AP Psych Study Set

Go ahead and make whatever changes you want to this it won't affect me so if you want to add stuff or get rid of confusing definitions then by all means go ahead

Acquisition

When a response is being connected to a new stimulus

Unconditioned stimulus

Something that naturally and automatically causes a reaction

Unconditioned Response

The natural reaction that happens automatically BECAUSE of the unconditioned stimulus

Conditioned Response

The learned reaction to the conditioned stimulus

Conditioned Stimulus

Something that didn’t cause a reaction before, but after being paired with the unconditioned stimulus, it starts to trigger a reaction

Taste aversion

A special type of learning where you avoid a food after getting sick from it once

One-trial learning

Learning that happens from just one experience because of how impactful it was

Habituation

An organism’s decreasing response to a stimulus

The law of effect

Behaviors that have good outcomes are repeated where behaviors that have bad outcomes are not

Positive reinforcment

Adding something good to increase the behavior (cookie after homework)

Negative reinforcement

Taking something that’s unpleasant away to increase behavior (doing chores to stop parents nagging)

Primary reinforcers

Things that are naturally rewarding because they satisfy your basic biological needs (food, water, warmth, sleep, etc.)

Secondary reinforcers

Learned rewards that are valuable because they’re linked to primary reinforcers (money buys food)

Shaping

Teaching a behavior by rewarding small steps towards the final product

Instinctive drift

When trained animals go back to their natural instincts, even if they’ve been conditioned to do something else

Learned helplessness

When you stop trying to escape (change) a bad situation because from past experiences nothing that did made a difference

Continuous reinforcement

Rewarding a behavior every time it happens (dog gets a treat when it sits)

Partial reinforcement

Rewarding behavior only sometimes, not every time. This makes the behavior long-lasting

Fixed-interval schedule

You get a reward after a set amount of time has passed (paychecks)

Variable-interval schedule

You get a reward after unpredictable amounts of time (checking for texts)

Fixed-ratio schedule

You get a reward after a set number of behaviors

Variable ratio

You get a reward after an unpredictable number of behaviors

Social learning theory

People learn by watching others and copying their behavior

Insight learning

A sudden realization of a problem’s solution

Latent learning

Learning that happens without any reward and isn’t shown until you need it

cognitive map

A mental layout of an environment