CHAPTER 11 - Generalization, Discrimination, and Stimulus Control

Generalization - the tendency for the effects of learning experiences to spread

Types of Generalization

• generalization across people (vicarious generalization)

• generalization across time (maintenance)

• generalization across behaviors (response generalization)

• generalization across situations (stimulus generalization)

Generalization across people (vicarious generalization)

• generalization of a model to those of a behavior

• observational learning: equivalent to this. For example, a son observes his father shaving, and then imitates what he does

Generalization across time (maintenance)

• generalization of behavior over time. As long as we maintain behaviors, we can access skills we have learned in the past (like bike riding).

Generalization across behaviors (response generalization)

• The tendency for changes in one’s behavior to spread to other behaviors, such as how to behave at a soccer game

Generalization across situations (stimulus generalization)

• the tendency for changes in behavior in one situation to spread to other situations

  • e.g: rotary phones and smartphones: they both have the same dialing technique, and you can take from your experience with rotary phones and and apply it to smartphones

Stimulus Generalization

• Research including stimulus generalization

  1. Pavlovian conditioning: dogs salivated in response to different tones and different decibels of the same tone

  2. Little Albert: Albert was conditioned to fear rats, and without prior exposure, was fearful of other white furry stimuli (rabbits, Santa Claus)

  3. Thorndike puzzle box: cats performed the same behavior (clawing, pulling on a lever, etc) to escape each new box.

• Generalization gradient: how alike (or different) a conditioned response is from a stimulus that resembles the conditioned stimulus

  • Flat: no discrimination, high generalization

  • Broad: some discrimination, some generalization

  • Narrow: high discrimination, low generalization

• Extinction, Punishment and Reinforcement

  • Stimulus generalization: applied to extinction, punishment, reinforcement

• How to increase generalization

  1. provide training in a variety of different settings

     • e.g: teaching children to sit still in class, music, and art so that they know that there is an expectation that sitting is a school behavior

  2. provide many examples

  3. provide a variety of different consequences

     • vary schedules of reinforcement, type of reinforcer

  4. reinforce generalization when it occurs

• Stimulus generalization - pros and cons

  • Pros: increases learning of new material, setting, etc, decrease the need for many specific trainings, increase the independence of learners

  • Cons: behavior may not be appropriate in all settings, resources may not be available in all settings, can be taken for granted by instructor, hate crimes

Discrimination: the tendency of behavior to occur in certain situations but not in others. the opposite of generalization.

• discrimination training

  • classical conditioning: conditioned stimulus (CS+) is paired with its unconditioned stimulus (US), while another (CS-) is presented alone

  • operant conditioning: discriminative stimuli. (SD signals reinforcing consequences, S∆ signals lack of reinforcing consequences)

• Simultaneous discrimination training

  • both SD and S∆ are presented at the same time, where SD yields reinforcing consequences and S∆ yields no reinforcing consequences.

• Successive discrimination training

  • the SD and S∆ are presented individually and alternate randomly

• Matching to sample (MTS)

  • given two or more alternates, the learner is presented with the SD and must match it to the SAME image/ item in an array of alternatives

• Oddity matching or mismatching

  • given two or more alternates, the learner is presented with the SD and must match it to the DIFFERENT item/ image in the array of alternates

• Errorless discrimination training

  • in the training phase, the instructor PROMPTS the correct response before any error can be made by the learner. an example would be using hand-over-hand guidance.

  • reduces negative emotional responses

  • increases the rate of learning

• Differential outcomes effect (DOE)

  • when teaching multiple behaviors simultaneously, by reinforcing immediately for one behavior and delaying reinforcement for another correct response, the rate of learning for both individual correct responses increases.

Stimulus Control: when discrimination training brings behavior under the influence of discriminative stimuli

• if someone always eats food in the kitchen, the sight of a kitchen may make them hungry!

Concept: any class the members of which share one or more defining features

• a Yorkie, a Cocker Spaniel, and an Italian Greyhound are all different but still represent dogs in general.

CHAPTER 12: Forgetting

What is Forgetting?: the deterioration in performance of a learned behavior following a period in which learning or practice does not occur.

Forgetting and Stimulus Control

• all behavior can be said to fall under some degree of stimulus control because some behavior can occur in the presence or absence of environmental stimuli.

• forgetting could be a shift in stimulus control due to a change in the current environment in comparison to the original environment where initial learning took place

Measuring Forgetting

• free recall

  • giving an opportunity to perform a previously learned behavior.

  • the traditional measure of forgetting

  • does not account for partial retention of behavior or skill

• prompted/cued recall

  • give a hint or prompt when providing an opportunity to perform a previously learned behavior

  • this allows for the display or partial retention of behavior itself

• relearning method/saving method

  • measuring the amount of training required to reach a previous level of performance

• recognition

  • identifying material that was previously learning

  • different than prompted recall as there is no hint, only the correct and incorrect responses are presented

Measurements Used in Animal Research

1. Delayed matching to sample: give a sample briefly, then matching is expected after a “retention interval” has elapsed

2. Extinction method: put a behavior on extinction after a retention interval. the faster the behavior is put on extinction the greater the forgetting. NO REINFORCER

3. Gradient degradation: increased generalization, decreased discrimination yield higher rates of forgetting.

Sources of Forgetting

• degree of learning: the better something is learned, the more slowly it is forgotten. OVERLEARNING is learning beyond the mastery criteria.

• Prior learning: the more meaningful the material, the easier it is to retain over time

  • prior experience creates “meaning”

  • prior experience can interfere with recall (proactive interference)

• subsequent learning: we forget less when learning is followed by periods of sleep rather than activity

  • learning new material increases forgetting for previous learning (retroactive interference)

• changes in context: there is an increase in forgetting when a learned behavior is expected in a new environment

  • cue dependant learning: decreases in performance of a previously learned behavior in the absence of a stimuli that was present at the initial time of learning

How to decrease forgetting

1. overlearning: training a new skill beyond the mastery criteria

2. practice with feedback: perform the skill and get feedback

   • positive feedback reinforces correct performance

   • constructive feedback allows the learner to correct errors and increase future performance

3. distribute practice: perform the skill over time aka distributed or spaced practice

   • avoid massed practice: repetitious practice in a short period

4. test yourself: period testing yields greater retention than studying

5. mnemonics: a device used for aiding recall (ROY G BIV)

6. context clues: learning in different environments yields greater retention of skills in multiple settings.

CHAPTER 13: The limits of learning

Learning is not inherited

• behavior acquired through learning is not passed from one generation to the next

• reflexes and modal action patterns are inherited and consistent across a species

• the benefit to individual learning is that we can adapt and change to our environment in real-time and have the ability to be innovative

Learning ability and Heredity

• the differences in learning abilities between similar species (domesticated dogs vs wild wolves)

• the difference in learning abilities within a species (the offspring of an artist vs of a scientist)

• Heredity is not the ONLY factor; enriched environments are important too.

Critical Periods

• a period in development of an individual when they are more likely to learn a particular behavior

  • example: bonding between a mother and infant shortly following birth

  • imprinting: the tendency of some animals to follow the first moving object they see after birth; not always their mother.

• Harlow’s experiments with surrogate mothers - monkeys

  • monkeys chose warmth/comfort > food

  • monkeys relied on surrogate mothers for comfort in new environments, protection when afraid, and confidence to defend themselves or explore something new

  • monkeys lacked social skills that could not be taught by surrogate mother (interaction with peers/mating)

• critical periods are not clearly defined in humans

• Harlow’s experiments changed how we provide services in orphanages/human services

• Evidence of critical periods for empathy in infancy/early childhood

• Evidence of critical period for language development in the first 12 years of life

Preparedness and Learning

• learning occurs differently in different situations

  1. instinctive drift: the tendency of an animal to revert to fixed action patterns

  2. autoshaping: the innate tendency to engage in behavior associated with food without receiving a reinforcement

• learning occurs on a continuum of preparedness

  • somethings are learned with ease, while others are difficult to learn

    • animals that come to learning situations genetically prepared, for example, humans fear snakes over flowers.

    • animals that come to learning situations unprepared: learning proceeds slowly and steadily (no prior knowledge, not genetically prepared)

    • animals that come to learning situations contraprepared: learning proceeds slowly and irregularly