Learning and Memory - Principles and Theorists

Flashcards covering fundamental definitions of learning and memory along with Aristotle's principles of association.

Learning

The lasting change in capabilities or behavior due to experience.

Exclusions from Learning

Disease, drugs, and biological maturation, which are not examples of learning even though they may cause a lasting change in behavior.

Relationship Between Memory and Learning

Memory is dependent on learning, and learning is dependent on memory.

Aristotle

A theorist who took an empiricist approach and said that memories are formed through associations (links).

Associations

Links through which memories are formed, arising from contiguity, frequency, and similarity.

Contiguity

The principle that experiences near each other in time or space are joined together (e.g., cat - dog, apple - orange).

Frequency

The principle that experiences that are often repeated are connected more strongly.

Similarity

The principle that experiences similar to one another are connected.

Plato

A nativist who believed that humans are shaped primarily by their biological nature. Everyone is born with innate differences in skill and talent

Rene Descartes

theorist that believed in dualism , proposing that the mind and body are distinct entities

John Locke

an empiricist who argued that the mind is a blank slate at birth, shaped by experiences and learning.

Charles Darwin

a naturalist who proposed the theory of evolution through natural selection, emphasizing the role of adaptation in behavior and learning.

the 3 criteria of trait for evolution

1. inheritable

2. variable

3. makes organisms more “fit”

William James

the father of American psychology and an associationist who said that experiences link ideas in mind

Ebbinghaus

Father of experimental psychology who studied memory empirically and developed the exponential forgetting curve.

Exponential forgetting curve

pattern showing that the bulk of forgetting is up front, with progressively less forgetting over time

Pavlov

Father of classical conditioning who showed that learning occurs through associations between events.

Watson

Founder of behaviorism in the US who conducted the Little Albert study.

Thorndike

Psychologist who developed instrumental conditioning and the Law of Effect.

instrumental learning

Learning to associate a specific behavior with its subsequent consequences.

law of effect

Behaviors followed by satisfying events become more likely to recur. Behaviors followed by unsatisfying events become less likely to recur.

Clark Hull

developed the 1st mathematical model of learning that explains how much learning would occur on any given trial or situation

Skinner

Radical behaviorist who pioneered operant conditioning and defined the ABCs of behavior.

ABC’s of behavior

Antecedent

Behavior

Consequence

Edward Tolman

the father of cognitive psychology but also a behaviorist who created cognitive maps, co-founded latent learning, and stressed purposeful behavior.

latent learning and the 4 steps

learn the knowledge and it lays dormant until its needed later

1. attention

2. retention

3. reproduction

4. motivation

Bandura

Co-founder of latent learning and social learning theory; conducted the Bobo doll experiment.

William Estes

applied mathematical models to cognitive processes and created stimulus sampling theory

stimulus sampling theory

over many learning trials most elements of a stimulus would be associate with the response

George Miller

quantified how many pieces of information a person can deal with at one time in STM - magical number 7

Gordon Bower

Developed a 'one-step' model of learning focused on analyzing individual performance.

David Rumelhart

Cognitive scientist who developed the connectionist model of memory.

Connectionist model of memory

Model proposing that ideas are represented by patterns of activation across nodes called distributed representation.