predict an outcome in an initial phase of training (Phase 1) are learned faster in a second phase of training (Phase 2) than cues that were unreliable in Phase 1.
It demonstrates selective attention in learning is based on the past utility of cues.
Pearce and Hall on selective attention
When the consequences of a CS are already well known, there is little need to attend to it - CRs become automatic.
Better to devote limited resources attending to stimuli whose consequences are uncertain.
What is exploitation in relation to learning?
Attending to things you already know.
What is exploration in relation to learning?
For example, negative transfer. This information may help you differentiate your attention in the future.
Positive transfer
Occurs when something we’ve learned previously aids us in learning at a later time.
Negative transfer
Takes place when something we’ve learned interferes with our learning at a later time.
