Ch.

7: Principles of Learning (Taken from Textbook)

Four types of learning: classical conditioning, operant conditioning, social learning, and cognitive approach.

Classical Conditioning: Ivan Pavlov first demonstrated the most primitive learning, classical conditioning, in the early 1900s. Pavlov s original goal was to understand how the digestive system works. He wanted to discover how salivation and gastric juices aid in digestion. After separating the esophagus from the stomach in dogs, he noticed: a) Salivation at the time of eating is critical to proper digestion. b) Even though no food was placed in the dog s mouth, the animal would still salivate at the sight of food. c) The sight of the experimenter who fed the animal would cause the dog to salivate even if that person was not carrying any food.

Classical Conditioning: Ivan Pavlov s method of conditioning (associating), which associations are made between a natural stimulus and a learned, neutral stimulus. Stimulus: Anything that elicits a response. Response: A reaction to a stimulus. Unconditioned stimulus: A stimulus that automatically elicits a response, as meat causes salivation. Unconditioned response: An automatic response to a particular natural stimulus, such as salivation to the sight of meat. Conditioned stimulus: A previously neutral stimulus that has been associated with a natural (or unconditioned) stimulus. Conditioned response: A response to a stimulus that is brought about by learning-----for example, salivating at the word pickle. Little Albert: John Watson s attempt to prove that deep emotions are just the result of association and learning. Loud sound (UCS) Fear (UCR) Rat (NS) Loud Sound (UCS) Fear (UCR) Rat (CS) Fear (CR)

Stimulus generalization: Process in which a response spreads from one specific stimulus to other stimuli that resemble the original. With his experiment, Watson had shown two things: 1) Conditioning of emotions to neutral objects is possible 2) A conditioned emotion can generalize to other objects that have similar characteristics. Extinction:The gradual loss of an association over time. (ex: Pavlov s dogs would stop their salivation in the presence of the experimenter unless he/she continues to feed them) Spontaneous Recovery: The sudden reappearance of an extinguished response. Mary Cover Jones was able to prove that fears, or phobias, can be removed by associated something pleasant with the feared object. She proved this by associating food with rabbits. It didn t take too long for her subject Peter to stop being afraid of rabbits. Operant Conditioning: -involves voluntary behaviour, while classical conditioning involves involuntary behaviour. B.F. Skinner is best known for his work with the operant conditioning theory. Operant Conditioning: Conditioning that results from the individual s actions and the consequences they cause. Reinforcement: Something that follows a response and strengthens the tendency to repeat that response. Primary reinforcement: Something necessary for psychological or physical survival that is used as a reward (ex. food). The possibility of receiving a primary reinforcement when you perform an action is the strongest incentive to learn.

Secondary reinforcement: Anything that comes to represent a primary reinforcement, such as money. Positive reinforcement: Reinforcement that involves strengthening the tendency to repeat a response by following it with the addition of something pleasant. Negative reinforcement: Reinforcement that involves strengthening a response by following it with the removal of something unpleasant. In both + and reinforcement, the consequences of an action are wanted by the organism. In one, something pleasant is added; in the other, something unpleasant is stopped or avoided. Reinforcement always strengthens a response.

Punishment: Weakening a response by following it with unpleasant consequences. Either take away something desirable (ex. allowance) or add something unwanted (ex. community service). Generalization: Behaviour that spreads from one situation to a similar one. Discrimination: Learning to tell the difference between one event or object and another; the reverse of generalization. -Both operant conditioning and classical conditioning involve generalization, extinction, and spontaneous recovery. Shaping: the process of gradually refining a response by reinforcing closer versions of it (Ex. you want a dog to jump through a hula hoop. You will slowly reinforce its behaviour. You might first reward it for only walking up to the hula hoop.) Chaining: reinforcing the connection between the parts of sequence. When we want a complete sequence done in order, we usually have to start by reinforcing each part of that sequence. Then each part or link is connected to the others by reinforcement. Attempting to teach a child the alphabet is chaining.

Continuous reinforcement: Reinforcement given each time a desired behaviour occurs. Continuous reinforcement is not the best method, because the creature gets used to having the reinforcer and will quit responding if it doesn t show up every time. To avoid this problem, different schedules of reinforcement may be used.

Schedules of reinforcement: Different methods of reinforcing. Partial reinforcement schedule: Reinforcement is not given each time a desired act occurs. Four kinds of partial reinforcement schedules: 1) Variable ratio schedule: schedule where reinforcement occurs after a desired act is performed a specific but variable number of times (Ex: One time, you must play the slot machines 25 times to win anything, and another time, you must play the slot machines 75 times. Each time is specific but overall the number of times you have to play the machines is variable.) 2) Fixed ratio schedule: schedule where reinforcement occurs after a desired act is performed a fixed number of times. (The organism will speed up because he/she knows that the more he completes the desired behaviour, the more reinforcements will be received.) This does not work well in factories where products are assembled. If workers were paid according to the number of products they assembled, they would put less effort into putting them together. 3) Variable interval schedule: schedule where reinforcement occurs after a desired act is performed following a variable amount of time. (The organism never knows, in terms of time, when the reinforcement will arrive) This is why animals will continue to work at a steady pace making sure they are performing the right act when the reinforcement does come. A good

example is fishing on the lake. You continue to wait for a fish to hook on to the bait. Hope is kept alive when the bobber disappears under the water level. 4) Fixed interval schedule: schedule where reinforcement occurs after a desired act is performed following a fixed amount of time. For example, pigeons that learn they are going to be rewarded every five minutes will become very casual. They will peck at the button more when the time interval of five minutes is over. Extinguishing Bad Habits (Methods to breaking a habit): 1) Remove, avoid, or delay reinforcement Jim has a bad habit of snacking while doing his homework. The snacks are the reinforcement so he could do his homework where snacks aren t available, make sure snacks are put in an inconvenient place, or tell himself that he must complete 30 minutes of homework before snacking. 2) Do not remove reinforcement, but find a new behavior to get that reinforcement Smoking helps reduce stress. A relief from stress is the reinforcement. Instead of smoking, listen to music to reduce stress. 3) Narrow or avoid the stimuli (cues) that precede the habit Gina buys too much junk food at the grocery store. One of the cues that precede this behavior is hunger. If she eats before shopping, she can avoid this one cue. 4) Break the chain On her way to the exercise room, Lisa begins talking with a few friends and realizes that so much time has gone by already and now there isn t enough time to exercise. She should break the chain next time by going to the exercise straight from her class to avoid the behaviours that keep her from exercising. 5) Monitor the bad habit To help control spending, create a journal where you write how much you spend each day. Classical and operant conditioning fall short of explaining complex learning processes. One theory of learning involves social learning, studied by psychologist Albert Bandura. He believed that between the stimulus and the response is the complex inner person who is able to analyze events and make decisions before a response is given.

Social learning: learning from the behavior of others Imitation is one form of social learning and is often called observational learning.

Observational learning: form of social learning in which the organism observes and imitates the behavior of others. From a parent, a child learns speech patterns, personal habits, and how to react to other people. Social learning refers to all learning in a social situation. Observational learning is one of the processes used for social learning. Bandura was able to demonstrate that children who observe aggressive adult models become aggressive themselves as a result.

The child does not require a specific reinforcement for learning to occur. Social learning can occur by exposure and imitation alone.

Cognitive approach: approach to the study of learning that emphasizes abstract mental processes and previous knowledge. Psychologists following this approach emphasize that we are able to learn very abstract and subtle things that could not be learned simply through conditioning or social learning. For instance, some people have learned through stories of others that it is bad luck to walk under a ladder or to break a mirror. This kind of belief is very abstract and hence could not be learned by any method other than the cognitive one. When psychologists study cognition, they focus on how complex knowledge is obtained, processed, and organized.

Complexities of Conditioning: -The conditioning process can be far more complex than it at first appears. -Rewards have different effects on people; the familiarity with the surrounding the animal is placed in will affect the results -At times, pigeons peck differently if they are trying to get water as compared to their efforts to get food. Classical Conditioning: Learning by association Operant Conditioning: Learning through reinforcement Social Learning: Learning by observing and imitating Cognitive Learning: Learning through mental processing Sometimes learning is not all that obvious. For instance, if an experimenter doesn t put any food in a maze, but just lets some rats wander around in it, they still learn something about the maze. If food is then made available, these rats will learn the correct route through the maze faster than rats who have never seen the maze before. Learning like this that is not obvious at first, but takes place under the surface, is called latent learning.

Latent learning: learning that is not obvious but goes on under the surface. Simply being exposed to something may result in a small amount of learning. However, we generally learn much more when we are motivated or reinforced for doing so. Though processes play a big role in whether we are motivated and what is most reinforcing to us. Motivation is determined by our expectancies.

Expectancies: beliefs about our ability to perform an action and get the desired reward.

Thought processes also influence how desirable a particular reinforcement is.

Reinforcement value: the preference for certain types of reinforcement over other types. E.C. Tolmanclaimed that even rats in a maze were able to form what he called a cognitive map. Cognitive map: a mental image of where one is located in space. Strategies: methods for solving problems

Ch.8 Information Processing and Memory

Attention person s alert focusing on material -a curve that moves gradually upward with practice as learning progresses is described as conventional (or usual) one and applies to most learning. It is simply called the learning curve. Learning Curve a gradual upward slope representing increased retention of material as a result of learning -Many chemicals influence learning. The two main categories include stimulants and depressants. -caffeine is one stimulant; alcohol is one depressant -Stimulants increase the level of brain chemicals that allow for more rapid learning. Strong stimulants, like amphetamines (speed) will overstimulate the brain and cause a loss of learning. - Anxiety about a test can help in learning or overstimulate the body causing a loss of learning. -Depressants will block the firing of brain cells and reduce learning -What we eat or drink can sometimes influence our behavior. State-dependent learning learning that occurs in one chemical state and is best reproduced when the same state occurs again. -Emotional involvement plays a role in increasing learning. -A story is better recalled if it has some connection to emotions; learning is increased in the classroom if there is some moderation of humour. Transfer of training learning process in which learning is carried over from one task to another based on similarities between the tasks. Positive transfer transfer of learning that results from similarities between 2 tasks. Negative transfer interference with learning that results from differences between two otherwise similar tasks.

Information processing methods by which we receive, analyze, store, and retrieve material. Schema an organized and systematic approach to answering questions and solving problems. Elaboration the process of attaching a max # of associations to an item to be learned so that it can be retrieved more easily. If you are using elaboration, the moral is that if you have to read something dull, try associating it with something important in your life For example, you must learn that the cerebellum controls balance and coordination; think of acrobats on each letter of the word cerebellum ; you will remember how they have good balance; this means they also have a well-developed cerebellum

Mnemonic devices unusual associations to aid memory -They are not logical, but they can help you remember info. They can replace unthinking, rote memorization -If you can already make sense of whatever you are trying to remember, don t use mnemonic devices. -For example, ROY G BIV (the colors of the visible spectrum) -For example, you must learn that a part of the brain: the cerebellum, which controls balance. Use narrative chaining and tie the material to be learned with a story. So, information might be stored as He hit me in the cerebellum with a brick, and I was thrown off balance . -Students who are slightly mentally retarded usually have trouble organizing material and making elaborations and meaningful associations. When mnemonics are used extensively in teaching them, they both learn better and remember better. -Mnemonics will not work unless you use them from the beginning with whatever you are trying to remember. Attempting to attach them later won t help you remember. Second, you start using them while you re still young. Elderly people aren t very good at this, even with practice. Principle Learning a method of learning in which an overall view (principle) of the material to be learned is developed so that the material is better organized. -focus on the basic idea behind what is trying to be remembered.