Psych Midterm 2

Learning

An enduring change in behavior resulting from prior experience

Associative Learning

A form of learning that involves making connections between stimuli and behavioral responses.

Nonassociative Learning

A form of learning that involves a change in the magnitude of an elicited response with repetition of the eliciting stimulus.

Two types of nonassociative learning are

Habituation and Sensitization

Habituation

An organism becomes less responsive to a repeated stimulus.

Sensitization

An organism becomes more sensitive, or more responsive to a stimulus.

When habituation is at play, the initial responsiveness to the sensory input can be immediately recovered if the brain detects something...

Novel

Dishabituation

The recovery of a response that has undergone habituation as a result of the presentation of novel stimulus.

Dual Process Theory of Nonassociative Learning suggests…

both habituation and sensitization are at work. Which one takes place depends on your current state of arousal. (More aroused = sensitization.)

Classical Conditioning

Passive form of learning by which an association is made between a reflex-eliciting stimulus and another stimuli.

Unconditioned Stimulus (US)

A stimulus that produces a reflexive response without prior learning.

Unconditioned Response (UR)

The response that is automatically generated by the unconditioned stimulus.

Conditioned Stimulus (CS)

Stimulus that has no prior positive or negative association but comes to elicit a response after being associated with the unconditioned stimulus.

Conditioned Response (CR)

A response that occurs in the presence of the conditioned stimulus after an association between the conditioned and unconditioned stimulus is learned.

Acquisition

The initial learning of an association between the unconditioned and neutral stimulus during classical conditioning.

Generalization

The tendency to respond to stimuli that are similar to the conditioned stimulus, so that learning is not tied too narrowly to a specific stimulus.

Contiguity

Two stimuli becoming associated because they occur together closely in time or space.

Contingency

A predictive cause and effect relationship where the occurrence of one event signals another.

Overgeneralization

Overgeneralizing all sorts of stimulus overly to the CS.

Discrimination

Learning to respond to a particular stimulus but not to similar stimuli, preventing overgeneralizations,

Extinction

Active learning process where there is a weakening between the conditioned response to the conditioned stimulus in the absence of the unconditioned stimulus.

Spontaneous Recovery

The reappearance of an extinct behavior after a delay.

Residual Plasticity Hypothesis

Neural networks of learning persist even after extinction

If a neutral stimulus and an unconditioned stimulus are presented exactly the same time, there will be…

little to no learning.

Blocking

A prior association with a conditioned stimulus prevents learning of an association with another stimulus because the second one provides no predictive value.

Counterconditioning

Overriding a conditioned response with another.

Preparedness

Species specific biological predisposition to learn some associations more quickly than others.

Vicarious Classical Conditioning

Learning a conditioned response by observing another organisms experience.

Conditioned Taste Aversion

Classically conditioned response where individuals are more likely to associate nausea with food than with environmental stimuli

Operant Behavior

Our behavior acts as a tool to change the environment, and as a result, voluntary behaviors are modified.

Law of Effect

Behavior is a function of its consequences. Actions followed by positive outcomes are strengthened while actions followed by negative outcomes are weakened.

Reinforcement

A consequence that increases the likelihood that a behavior will be repeated

Punishment

A consequence that decreases the likelihood that a behavior will be repeated

Primary Reinforcers

A consequence that is innately pleasurable or satisfies a biological need.

Secondary Reinforcer

A learned pleasure that acquires value through experience because of its association to primary reinforcers.

Positive Reinforcement

Presentation of a positive stimulus, leading to an increase in the frequency of a behavior.

Negative Reinforcement

The removal of a negative stimulus, leading to an increase in the frequency of behavior

Positive Punishment

The presentation of a negative stimulus, leading to a decrease in the frequency of a behavior.

Negative Punishment

The removal of a positive stimulus, leading to a decrease in the frequency of a behavior.

Premack Principle

Idea that activities individuals indulge in can be used to reinforce activities they are less inclined to do

Delay Discounting

value of a reward drops as the time you have to wait to receive it increases

Shaping

Process by which random behaviors are gradually changed into a desired target behavior.

Instinctive Drift

An animal’s reversion to evolutionary derived instinctive behaviors instead of demonstrating newly learned responses.

Continuous Reinforcement Schedule

A reinforcement schedule where a behavior is rewarded every time it is preformed.

Partial Reinforcement Schedules

A reinforcement schedule where a behavior is rewarded only sometimes it is preformed.

Fixed-Ratio Schedule

A reinforcement schedule in which a specific number of behaviors are required before a reward is given.

Variable-Ratio Schedule

Reinforcement schedule where an average number of behaviors are required before a reward is given.

Fixed-Interval Schedule

Reinforcement Schedule based on a fixed amount of time before a reward is given.

Variable-Interval Schedule

Reinforcement schedule based on an amount of time between rewards that varies around a consistent average.

Contingent Reinforcement

A specific response is reinforced because it yields some desired change to the environment.

Noncontingent Reinforcement

Items are delivered on a set time schedule rather than in response to a specific behavior.

Superstitious Conditioning

Form of operant conditioning in which a behavior is learned because it was coincidentally reinforced, but has no actual relationship with reinforcement.

Latent Learning

Learning that occurs without either incentive or any clear motivation to learn.

Insight Learning

A form of learning that occurs without trial and error, thus without clear reinforcement.

Observational Learning

A form of learning in which a person observes and imitates a behavior from a model.

Imitation

The purposeful copying of a goal directed behavior.

Social Learning Theory

A theory of how people’s cognitions, behaviors, and dispositions, are shaped by observing and imitating the actions of others.

Four main processes to Social Learning Theory are…

Attention, Retention, Motor Reproduction, and Reinforcement.

Vicarious Reinforcement

When an observer becomes more likely to repeat a behavior after watching someone else get rewarded for it.

Vicarious Punishment

An observer decreases or stops a behavior after seeing someone get punished for it.

Mirror Neurons

Neurons that are active when performing an action when observing the same action.

Cultural Transmission

The transfer of information from one generation to another that is maintained not by genetics, but by teaching and learning.

Vertical Transmission

The transmission of skills from parent to offspring.

Horizontal Transmission

The transmission of skills between peers.

Diffusion Chain

A process where individuals learn a behavior by observing a model and then serve as models where other individuals can learn.