Learning Theories Related to Healthcare Practice

• a relatively permanent change in mental processing, emotional functioning, skill, and/ or behavior as a result of exposure to different experiences

• occurs when the individual interacts with his/her environment and incorporates or applies new information or experiences to what he/she already knows

Learning

a coherent framework of integrated constructs and principles that describe, explain, or predict how people learn.

Learning Theories

• Focus: what directly is observable

• Learning – product of the stimulus (S) response (R)

• observe responses and then manipulate the environment to bring about the intended change

Behaviorist

• stress the importance of what goes xon inside the learner

• key to learning and changing – individual’s cognition

• highly active process involving perceiving, interpreting, reorganizing/understanding the information

Cognitive

• Considers personal characteristics of the learner, behavioral pattern and environment

• Learners are “human agency” that is viewed as “central”

• Central concept: ROLE MODELING

Social

• Emphasizes the importance of stimulus conditions and the association formed in the learning process.

Respondent Conditioning

Used by psychologist to reduce fear and anxiety in their clients

Systematic Desensitation

Fear of a particular stimulus or situation is learned, therefore, can be unlearned or extinguished

Assumption

• tendency of initial learning experiences to be easily applied to other similar stimuli (generalization learning)

• with more and varied experiences, the individual learn to differentiate among similar stimuli (discrimination learning)

Stimulus Generation

• Is being used in relapse prevention programs

• Principle: Although a response may appear to be extinguished, it may recover and reappear at anytime if, stimulus conditions are similar to those in the initial learning experience

Spontaneous Recovery

• focus: behavior of the organism and the reinforcement that occurs after the response

• A reinforcer is a stimulus or event applied after a response that strengthens the probability that the response will be performed again.

• When specific responses are reinforced on the proper schedule, behaviors can be either increased or decreased

Operant Conditioning

• Should be administered immediately

• Must be consistent and highly reasonable

• Should not be prolonged

• Not do harm or serve as release of anger

• There should be time-out following punishment to eliminate the opportunity for positive reinforcement

• GOAL of PUNISHMENT → “to decrease a specific behavior and to instill self-discipline”

Punishment

• Gestalt = configuration or patterned organization

• Emphasizes the importance of perception in learning.

• “the whole is greater than the sum of its parts”

Gestalt Perspective

• A cognitive perspective that emphasizes:

o thought reasoning

o ways information is encountered & stored

o thinking process

o memory functioning

Information Processing

• FOCUS: qualitative changes in perceiving, thinking and reasoning as individual grow and mature

• PRINCIPAL ASSUMPTION: learning is a developmental, sequential & active process that transpires as the child interacts with the environment”

Cognitive Development

• emphasizes importance of environmental or situational determinants of behavior and their continuing interaction

Social Learning Theory