Wk7 Flashcards
Habituation
Occurs when stimulus is repeated and the response weakens.
Unconditioned stimulus
What originally causes the response. Involuntarily elicits a response.
Unconditioned response
What is the original response. Innate or unlearned response, usually a reflex.
Neutral stimulus
What is now causing the response (the NS will become the CS)
Conditioned stimulus
Starts as the NS and is then paired with the UCS in experiments
Conditioned response
What is the learned response, typically same as UCS.
Phobia
excessive and irrational fear of something
Reinforcement
Pairing of the 2 stimuli (CS and UCS)
Acquisition
Initial stage of learning
Extinction
Procedure produces a reduction and eventual disappearance of CR. Involves repeatedly presenting CS without UCS.
Spontaneous recovery
Reappearance of extinguished response after a period of non-exposure to CS.
Generalisation
After classical conditioning with CS similar stimuli will elicit CR even if never paired.
Discrimination
Opposite of generalisation.
Classical conditioning
Pavlovian. UCS, UCR, CS,CR,NS. Reflex behaviours
Psychoneuroimmunology
Study of interactions between psychological processes and nervous and immune systems.
Associative learning
Classical and operant conditioning is a behaviourist perspective
Laws of association
Conditions under which one thought becomes associated with another
Laws of contiguity
2 events will be connected in the mind if they are experienced close together in time
Law of similarity
Objects that resemble each other are likely to become associated.
Galvanic skin response
Electric measure of amount of sweat on skin associated with arousal or anxiety
Interstimulus interval
Time between presentation of CS and the UCS
Blocking
Failure of stimulus to elicit a CR when combined with another stimulus that already elicits that response
Latent inhibition
Initial exposure to neutral stimulus without UCS slows the process of later learning the CS-UCS association and developing a CR
Prepared learning
Biologically wired readiness to learn some associations more eaily than others
Prepared learning
Biologically wired readiness to learn some associations more easily than others.
Law of prediction
CS-UCS association will form to the extent that the presence of CS predicts the appearance of the UCS
Paradoxical conditioning
CR is opposite of UCR - body’s attempt to conteract the effects of a stimulus that’s about to occur.
Operant Conditioning
B.F Skinner - learning to operate on the environment to produce a consequence. Mouse with lever. Non-reflex behaviours
Reinforcement
Increase behaviour
Punishment
Decrease behaviour
Positive
Something has been added
Negative
Something has been taken away
Law of effect
Thorndike - Animals tendency to reproduce a behaviour depends on the behaviours effect on the environment and the consequences of that.
Operants
Behaviours spontaneously produced rather than elicited by the environment
Escape learning
Behaviour is reinforced by elimination of aversive state of affairs that already exists
Avoidance learning
Occurs as organism learns to prevent unexpected adverse events from happening.
Continuous reinforcement schedule
Consequence is the same each time
Intermittent schedules of reinforcement
Action sometimes leads to reinforcement
Response contingency
Connection exists between behaviour and consequence
Discriminative stimulus
Stimulus signals presence of particular contingencies of reinforcement
Shaping
Used by animal trainers to produce novel behaviours by reinforcing closer and closer approximations to desired response.
Successive approximations
Process of rewarding behaviours that move subject closer to desired behaviour.
Reward
Reinforcer
Ratio
Behaviour completed to get reward
Interval
Time completed to get reward
Fixed
Specific/definitive
Variable
Undetermined/varying
Biofeedback
Psychologists feed back info about biological processes, allow person to gain operant control over autonomic responses, heart rate etc.
Chaining
Involves putting together sequence of existing responses in novel order
Cognitive social theory
Incorporates concepts of conditioning but adds 2 new factors - a focus on cognition and social learning
Cognitive maps
Mental representations or images
Latent learning
Learning that has occurred but not currently manifested in behaviour.
Insight
Sudden understanding of relation between problem and solution
Expectancies
Expectations about consequences of behaviour are what render behaviour more or less likely to occur
Generalised expectancies
expectancies that influence a broad spectrum of behaviour
Locus of control of reinforcement
Generalised expectancies people hold about whether or not their own behaviour can bring about the outcomes they seek
Internal locus of control
Belief that they are masters of their own fate
External locus of control
Belief that lives are determined by forces outside of themselves
Learned helplessness
Consists of expectancies that one cannot escape aversive events and motivation and learning deficits that results from this belief.
Explanatory style
The way people make sense of bad events.
4 components of successful modelling
- Attention
- Retention
- Motor reproduction
- Motivation
