Learning

Learning

1. Any relatively durable change in behaviour or knowledge that is due to experience

2. Conditioning

   • Involves learning connections between events that occur in an organism's environment

3. Classical Conditioning

   • Developed by Ivan Pavlov
     • Helped turn psychology in the direction of the scientific approach
   • Type of learning in which a stimulus gets the capacity to evoke a response that was originally evoked by a physically natural stimulus
   • Phobias
     • Irrational fears of specific objects or situations
   • Conditioning
     • Learning connections between events in the environment
   • Unconditioned Stimulus
     • A stimulus that automatically leads to an observable response prior to any training
   • Unconditioned Response
     • The observable response that is produced automatically, prior to training, on presentation of US
   • Conditioned Stimulus
     • Neutral stimulus that is paired with the US during classical conditioning
   • Conditioned Response
     • The acquired response produced by the conditioned stimulus in anticipation of the US
   • Trial
     • A presentation of a stimulus or pair of stimuli
   • Evaluative Conditioning
     • Refers to changes in the liking of a stimulus that results from pairing the stimulus with other positive or negative or negative stimuli
   • Conditioning and Physiological Responses
     • Ader and Cohen showed that classical conditioning can lead to immunosuppression
       • Immunosuppression - A decrease in the production of antibodies
       • Injected animals with a drug that chemically causes immune suppression and also gave them an unusual tasting drink. Later they gave the animals only the drink and when they measured antibody production, it decreased. The drug was paired with the drink which then caused immune suppression without the drug even being administered
   • Basic Processes
     • Aquisition
       • Acquring the new behavior
     • Extinction
       • Presenting a CS repeatedly, after conditioning, without the US, resulting in no response
     • Spontaneous Recovery
       • Recovery of an extinguished CR after a period of non-exposure to the CS - often the CR isnt as strong as it once was
     • Renewal Effect
       • If a response is extinguished in a different environment from where it was acquired, it will reappear once the animal or person is returned to the original environment
     • Stimulus Generalization
       • Responding to a new stimulus in a way similar to the response produced by an established CS in this case, a similar stimulus leads to a similar CR
     • Stimulus Discrimination
       • Responding differently to a new stimulus than one responds to established CS

4. High order Conditioning

   • After a conditioned stimulus reliably elicits a response, this conditioned stimulus can be paired with another stimuli which also elicits the same response. If Pavlov had put on a red light each time he rang the bell, the dogs would begin to salivate to the red light even though the red light was never paired with the meat.

5. Operant Conditioning

   • Form of learning in which responses come to be controlled by their consequences of their own voluntary actions
   • Law of Effect (Thorndlike)
     • If a response in a particular situation is followed by a satisfying consequence it will be strengthened, if followed by an unsatisfying consequence, it will be weakened
   • B.F. Skinner
     • Took the perspective on human and animal behavior that emphasizes explaining behavior in terms of environmental events and that minimized the use of internal explanations, like thoughts, beliefs, and intentions
   • Reinforcement
     • Occurs when an event following a response increases a person or animal's tendency to make that response
   • Operant Chamber
     • Acquisition also refers to the initial stage of learning a new response. Some responses are more complex and require a process called shaping. Shaping occurs when rewards are given for behavior that is closer and closer to the desired end result
   • Extinctinon
     • Response is no longer followed by a reinforcer. And when the reinforcer is removed, the animal or person often increases their behavior. This behavior then decreases slowly.
   • Resistance to Extinctiton
     • Sometimes you want resistance, schedules of reinforcement affect this
   • Primary Reinforcers
     • Events that are inherently reinforcing because they satisy biological needs. For humans food, water, warmth, sex, affection involving bodily contact
   • Secondary or Conditioned Reinforcers
     • Associated with primary reinforcers and so acquire reinforcing qualitites Ex. Money, good grades, attention

6. Schedules of Reinforcement

   • Rules that an experimenter uses to determine when particular responses will be reinforced. This strongly affects speed and strength of training
   • Continuous
     • Every response is followed rapidly by reinforcement
   • Definitions
     • Ratio - number of responses
     • Interval - time on clock
     • Fixed - always the same
     • Variable - changes (around an average amount)
   • 1) Ratio Schedules
     • Fixed-Ratio Schedules
       • Number of responses required for reinforcement stays the same. It tends to produce steady, consistent rates of responding but might stop for a period after reinforcement. Extinction may occur when reinforcement is no longer given.
     • Vairable-Ratio Schedules
       • A certain number of responses required for reinforcement but this number changes
   • Interval Schedules
     • Fixed interval
       • Reinforcement delievered for first response after a fixed allotment of time. This tends to produce low rates of responding and a "Scalloping" period
     • Variable-Interval
       • Allotted time before a response will yield reinforcement changes

7. Positive and Negative Reinforcement

   • Positive
     • Increase in responding is due to giving something good or rewarding
     • Something good given
   • Negative
     • Increased responding is due to removing something bad
     • Something bad is removed
   • Escape Response
     • Learning a response to end or decrease an aversive stimulus
   • Avoidance Response
     • Acquiring a response that prevents some aversive stimulus from even occuring at all. Ex) Turn the fan on before the room gets hot
     • Begins with classical conditioned fear to shock and is maintained with operant conditionind due to removal of the fear.

8. Punishment: Consequences that Weakens Responses

   • Punishment
     • Consequences that decrease the likelihood of responding in similar ways again.
   • Side Effects of Physical Punishment of Children
     • The supreme Court of Canada ruled that a parent can legally spank their child only for children between ages 2 and 12 but never on the head or with objects
     • Physical Punishment is associated with poor quality parent-child relationships, elevated aggression, delinquency and behavioural problems in children. It increases the likelihood of child abuse. In adulthood, people may experience increased aggression criminal behavior, mental health problems, and child abuse. Evidence is correlational so does not indicate causation. Also research often does not distinguish between infrequent, moderate, corporal punishment and harsh punishment more often.

9. Learning From Others

   • Result of observing the experiences of others (Social learning or modelling). It occurs in many species. The natural tendency to imitate behavior of significant others
   • Strongest when the model is viewed positively. The model is rewarded for the modeled behavior

10. Observational Learning

    • Relevant in children. Modelling techniques such as films have been used to reduces fears, promote positive behavior. TV may however, produce modelling of negative behavior
    • Media Violence
      • Excessive Television watching has been linked to obesity, lower academic performance Canadian Pediatric Society recommends children watch no more than 2 hours of television per day TV, movie and video game violence is linked to physical and verbal aggression and aggressive thoughts and emotions in children and adults and can make people less sensitive to the pain of others. Longitudinal studies have shown that exposure media violence in childhood predicts aggressiveness in adolescence and adulthood.
    • Mirror Neurons
      • One line of research that explains how observational learning works biologically, is the role of mirror neurons. Mirror neurons are neurons that are activated by performing an action or by seeing another monkey or person perform the same action. Italian researchers working with monkeys watch as neurons were activated when the monkeys made certain hand movements. Surprisingly, the same neurons were also activated when they observed the experimenter make the same hand movement. This has also been found to occur in humans.

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