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PSYC*2330 > PSYC*2330 Chapter 5: Instumental Conditioning Foundations > Flashcards

PSYC*2330 Chapter 5: Instumental Conditioning Foundations Flashcards

1
Q

What is instrumental behaviour?

A

Behaviour that occurs because it was previously effective in producing certain consequences/ reinforcers

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2
Q

T or F: In both classical and instrumental conditioning, responding is necessary to produce a desired outcome.

A

False. Only instrumental conditioning requires specific responding for the consequence/outcome to occur.

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3
Q

How did Thorndike propose cats were able to escape from his puzzle boxes?

A

Through trial and error, cats accidentally escaped the box, then remembered how to do so

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4
Q

T or F: Thorndike believed that cats understood the mechanisms involved in escaping his puzzle boxes.

A

False

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5
Q

What does the law of effect state?

A

Behaviours leading to desirable outcomes are repeated and behaviours leading to undesirable outcomes are not repeated

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6
Q

According to the law of effect, associations are made between what two events?

A
  • The preceding stimulus
  • The response
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7
Q

T or F: The law of effect doesn’t consider the outcome of a behaviour

A

True

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8
Q

What type of association is considered a key mechanism of habitual behaviours and compulsions?

A

S-R associations

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9
Q

In what type of instrumental conditioning procedure are participants only able to perform the instrumental responses during specified periods?

A

Discrete-trial procedures

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10
Q

How do discrete-trial procedures begin and end?

A
  • Begin by placing the animal in the apparatus (usually a maze)
  • End by removing the animal from the apparatus after the instrumental response has been performed
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11
Q

What type of maze contains a start box (separated by a removable barrier) at one end and a goal box at the other

A

A runway/ straight-alley maze

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12
Q

What are two ways behaviour in discrete-trial procedures can be quantified?

A
  • Measuring running speed
  • Measuring latency
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13
Q

In discrete-trial procedures, what does running speed measure?

A

How fast the animal gets from the start box to the goal box

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14
Q

With training in discrete-trial procedures, does running speed typically increase or decrease?

A

Increase

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15
Q

In discrete-trial procedures, what does latency measure?

A

The time it takes the animal to leave the start box and begin running down the alley

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16
Q

With training in discrete-trial procedures, does latency typically increase or decrease?

A

Decrease

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17
Q

What is the instrumental response in a straight-alley maze?

A

Leaving the start box and running down the alley

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18
Q

What type of maze is used in discrete-trial procedures to study choice?

A

The T maze

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19
Q

What type of instrumental conditioning procedure permits repeated performance of the instrumental response without intervention by the experimenter?

A

Free-operant procedures

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20
Q

Who invented free-operant procedures?

A

B.F Skinner

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21
Q

In free-operant procedures, what are the two primary measures of interest?

A
  • Number of responses
  • Response rate
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22
Q

How are operant responses defined?

A

By the effect they produce on the environment

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23
Q

T or F: Different behaviours that have the same environmental outcome are considered to be instances of the same operant response.

A

True

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24
Q

What is the relation between operant responses and instrumental responses?

A

The individual actions involved in producing an operant response are instrumental responses

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25
Q

What is the preliminary stage of instrumental conditioning that involves repeatedly pairing a stimulus with a reinforcer to teach the participant to go get the reinforcer when it’s presented?

A

Magazine training

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26
Q

What is a food magazine, and what happens when it is repeatedly used?

A

A food delivery device that elicits a sound with the release of a food pellet and eventually elicits an approach response when just the sound is made

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27
Q

Does response shaping occur before or after magazine training?

A

After

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28
Q

How does response shaping lead to a desired instrumental response?

A

By reinforcing successive approximations to the desired instrumental response

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29
Q

What are the three components of successful response shaping?

A
  • Clearly define the desired final response
  • Clearly assess the starting level of the performance (regardless of how far it is from the desired response)
  • Divide the progression from the starting point to the desired final response
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30
Q

What are the two complementary tactics involved in executing a response shaping training plan?

A
  • Reinforcement of successive approximations
  • Withholding reinforcement for earlier response forms
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31
Q

What is latent learning?

A

A form of learning not overtly expressed immediately, but becomes apparent when motivation is present

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32
Q

Who proposed/ demonstrated the concept of latent learning?

A

Edward Toleman

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33
Q

How did the learning of rats who were rewarded every time they made it to the end of the maze compare to rats who did not receive a reward at the end until day 11 of the procedure?

A

Rats who were only rewarded after day 11 showed no improvement until they were offered a reward, then they performed the same as the regularly rewarded rats

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34
Q

What are the two types of stimuli that can be used in instrumental conditioning procedures?

A
  • Appetitive stimuli
  • Aversive stimuli
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35
Q

What is an appetitive stimulus?

A

A pleasant or satisfying stimulus

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36
Q

What is an aversive stimulus?

A

An unpleasant or annoying stimulus

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37
Q

What does a positive response-outcome contingency imply?

A

The response produces a stimulus (either appetitive or aversive)

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38
Q

What does a negative response-outcome contingency imply?

A

The response eliminates or prevents the occurrence of a stimulus (either appetitive or aversive)

39
Q

What is the result of reinforcement (either positive or negative)?

A

An increase in response rate

40
Q

What is the result of punishment (either positive or negative)?

A

A decrease in response rate

41
Q

What type of instrumental conditioning procedure produces an appetitive stimulus to increase response rate?

A

Positive reinforcement

42
Q

What type of instrumental conditioning procedure produces an aversive stimulus to decrease response rate?

A

Positive punishment

43
Q

What type of instrumental conditioning procedure eliminates or prevents the occurrence of an aversive stimulus to increase response rate?

A

Negative reinforcement

44
Q

What type of instrumental conditioning procedure eliminates or prevents the occurrence of appetitive stimulus to decrease response rate?

A

Negative punishment

45
Q

Omission training and differential reinforcement of other behaviour (DRO) are alternative ways of describing which instrumental conditioning procedure?

A

Negative punishment

46
Q

What are the three elements fundamentally involved in instrumental conditioning and operant behaviour?

A
  • Instrumental response
  • The outcome of the response (reinforcer)
  • The relation/contingency between response and outcome
47
Q

Does reinforcement of a particular response typically lead to an increase or decrease in uniformity of response pattern?

A

Increase

48
Q

How can response variability be increased using instrumental reinforcement procedures?

A

By explicitly reinforcing response variability

49
Q

What is belongingness

A

The idea that an organism’s evolutionary history makes certain responses “fit” or “belong” with certain reinforcers

50
Q

What happened when Thorndike tried to train cats to scratch themselves or yawn to be let out of a puzzle box?

A

The cats learned these responses initially, but their form changed as training proceeded, and they resembled the desired response less and less

51
Q

What is instinctive drift?

A

A gradual change in instrumental behaviour away from the responses required for reinforcement and towards instinctive responses related to the reinforcer

52
Q

What does the behaviour systems theory state?

A

Systems of behaviour have evolved to enable critical tasks like procuring food, defending territory, and avoiding predators

53
Q

T or F: Behaviour systems include behaviours associated with instinctive drift, but not reinforced behaviours.

A

False. Behaviour systems include both the behaviours associated with instinctive drift and reinforced behaviours.

54
Q

What are primary reinforcers?

A

Stimuli needed for survival (ex. food, water, sex)

55
Q

Are stimuli that mimic the effects of primary reinforcers in the brain (i.e. drugs) considered primary or secondary reinforcers?

A

Primary reinforcers

56
Q

What are secondary/conditioned reinforcers?

A

Previously neutral stimuli that have been paired with a primary reinforcer and acquired the capacity to strengthen stimulus-response associations

57
Q

What are social reinforcers?

A

Stimuli whose reinforcing properties derive from the behaviour of other conspecifics

58
Q

Praise, affection, and attention are examples of what type of reinforcer?

A

Social reinforcers

59
Q

T or F: Social reinforcers are usually a blend of primary and secondary reinforcers.

A

True

60
Q

Are longer or shorter reinforcements typically more effective in maintaining instrumental behaviour?

A

Longer

61
Q

T or F: The effectiveness of a reinforcer depends only on its own properties, not how its properties compare to others.

A

False. The effectiveness of a reinforcer depends on both its own properties and how it compares to other reinforcers the individual has received in the past.

62
Q

What term describes a change in the value of a reinforcer produced by prior experience with another reinforcer of higher or lower value?

A

Behavioural contrast

63
Q

What is a positive behavioural contrast?

A

When prior experience with a lower valued reinforcer increases the current reinforcer’s value

64
Q

What is negative behavioural contrast?

A

When prior experience with a higher valued reinforcer decreases the current reinforcer’s value

65
Q

What are the two types of relationships between a response and a reinforcer?

A
  • Temporal relation
  • Response-reinforcer contingency/ causal relation
66
Q

T or F: Temporal and causal factors in the response-reinforcer relationship are independent of one another.

A

True

67
Q

In the response-reinforcer relation, what is the temporal relation?

A

The time interval between an instrumental response and the reinforcer

68
Q

What is temporal contingency?

A

When the reinforcer is delivered immediately after a response

69
Q

In the response-reinforcer relation, what is response-reinforcer contingency?

A

The extent to which an instrumental response is necessary and sufficient to produce a reinforcer

70
Q

With delayed reinforcement, it is difficult to determine which response deserves the credit for causing the reinforcer to be delivered. This is known as what?

A

The credit-assignment problem

71
Q

What are two ways to overcome the credit-assignment problem?

A
  • Providing a secondary/conditioned reinforcer immediately after the instrumental response
  • A marking procedure
72
Q

What occurs during the marking procedure?

A

A procedure in which the instrumental response is immediately followed by a distinctive event

73
Q

What effect does the marking procedure have on an instrumental response?

A

It makes the instrumental response more memorable

74
Q

According to Skinner, what type of behaviour increases in frequency because of accidental/ adventitious reinforcement?

A

Superstitious behaviour

75
Q

What is accidental/adventitious reinforcement?

A

An instance in which the delivery of a reinforcer happens to coincide with a particular response, even though the response wasn’t responsible for the reinforcer presentation

76
Q

T or F: Skinner’s claim that contiguity is more important than contingency is supported by empirical evidence.

A

False

77
Q

What were the two responses observed by Staddon and Simelhag that challenge Skinner’s interpretation of the superstitious pigeon experiment?

A
  • Terminal responses
  • Interim responses
78
Q

What are terminal responses?

A

Responses that occur most often at the end of the interval between successive reinforcements

79
Q

What are interim responses?

A

Responses that occur most often in the middle of the interval between successive reinforcements

80
Q

What type of behaviours may be responsible for the non-contingent reinforcement observations made by Skinner in the superstitious pigeon experiment?

A

Non-operant behaviours

81
Q

What did Staddon and Simelhag conclude when they repeated Skinner’s superstitious pigeon experiment that contradicted Skinner’s original findings?

A

Both contiguity and contingency influence the acquisition of instrumental behaviour

82
Q

What effect refers to the interference of learning new instrumental responses as a result of exposure to inescapable and unavoidable aversive stimulation?

A

The learned-helplessness effect

83
Q

T or F: Leaned-helplessness of a certain task only impacts learning of related tasks.

A

False. Learned-helplessness impacts learning even when tasks are unrelated.

84
Q

Learned-helplessness tasks usually follow what type of design?

A

A triadic design

85
Q

What are the two phases of a triadic design?

A
  • Exposure phase
  • Conditioning phase
86
Q

What are the three conditions typical of a triadic design?

A
  • Escape (Group E): exposed to periodic shocks that can be terminated by performing an escape response
  • Yolked (Group Y): yolked to group E
  • Restricted (Group R): receives no shocks
87
Q

What does it mean for one group to be “yolked” to the other in a triadic design?

A

The rats in the yolked group are partnered with rats in the escape group, and they receive the same duration and distribution of shocks as their E group partner, but have no way of preventing the shocks

88
Q

What does the learned-helplessness hypothesis propose?

A

That exposure to inescapable and unavoidable aversive stimulation disrupts subsequent learning because participants learn that their behaviour has no control over outcomes

89
Q

What is the difference between the learned-helplessness effect and the learned-helplessness hypothesis?

A
  • Effect: Describes a pattern of results
  • Hypothesis: Attempts to explain why the effect occurs
90
Q

According to the leaned-helplessness hypothesis, what are the two reasons for the learning deficit caused by learned-helplessness?

A
  • The expectation of lack of control reduces motivation to perform response
  • The expectation of lack of control makes it more difficult to lean that behaviour is now effective in producing outcomes
91
Q

What are the two alternative theories proposed to explain the learned-helplessness effect?

A
  • The activity deficit hypothesis
  • The attention deficit hypothesis
92
Q

What does the activity deficit hypothesis propose?

A

That animals in Group Y show a learning deficit following exposure to inescapable shock because it encourages them to become inactive or freeze

93
Q

What does the attention deficit hypothesis propose?

A

That animals in Group Y show a learning deficit following exposure to inescapable shocks because the shocks reduce the extent to which one pays attention to their own behaviour

94
Q

Has the activity deficit hypothesis or attention deficit hypothesis been more successful as an alternative to the learned-helplessness hypothesis?

A

The attention deficit hypothesis

PSYC*2330 (13 decks)

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