LEARNING BEHAVIORISM DEFN of Learning a Learning PERMANENT

LEARNING: BEHAVIORISM DEFN of Learning: a Learning PERMANENT CHANGE in behavior due to EXPERIENCE or practice (that it’s permanent, that there is a change, and it’s due to experience are key)

What is Behaviorism? Major perspective - studies scientifically observable behaviors, not unconscious drives. Names: Pavlov, Watson, Skinner, Bandura Includes classical conditioning, operant conditioning, and observational learning Nurture not nature

Behaviorism Basic Premise: Behavior is motivated EXTERNALLY from OUTSIDE – not internally (opposes psychodynamic and humanistic schools of thought) A+ A AB+ F

Classical Conditioning It all started with: Ivan Pavlov

Ivan Pavlov and his Drooling Dogs Russian scientist, studying saliva and digestion – father of CLASSICAL CONDITIONING

Basic Defns: 1) STIMULI: a change in environment that affects a sense organ or gland 2) RESPONSE: a change in a muscle or gland

What is classical conditioning? • When your brain and nervous system make an association between 2 stimuli (things). • Example: food and a bell (Ivan Pavlov)

Unconditioned Stimulus (UCS): (the meat) a stimulus that naturally and automatically triggers a response. Unconditioned Response (UCR): (drooling to meat) the unlearned, naturally occurring response to the UCS.

Conditioned Stimulus (CS): (the bell) an originally irrelevant stimulus that, after association with the UCS, comes to trigger a response. Conditioned Response (CR): (drooling to the bell) the learned response to a previously neutral stimulus.

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• 1. Sara is watching a storm. A bolt of lightening is followed immediately by a huge crash of thunder and makes her jump. This happens several more times. The storm starts to move away and there is a gap between the lightening bolt and the sound of thunder, yet Sara jumps at the lightening bolt. • What is the: • UCS • UCR • CS • CR

• 2. Steve's mouth waters whenever he eats anything with lemon in it. One day, while seeing an advertisement showing lemons, his mouth begins to water. • What is the: • UCS • UCR • CS • CR

Pavlov spent the rest of his life outlining his ideas. He came up with 5 critical terms that together make up classical conditioning. • • • Acquisition Extinction Spontaneous Recovery Generalization Discrimination

Acquisition (pairing food with bell) • The initial stage of learning. • The phase where the neutral stimulus is associated with the UCS so that the neutral stimulus comes to elicit the CR (thus becoming the CS). Does timing matter? • The CS should come before the UCS • They should be very close together in timing.

Extinction • The diminishing of a conditioned response. • Will eventually happen when the UCS does not follow the CS. • Dog stops drooling to bell Is extinction permanent?

Spontaneous Recovery • The reappearance. After a rest period, of an extinguished conditioned response. • Dog drools to bell again

Generalization • We fear things similar to the original stimulus

Discrimination • The learned ability to distinguish between a CS and other stimuli that does not signal UCS. Dog drools to a bell, but not a gong

Garfield

John B. Watson “Give me a dozen healthy infants, wellformed, and my own special world to bring them up in, and I’ll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select – doctor, lawyer, merchant-chief, and yes, beggar man or thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors. ”

What is the Little Albert experiment? • John Watson classically conditioned a baby to fear a white rat. Then the baby feared all furry things.

Stimulus Generalization The Baby was given the rat while Watson sounded a loud, scary clank. Now the baby is afraid of all furry things.

Cognitive Processes Early behaviorists believed that learned behaviors of various animals could be reduced to mindless mechanisms. However, later behaviorists suggested that animals learn the predictability of a stimulus, meaning they learn expectancy or awareness

Biological Predispositions § Pavlov and Watson believed that laws of learning were similar for all animals. Therefore, a pigeon and a person do not differ in their learning. § However, behaviorists later suggested that learning is constrained by an animal’s biology.

Conditioned Taste Aversions Can you think of a food that you once had a bad experience with that still produces a feeling of nausea when you encounter it? – Can you think of a benefit to food aversions?

John Garcia showed that the time duration between the CS and the US may be long (hours), but yet result in conditioning. Rats avoid drinking or eating from containers that made them sick. – They associated flavored water with illness.

How can we apply classical conditioning?

Applications of Taste Aversion • treating alcoholism, using the drug Antabuse – causes nausea and violent vomiting when combined with alcohol – attempts to create a taste aversion to alcohol • Problem: alcoholics tend to stop taking Antabuse so they can drink again – but when used properly, Antabuse does reduce total amount of alcohol consumed

Applications of Taste Aversion • humane methods of controlling predators, agricultural pests? – coyotes & wolves ate sheep carcasses laced with nauseainducing poison; developed aversion to sheep meat • wolves penned with sheep later seemed to fear it!

Pavlov’s Legacy Pavlov’s greatest contribution to psychology is isolating elementary behaviors from more complex ones through objective scientific procedures.

Applications of Classical Conditioning Watson used classical conditioning procedures to develop advertising campaigns for a number of organizations, including Maxwell House, making the “coffee break” an American custom.

What is operant conditioning? • Behaviors are a result of reinforcements and punishments. • B. F. Skinner is the famous guy.

Edward Thorndike • Law of Effect: rewarded behavior is likely to recur. • Cat in box

Thorndike’s Puzzle Box • Edward Thorndike (18741949): created a puzzle box: cage with latched door that could only be opened by pressing lever inside – cats became quicker and quicker to press lever once they figured it out – Law of Effect: rewarded behaviors are more likely to be repeated

B. F. Skinner

B. F. Skinner • Most influential behaviorist – Envisioned a utopian society based upon his theories – Skinner Box – Ping-pong playing and figure 8 walking pigeons • Shaping – training with rewards

Skinner Box

How are these similar?

What is Shaping? • Gradually reinforcing a behavior until perfect. (ex: feed pigeon for turning 30 deg, then 60 deg, eventually full circle)

Reinforcement – increasing desired behavior – Positive Reinforcement – giving something to increase a behavior (example? ) – Negative Reinforcement – taking away something bad to increase a behavior (example? )

Punishment – reducing behavior • - positive punishment giving something bad to reduce a behavior (example? ) spanking = aversive stimulus • - negative punishment – (omission training) taking away something good to reduce a behavior (example? )

The following are examples of what? ? ? Answer choices are: positive punishment negative punishment positive reinforcement negative reinforcement

Spanking a child for using markers to draw on your bedroom wall. Positive Punishment

Giving candy for correct answers. Positive Reinforcement

Nagging and nagging until you do the dishes. Negative Reinforcement

Child whines and cries until he gets his candy at the store. The child is _____ the parent for getting candy. The parent is ______ the child for whining.

Taking away cell phone privileges to reduce low grades. Negative punishment

Stop jamming toothpicks up one’s fingernails in exchange for information

Draw a cartoon representing • Positive, negative punishment • Positive, negative reinforcement • 4 cartoons

Can all animals be taught anything?

What is Instinctive drift? • Animals will drift (or revert) back to instinctual behaviors while performing tasks. • Example: Pigs will deposit coins in a piggy bank but will push the coins through the mud and flip it around on its way.

Reinforcement Schedules

Continuous Reinforcement • Reinforcing the desired response every time it occurs. Quick Acquisition Quick Extinction

Partial Reinforcement • Reinforcing response part of the time. • The acquisition process is slower. • Greater resistance to extinction.

Fixed-ratio Schedules • A schedule that reinforces a response only after a specified number of responses. Example: I give cookie monster a cookie every FIVE times he sings “C is for cookie”.

Variable-ratio Schedule • A schedule of reinforcement that reinforces a response after an unpredictable number of responses.

Fixed-interval Schedule • A schedule of reinforcement that reinforces a response only after a specified (fixed) time has elapsed. Example: People checking the oven to see if the cookies are done.

Variable-interval Schedule • A schedule of reinforcement that reinforces a response at unpredictable time intervals. Pop Quizzes

Summary • Partial • Continuous reinforcement – reinforce every time (best for animals) FR FI VR VI

Schedules of reinforcement • Fixed – predictable • Variable – not predictable (varies) • Ratio – every 3 responses, every 10 responses • Interval – time every month, 4 minutes

Fixed-ratio schedule FR Variable-ratio schedule VR Fixed-interval FI Variable-interval VI 1. ________ Paid 10 dollars for every 20 puzzles solved • FR 2. ________ Studying for a class that has surprise quizzes • VI 3. ________ Slot machines are based on this schedule • VR 4. ________ Doing 20 pushups a day to stay fit • FR

Fixed-ratio schedule FR Variable-ratio schedule VR Fixed-interval FI Variable-interval VI 5. ________ Playing Bingo 6. ________ Getting a paycheck at the end of 2 weeks 7. ________ A strike in bowling 8. ________ Calling your mechanic to see if your car is fixed

9. ________ Frequent flyer program where you get points every 100 m. 10. _______ Waiting for a sunny day to go to the beach 11. _______ Wife is watching boxing match with husband-she receives a kiss at the end of every 3 -minute round

What is Observational (Social) Learning Theory? • Albert Bandura: Bobo doll. We learn by observing the behavior of others and from imagining the consequences of our own behavior.

Observational (Social) Learning Theory Cont. • Modeling: we imitate people who we – Resemble – Identify with – View as successful • Vicarious Reinforcement and Punishment

Bobo doll experiment • Albert Bandura allowed children to watch an adult play with a bobo doll. • The experimental group watched a video of an adult playing violently with the doll • The control group watched a boring video. • The experimental group children imitated the violent behavior.

• Insight Learning: This is an extension of the term, insight which was identified by Wolfgang Kohler while studying the behavior of chimpanzees. He said that insight learning is a type of learning or problem solving that happens all-of-asudden through understanding the relationships of various parts of a problem rather than through trial and error. Sultan, one of Kohler's chimpanzes, learned to use a stick to pull bananas from outside of his cage by putting pieces of stick together. Given two sticks that could be fitted together to make a single pole that was long enough to reach the bananas, aligned the sticks and in a flash of sudden inspiration, fitted the two sticks together and pulled in the bananas. He didn't do this by trial and error, but had a sort of sudden inspiration or insight.

Classical Conditioning (to tune of You Are My Sunshine) You are my Pavlov, The dogs of Pavlov You paired the food with the lights and bells Response was very involuntary You taught classic conditioning well

OPERANT CONDITIONING His name is Skinner, oh BF Skinner You put the lab rats inside your box With reinforcements, and even punishments Consequences shape the response

Learning Quiz

1. The major perspective that studies how our behaviors are shaped by our environment is a. psychodynamic b. behaviorism c. humanistic d. biomedical

2. Classical conditioning was studied by a. Pavlov b. Bandura c. Freud d. Skinner

3. "Little Albert, " a very young boy, was conditioned to be afraid of a rat. He also became fearful of white furry rabbits and bearded men. This is an example of a. spontaneous recovery b. higher order conditioning c. extinction d. stimulus generalization

4. A coach who benches a player for poor performance is using a. aversive conditioning b. modeling c. negative reinforcement d. punishment

5. Advertisers try to use higher order (classical) conditioning by a. pairing images that evoke good feelings with pictures of their products b. sounding loud tones at key points in the ad c. reducing fear or anxiety as they repeatedly show the same commercial d. associating the UCS with a cognitive response

6. _____ occurs when making a response removes an unpleasant event. a. positive reinforcement b. extinction c. negative reinforcement d. punishment

7. Your young niece has a temper tantrum in the store when you two are shopping. If you buy her a toy you are a. being practical b. being kind c. encouraging more tantrums d. discouraging more destructive behaviors

8. He was famous for the Little Albert experiment a. Albert Bandura c. Ivan Pavlov b. Sigmund Freud d. John Watson

9. The Little Albert experiment illustrated a. How fears can be learned b. generalization c. unethical experimentation d. all of the above

10. Which of the following is an example of shaping? a. A dog learns to salivate at the sight of a box of dog biscuits b. A new driver learns to stop at an intersection when the light changes to red c. A parrot is rewarded first for making any sound, then for making a sound similar to “Laura, ” and then for “speaking” its owner's name d. A psychology student reinforces a laboratory rat only occasionally, to make its behavior more resistant to extinction

11. People who get sick after eating at a restaurant STILL won’t eat at that restaurant even when they know it wasn’t the restaurant’s fault. This is called a. instinctive drift b. Garcia effect c. secondary conditioning d. Cheech and Chong syndrome

12. Parents nag and nag you until your grades go up. They stop nagging when your grades go up. This is a. positive reinforcement b. negative reinforcement c. positive punishment d. negative punishment

13. Every time you call your boyfriend he’s depressed angry and disappoints you in every way. As a result, you don’t call him anymore. The boyfriend is unknowingly _____ you for calling him. a. positively reinforcing b. negatively reinforcing c. positively punishing d. negatively punishing

14. Albert Bandura’s Bobo Doll experiment illustrated a. negative reinforcement b. social learning theory c. classical conditioning d. operant conditioning

15. Many psychologists cite Bandura’s research to illustrate how a. teens conform to fashion fads b. introverted personalities succeed in high school c. exposure to violent TV and games leads to violent behavior d. abused women justify staying with their husbands.