W4 Critical Thinking in Comparative Psych Flashcards
What are the two types of anthropomorphism?
Mock Anthropomorphism (Acts ‘as if’ they have human qualities, but we know they don’t actually do)
Genuine Anthropomorphism ( we actually attribute human qualities to different phenomena, based solely on how their behaviour appears to us)
What is the the many-to-one mapping problem?
There are many cognitive mechanisms that are able to explain a single one behaviour.
What’s wrong with Genuine Anthropomorphism as a method?
It is fine to believe that animals behave ‘as if’ they have human mental states (this is a hypothesis we can test with science).
But if we use genuine
anthropomorphism as a method (i.e. if it looks like a human mental state, we conclude it is one), we are really only guessing.
Is there a problem with mock
anthropomorphism?
No. But to test them properly we need a good understanding of the simple cognitive mechanisms animals use to solve problems in their world
What are the Psychological mechanisms to consider when observing complex
animal (and human)
behaviour?
- Habituation
- Classical conditioning
- Operant Conditioning
- Associative rules
- Stimulus generalisation
- Learning biases
- Social learning
- Emotional contagion
What is Habituation?
Habituation: strength of reaction decreases with
repeated exposure to a “non-meaningful” stimulus.
What is Classical (Pavlovian) conditioning?
Classical conditioning forms an association between two stimuli that are
in close temporal and spatial proximity.
Pure association.
What are the distinguishing features of operant
conditioning vs Classical (Pavlovian) conditioning?
Learning by trial and error
• “Animal learns to associate a voluntary action with the
consequences that follow from performing it”
• Operant/Instrumental conditioning forms an association between a behaviour and a consequence.
What are Associative rules?
Most associative learning is a combination of classical and operant conditioning.
• Animal starts life with a small number of involuntary
behaviours.
• Develops new behaviours via operant conditioning
• Learns what aspects of the external environment
signal the best time to do a new behaviour using
classical conditioning.
• Animals therefore can learn many associative rules in response to particular situations.
How did Pfungst test Clever Hans?
He used strategies to narrow down his hypotheses
What is Stimulus generalisation?
Animals learn from one context and apply to another.
• For Clever Hans it would have allowed him to use
his rule ‘hit the ground with hoof until a human
breathes out’ with lots of different humans, even if
they breathed at different rates, or had louder or
softer breathing etc
Why is stimulus generalisation important?
It allows animals to generalise learnt associative rules to highly similar situations.
It suggests they must be using some kind of abstract concept e.g. “objects on a page”.
What are Learning biases?
Some things may be harder for an animal to learn. Some stimuli cannot just be assumed to be neutral.
What is social learning?
“learning that is influenced by observation of, or interaction with, another animal (typically a conspecific) or its products”
what is Emotional contagion?
“a process in which a person or group influences the emotions or behaviour of another person or group through the conscious or unconscious induction of emotion states and behavioural attitudes”
