Escape and Avoidance Learning

• escape: when behavior terminates aversive stimulus
• avoidance: when behavior prevents aversive stimulus
• avoidance conditioning maintains phobias   * phobias are resurgent and come back a lot   * we avoid our fears completely and that avoidance makes the fear stick bc we don’t have the chance to extinguish it   * phobias are irrational (like escalators) not rational (like guns)   * animals condition less readily than humans   * human phobias require one brief conditioning trial (doesn’t take much)
• stampfl procedure: avoidance response occurs early in sequence of events. early responding greatly reduces extent to which avoidance response can be extinguished
• ocd   * persistent thoughts, impulses, or images   * repetitive actions in response to obsessions     * persistent thoughts are reduced by the compulsion     * compulsion reinforces the obsession by reducing anxiety   * people w ocd believe that they should be in complete control of their thoughts and feel personally responsible for the highly improbable   * Exposure and Response Prevention     * method of treating ocd     * systematic desensitization with flooding therapy
• escape and avoidance conditioning strengthen the behavior through removal of an aversive stimulus
• punishment weakens the behavior through the application of an aversive stimulus or the removal of an appetitive stimulus   * positive punishment: adding something that they don’t like.   * negative punishment: removing something that they like     * response cost: removal of specific reinforcer following the occurrence of problem behavior     * time-out: loss of access to positive reinforcers for a brief period of time following problem behavior

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