Lectures 10-11 Learning and conditioning Flashcards
What is learning? (definition)
Change in behavior due to experience
List the different types of learning. Which are simple?
- Habituation
- Sensitization
- Conditioning
–> Classical
–> Operant - Observational
- Latent
- Insight
Simplest: habituation, sensitization
Habituation definition
- reduction in response to stimuli when presented repeatedly / frequently
- ex. your roommate plays video games at night. You can’t sleep the first week. After that, you get used to it, it isn’t as much of a problem, and you can sleep
Sensitization definition? Associated with:.
- Increase in response to stimuli
- A small thing that when repeated results in a huge response
- Ex. clearing throat is annoying, the more you hear it the more it pisses you off
- Associated with PTSD and depression
–> PTSD: explosion had a loud sound. Now, they have an excessive/not appropriate response to a loud sound even if there isn’t danger associated with it
–> Depression: much more sensitive to stress, raises cortisol, creates a bigger reaction
Based on the Aplysia studies, what is the biological basis of habituation?
ex.
1. if you touch the siphon of the aplysia, the gill withdraws/contracts
2. repeated same touch every minute for 10-15 minutes
3. progressively shorter withdrawal/contraction durations
Biology:
- cells release less glutamate
- neurons choose not to interact (prune synapses)
Based on the Aplysia studies, what is the biological basis of sensitization?
- interneurons release serotonin, causes motor neurons to release glutamate
- they release more glutamate = stronger response
Define classical conditioning
Creating an association between stimuli such that one stimulus results in the same reaction as the other
Pavlov?
- developed method for measuring salivation. Won nobel prize in medicine and physiology for research on digestion
- used metronome as a neutral stimulus for food and salivation
What are the 4 stages (basic principles) of classical conditioning?
- aquisition
- generalization
- higher order conditioning
- extinction
Acquisition?
- process of associating the neutral stimulus with the unconditioned stimulus and unconditioned response
- creates the conditioned (learned) stimulus with the conditioned response
Generalization?
- Organism responds not only to the original CS, but also to similar stimuli
- Response gets smaller the farther away from the original CS
- Generalization vs. discrimination: the point where the animal discriminates between a generalized stimulus and other, similar stimuli
Higher order conditioning?
- association of multiple things, further away from the UCS (and UCR)
ex.
1st: sound and food
2nd: shape and sound and food
3rd: light and shape and sound and food
Phases:
1: association between sound and food
2: association between shape and sound (without food)
Test: association between shape and food
- extremely common with commercials
Extinction
- continued presentation of CS without UCS
- conditioned response fades and eventually disappears
- spontaneous recovery: suddenly ‘remember’ and have CR again
- Extinction is NOT forgetting
- rapid reacquisition
In Little Albert’s experiment identify UCS, CS, NS, UCR, and CR?
NS - white rat
UCS - loud noise
UCR - fear (of loud noise)
CS - white rat
CR - fear (of animal)
How was the principle of generalization shown in little Albert experiment?
he became afraid not just of the white rat, but of other animals, like cats, bunnies, dogs, and even the mask
What are the learning sequences?
- forward learning (normal)
a. NS/CS is still present when UCS appears
b. easiest to learn - forward trace pairing
a. CS first, but is not present when UCS appears
b. longer the gap, the harder it is to learn
c. example: quack/nerf video from class - simultaneous pairing
a. CS and UCS appear at the same time
b. still learn, but it takes many many more trials
c. If dog gets sound and food at the same time,
they are salivating to the food, not the sound - backward pairing
a. UCS is presented before CS
b. most difficult to learn
c. hardest to measure (dog is already salivating)
Is it easier to learn an association with forward leaning or backward learning? Explain
your answer
forward learning!
CS is present when UCS appears. They anticipate the UCS when they’re exposed to CS. With backward pairing, the CS is not as important, because they have the response to the UCS first
Extinction of a behavior is different from forgetting a behavior. Give an experimental
example showing that extinction is different from forgetting
- pavlov’s dogs had an association between sound and food (therefore salivation)
- if the sound were repeatedly presented without the food, they would eventually stop reacting to the sound
- later, if the sound is followed with the food again, the dog will rapidly reacquire the association and CR