LM-Operant Conditioning

What is Operant Conditioning?

The process whereby organisms learn to make or to refrain from making certain responses to obtain or avoid certain outcomes

What did Thorndike do?

Tried to systematically explore how animals learn new behaviors

• How cats learned to escape from puzzle boxes

What is the three-part association of Operant conditioning?

IN the presence of a discriminative stimulus (S^D), a particular response (R) may lead to a particular outcome (O)

What do discriminative stimuli do?

Help the learner identify the conditions in which a response will be followed by a particular outcome

How is a response defined?

By the outcome it produces

What are two operant condition training behaviors?

shaping and chaining

What is shaping?

An operant conditioning technique in which successive approximation to the desired response are reinforced

• Like teaching a dog how to roll, you teach one step at a time, until it learns the complete roll.

What is chaining?

An operant conditioning technique in which organisms are gradually trained to execute complicated sequences of discrete responses

• Multiple individal techniques are learned to produce a chain in order like a dog learning how to fetch.

What is a reinforcer?

A consequence of behavior that leads to increased likelihood of that behavior in the future

What is a punisher?

A consequence of behavior that leads to decreased likelihood of that behavior

What is the difference between reinforcement and punishment?

Both are the process of providing outcomes, but one leads to increase probability of a behavior (reinforcer) and one leads to decreased probability of a behavior (punisher)

What are some examples of primary reinforcers?

Food, Water, Sleep, Comfortable Temperatures, and Sex

What is Clark Hull’s drive reduction theory?

Proposed that all learning reflects the innate, biological need to obtain primary reinforces

What is the negative contrast effect?

A normally acceptable reinforcer evokes less responding if a preferred reinforcer is expected

• If you are expecting to get GTA 6, but you get GTA 5 instead. Both are reinforcers, except GTA 5 is less preferred so you would do less work to try and get that game

What are secondary reinforcers?

A reinforcer that initially has no biological value but that has been paired with (or predicts the arrival of) a primary reinforcer

• MONEY - Money cannot satisfy food or thirst because it is just an object, but this is paired with things so it becomes a secondary reinforcer

What is Token Economy?

Secondary Reinforcers

• An environment (such as a schoolroom) in which tokens function the same way as money does in the outside world

What are some examples of punishers?

For animals: Pain, Confinement, and Exposure to Predators

For Humans: Monetary fines, social disapproval, and prison

Is punishment as effective as reinforcement at controlling behavior?

Punishment is less effective

What is differential reinforcement or alternative behaviors (DRA)?

Instead of delivering punishment each time an unwanted behavior is exhibited, one can reward preferred alternative behaviors

• Lets say a student always gets all Cs, the parents have to award the child for getting an A because it is good

What are the effects of delay between a response and an outcome?

The longer the delay, the less responses were available

What is positive reinforcement?

A type of operant conditioning in which the response causes a reinforcer to be “added” to the environment, over time, the response becomes more frequent

What is a positive punishment?

A type of operant conditioning in which the response causes an undesirable element to be “added” to the environment, over time, the response becomes less frequent

What is a negative reinforcement?

A type of operant conditioning in which the response causes an undesirable element to be “subtracted from” the environment, over time, the response becomes more frequent

What is a negative punishment?

A type of operant conditioning in which the response causes a desirable element to be “subtracted from” the environment, over time, the response becomes less frequent

What are some example of The Operant Conditioning Paradigms

What are some questions to ask when determining the operant conditioning paradigms?

1. What is the behavior?

2. Is the outcome added or taken away? (Positive or Negative)?

3. Is the behavior likely to decrease or increase? (Reinforcement or punishment)?

What is the differences between classical and operant conditioning?

1. In classical conditioning, organisms experience an outcome (the US) whether or not they perform the conditioned response (CR)

2. In Operant Conditioning, the outcome depends on whether the organism performs the response

3. Both Operant and classical Conditioning show extinction

What are reinforcement schedules?

The rules determining how and when outcomes are delivered in an experiment

What is a fixed-ratio (FR) schedule?

A reinforcement schedule in which a specific number of responses must occur before a reinforcer is delivered; this, FR 5 means that reinforcement arrives after every fifth response

• Like a rat clicking a button 5 times to get the final product

What is a fixed-interval (FI) schedule?

A reinforcement schedule in which the first response after a fixed amount of time is reinforced, this, FI 1-min means that reinforcement follows the first response made after a 1-minute interval since the last reinforcement

• Changes the time in between a lever is activated and a result is produced.

What is a variable-ration (VR) schedule?

A reinforcement schedule in which a specific number of responses, on average, must occur before a reinforcer is delivered, thus, VR 5 means that, on average, every fifth response is reinforced

• Happens under an unpredictable number of responses, a rat being trained to get food after clicking a lever random times, so it spam clicks

What is a variable-interval (VI) schedule?

A reinforcement schedule in which the first response after a fixed amount of time, on average, is reinforced, this VI 10min means that reinforcement follows the first response made after a 1-minute interval, on average, since the last reinforcement

• Food is available after unpredicted amount of time after clicking lever, so the rat clicks the lever at a steady rate because it does not know what time it will come out

Correlation of FR VR and FI VI schedules

Rate of schedules?

1. VR schedules tend to produce higher rates of responding than FR schedules

2. VI schedules tend to produce higher rates of responding than FI schedules

What are some questions to ask regarding reinforcement schedules?

1. Fixed or Variable? Look for key words “every, average, about”

2. Ratio or Interval? Look for units of time “hour, minutes, days, months vs. # of times”

What is delay discounting?

The progressive reduction of the value of a reward the longer it is delayed

• Example: It is easier to convince a student to put off fun to study if the exam is coming up tomorrow, but it is harder if the exam is in 5 weeks

What was the delay discounting experiement?

Rats were given two levers: one that delivered a small immediate reward and one that delivered a larger reward. If the delay was short, the rats would choose the big prize. If delay was long, rats chose the small prize.

What is self-control?

An organism’s willingness to forgo a small immediate reward in favor of a larger future reward

Are the locations of learning the same?

No.

1. Parts of the brain that link stimuli with response (S^D to R learning) are different from the parts of the brain that learn about the expected outcomes of those responses (R to O)

What are the two key brain substrates to know?

1. Dorsal Striatum (S^D to R)

2. Orbitofrontal Cortex (R to O)

How does dorsal striatum and stimulus-response learning work?

1. Info from the sensory cortex to motor cortex can also travel by an indirect route (Basal Ganglia)

2. One part of that Ganglia is the striatum

3. Plays a critical role in operant conditioning, specifically the ability to learn associations based on feedback about reinforcement and punishment

How do the orbitofrontal cortex and prediction outcomes work>

1. The prefrontal cortex has the orbitofrontal cortex, which lies at the underside of the front of the brain - it predicts outcomes

2. It receives inputs that convey the full range of sensory modalities plus visceral sensations

3. Outputs travel to brain areas, including the striatum, where they can help determine which motor responses are executed

What is a pathological addiction?

A strong habit (or compulsion) that is maintained despite known harmful consequences and has significantly disrupted a person’s life

What is behavioral addiction?

Addictions to behaviors that produce reinforcements or highs, as well as cravings and withdrawal symptoms when the behavior is prevented

(GAMBLING, EXERCISE, INTERNET GAMING)