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Chapter 7– Learning Most people equate learning with studying. But psychologists define learning more broadly. Learning – relatively permanent change in behavior due to experience. This definition includes classroom learning and studying, but it covers many other forms of learning as well: Behaviorism – view that psychology should be an objective science studies behavior without reference to mental processes Most research psychologists today agree with (1) but not with (2) Learning About Stimuli We don’t meaningfully attend to everything going on around us – we just can’t. We’re constantly being bombarded by stimuli – the ambient temperature, the feeling of our clothes on our bodies, etc. We have to ignore a lot of the stimuli around us so we can function. We seem to notice certain kinds of stimuli because we are genetically predisposed to do so. For example, we notice loud noises – they are likely to indicate something important or dangerous to us. We also notice novel stimuli – something we are not familiar with and therefore, it can be dangerous. Habituation – a simple form of learning in which we ignore unchanging stimuli. Dishabituation – we re-orient to the stimulus when it changes in some way. Both habituation and dishabituation are forms of non-association learning – learning that only involves one stimulus. However, most of our learning is more complicated. Conditioning : process of learning associations. Associative learning – learning that certain events occur together. Classical conditioning, AKA Pavlovian conditioning – type of learning in which a response naturally provoked by one stimulus comes to be provoked by a different, formerly neutral stimulus. A neutral stimulus is one that does not usually produce the behavior being studied. Classical conditioning was discovered almost by accident by Ivan Pavlov, a Russian physiologist who was studying digestive processes. Because animals salivate when food
is placed in their mouths, Pavlov inserted tubes into the salivary glands of dogs to measure how much saliva they produced when they were given food. He noticed, however, that the dogs salivated before the food was in their mouths: the mere sight of food made them drool. In fact, they even drooled at the sound of the experimenter’s footsteps. So Pavlov wondered – what was making the dogs salivate even before they got the food? To answer these questions, Pavlov set out to teach the dogs to salivate when food was not present. He came up with an experiment where he sounded a bell just before the food was brought into the room. After hearing bell many times just before getting fed, Pavlov’s dogs began to salivate as soon as bell rang. Elements of Classical Conditioning Unconditioned stimulus - UCS – a stimulus that invariably causes an organism to respond in a specific way. It produces a reflective behavior. Unconditioned response – UCR – a response that takes place in an organism whenever an unconditioned stimulus occurs. Conditioned stimulus – CS – an originally neutral stimulus that is paired with an unconditioned stimulus and eventually produces the desired response in an organism when presented alone. Conditioned response – CR – after conditioning, the response an organism produces when only a conditioned stimulus is presented. UCS: Food UCR: Drool CS: Bell CR: Drool Conditioned Responses Over Time: Extinction and Spontaneous Recovery If Pavlov had stopped giving the dogs food after ringing the bell, eventually, they would stop drooling to the sound of the bell. This is known as extinction – gradual disappearance of a CR when CS no longer predicts appearance of UCS. If Pavlov had then gone back to dogs whose conditioned response of drooling had been extinguished, and again started giving them food after the bell rang, he would have seen reconditioning – quick learning of a CR following extinction
6. Contrapreparedness – other types of stimuli do not serve as conditioned stimuli well. Preparedness underlies conditioned taste aversion – conditioned avoidance of certain foods even if there is only one pairing of conditioned and unconditioned stimuli. CC often requires many presentations of CS and UCS with a short time interval. Why do taste-illness combinations produce such rapid and long-lasing learning? Evolution : rapid learning increases an animal’s chances of survival. Since we are carnivore, it is necessary for us to recognize the food that makes us throw up. This way we can prevent going through the same conditions. -Real Problem for cancer Patients: kimo therapy makes you throw up. Doctors tells you to eat something really blend. Applications of Classical Conditioning Phobias – irrational fears of particular things, activities, or situations. When you are scared of a teddy bear is a phobia. Its not when you’re scared of a real bear. To see how phobias might develop through classical conditioning, let’s look at a classic experiment conducted by John Watson and Rosalie Rayner. In this famous study, an 11-month-old boy, named Little Albert, was taught to fear a harmless lab rat. The experimenters started by showing Albert a white rat. At first the child showed no apparent fear of the rat. He crawled toward it and tried to play with the rat. Soon he was afraid of the rat and would began crying. Operant Conditioning – a type of learning in which a behavior is strengthened if followed by a reinforce or diminished if followed by a punisher Operant behavior – behavior designed to operate on the environment in a way that will gain something desired or avoid something unpleasant. Elements of Operant Conditioning Operant behavior - operant conditioning occurs when we choose a particular response – the operant behavior – from a wide variety of possible behaviors and then focus on observing and changing that response. An operant behavior is a behavior that is modifiable by its consequences. The second essential element in operant conditioning is the consequence that follows the behavior.
Reinforcers – increases likelihood that behavior will be repeated. Punishers – decrease likelihood that behavior will be repeated. To explain these findings, Thorndike coined the law of effect – theory that behavior consistently rewarded will be “stamped in” as learned behavior, and behavior that brings about discomfort will be “stamped out”. Contemporary psychologists often call this the principle of reinforcement. Shaping – reinforcing responses that come successively closer to the desired response. Example: training a rat to hit a bar. Types of Reinforcement Positive reinforcers – any event whose presence increases the likelihood that ongoing behavior will recur. Negative reinforcers – any event whose reduction or termination increases the likelihood that ongoing behavior will recur. Animals will learn to press bars and open doors not only to obtain food and water – positive reinforcement – but also to escape electric shocks or loud noises – negative reinforcement. Both positive and negative reinforcement result in the learning of new behaviors or the strengthening of existing behaviors. Escape and Avoidance Conditioning – as types of negative reinforcement. Escape conditioning – organism learns to make a particular response in order to end an aversive stimulus. Example: taking an aspirin to get rid of a headache. A negative reinforces Avoidance conditioning – organism responds to a signal in a way that prevents exposure to an aversive stimulus. Example: heading off a migraine. Reinforcement Schedules - r efers to how and when reinforcement is applied. Continuous Schedule – giving reinforcement every time the behavior occurs (getting a raise after every successful project).
Cognitive Learning– learning that depends on mental processes that are not directly observable. Can be inferred by behavior
1. Latent Learning– learning that is not immediately reflected in a behavior change. Example: Stop, drop, and roll! 2. Insight – learning that occurs rapidly as a result of understanding all the elements of a problem. Learning by Observing Social learning theory – a view of learning that emphasizes the ability to learn by observing a model or receiving instructions, without firsthand experience by the learner. Observational learning – learning by observing other people’s behavior. Bobo Doll Study One of the big names in social learning theory is Albert Bandura, who conducted a very famous study on social learning. He randomly divided a group of 66 nursery-school children (33 boys and 33 girls) into 3 groups of 22 children each. Each child individually watched a film in which an adult model walked up to an adult-sized plastic doll and ordered it to move out of the way. When the doll did not move, the model became aggressive, pushing the doll on its side, punching it in the nose, hitting it with a rubber mallet, kicking it around the room, and throwing rubber balls at it. The film ended differently for children in each of the three groups. Model-reward condition - saw model get candies, soft drinks, and praise from a second adult. Vicarious reinforcement. Model-punish condition – Saw second adult shaking their finder at model, scolding, and spanking model. Vicarious punishment. No-consequences condition – saw a version of film that ended with scene of aggression. Immediately after seeing the film, the children were individually escorted into another room where they found a doll, rubber balls, a mallet, and many other toys. As a child played alone for 10 minutes, observers recorded their behavior from behind a one-way mirror. After 10 minutes, an experimenter entered the room and offered the child treats in return form imitating or repeating things the model had done or said to the doll.
Children in model reward condition especially likely to spontaneously perform model’s behavior. Children in all three group had learned to imitate model’s behavior equally well. The children learned aggressive behavior without being reinforced for it.
