Download Unit 3 Notes

Learning
Learning: A relatively permanent change in behavior due to experience.
-3 Main Types of learning:
1) Classical Conditioning (Pavlov): Unconscious Association or associative learning
2) Operant Conditioning (Skinner): Conscious Consequences (also associative
learning)
3) Modeling (Bandura): Conscious and unconscious copying
Classical Conditioning
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Unconditioned Stimulus (UCS): A stimulus that naturally triggers a response
Unconditioned Response (UCR): A response that is naturally triggered by a
stimulus.
Conditioned Stimulus (CS): An originally irrelevant stimulus that when
associated with a US comes to trigger a response
Conditioned Response (CR): A learned response to a previously neutral but now
conditioned stimulus
Neutral Stimulus (NS): A stimulus which does not trigger a response
Acquisition: The pairing of a neutral stimulus and unconditioned stimulus to
begin the triggering of a conditioned response
Extinction: The diminishing of a conditioned response; the cs no longer creates
the cr
Spontaneous Recovery: The reappearance of a weakened CR after a pause; the
cs once again creates the cr
Generalization: the tendency for a similar stimulus to elicit a similar response
Discrimination: the ability to distinguish between a cs and a similar stimuli that
do not signal a ucs
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Higher Order Conditioning: A procedure in which the cs in one conditioning
experience is paired with a new ns creating a second cs.
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Little Albert
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Trace, Delayed & Backward Conditioning
Operant Conditioning
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While classical conditioning involves what is called “respondent behavior,”
operant conditioning involves what is called operant behavior based on rewards
and punishments.
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Thorndike’s Law of Effect: Behavior followed by favorable consequences
becomes more likely and followed by unfavorable consequences becomes less
likely
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Operant Chamber: (Skinner Box)-Box contains a bar or key that allows animal to
obtain food or water by pressing it
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Shaping: Reinforcing behaviors that guide behavior closer and closer towards the
goal; aka “successive approximations
Reinforcement is increasing a behavior
Punishment is decreasing or stopping a behavior
Positive Reinforcement is increasing a behavior by giving something
Negative Reinforcement is increasing a behavior by taking something away
Positive Punishment is decreasing a behavior by giving something
Negative Punishment is decreasing a behavior by taking something away
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Escape Conditioning: The removal of an aversive stimulus in order to increase
behavior
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Avoidance Conditioning: The classical conditioning of an individual once escape
conditioning has been accomplished
Primary Reinforcer: An innately reinforcing stimulus such as one that satisfies a
biological need
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Secondary (Conditioned) Reinforcer: A stimulus that gains its power through its
association with a primary reinforcer such as tokens or coupons
Fixed (Continuous): Patterned; Variable: Intermittent (random); Ratio: Trials;
Interval: Time;
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Fixed Ratio: Set pattern of trials
Fixed Interval: Set pattern of time frame
Variable Ratio: Intermittent pattern of trials
Variable Interval: Intermittent pattern of time frame
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Punished behavior is suppressed, not forgotten
Punishment teaches discrimination
Punishment can teach fear
Physical punishment may increase aggression
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Cognitive Map: A mental representation of a maze
Latent Learning: Learning that becomes apparent only when there is an incentive
to demonstrate it
Intrinsic Motivation: The desire to perform a behavior for its own sake
Extrinsic Motivation: The desire to perform a behavior for a reward or avoidance
of punishment
Observational Learning (Bandura) is learning by observing and imitating others.
Mirror Neurons: Frontal Lobe neurons that fire when observing or imitating
another
Bandura’s Bobo Doll Experiment: Children who first observed an adult beat up a
bobo doll were more likely to do so than those who did not first observe the
aggression
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Prosocial Behavior: Positive, helpful, constructive behavior derived from
altruism.
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Learned Helplessness: Animals and people who experience no control over
repeated bad events and then become helpless.
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-Seligman experimented with mice by feeding them cheese for successes and
shocking them for failures.
Memory
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Human Memory System: 3 parts:
-Encoding: The processing of information into memory
-Storage: The retention of encoded information
-Retrieval: The process of getting information out of memory
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1) Sensory Memory: The immediate, brief recording of subconscious information
2) Short-term memory: Memory that holds a few items briefly
3) Long-term memory: Permanent and limitless storehouse of information
4) Working memory: A newer understanding of short term memory focusing on
auditory and visual information
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Automatic Processing: Unconscious encoding of information
Effortful Processing: Encoding that requires attention and concentration
-Rehearsal: The conscious repetition of information
-Ebbinghaus retention curve: the more we practice nonsense syllables on day 1,
the fewer repetitions were required on day 2 to relearn it
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Spacing Effect: Memorizing by separating and distributing the studying;
Serial Position Effect: Recalling the first and last items of a list.
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Levels of Processing:
Visual Encoding, Acoustic Encoding, Semantic Encoding
Imagery: Mental pictures to aid effortful processing
Mnemonics: Memory aids that use organizational devices
Chunking: Organizing items into familiar, manageable units
Iconic Memory: A momentary sensory memory of visual stimuli
Echoic Memory: A momentary sensory memory of auditory stimuli
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Long-term potentiation: an increase in synaptic firing believed to be a neural basis
for memory
Flashbulb Memory: A clear memory of an emotionally significant moment-event.
Implicit Memory (non-declarative): retention of how to do things (cerebellum)
Explicit Memory (declarative): memory of facts and experiences (hippocampus)
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Recall: Retrieval of basic information such as fill in the blank
Recognition: The identification of items previously learned
Relearning: A measure of memory that assesses the amount of time saved when
learning material for a second time
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Priming: The activation of particular associations in memory
déjà vu: the eerie sense that “I’ve experienced this before.”
Mood Congruent Memory: The tendency to recall experiences that are consistent
with one’s current good or bad mood
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Decay-The simple forgetting of material
Repression-The subconscious pushing down of painful material
Encoding Failure: The inability to remember what we have not encoded
Proactive Interference: The disruptive effect of prior learning on the recall of new
information (old blocks new)
Retroactive Interference: The disruptive effect of new learning on the recall of old
information (new blocks old)
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Memory Construction: When people had seen the film of a car accident, they
recalled a more serious accident when asked leading questions.
Misinformation Effect: incorporating misleading information into one’s memory
of an event
Source Amnesia (source misattribution): Attributing to the wrong source an event
we have experienced, heard, read, or imagined
Thinking & Language
• Cognition: The mental activities associated with thinking, knowing,
remembering, and communicating.
• Concepts: mental groupings of similar objects, events, and people
• Prototype: a mental image or best example that incorporates all the
features we associate with a category (Stereotypical example)
• Algorithms: step by step, methodical procedure guaranteeing a
solution
• Heuristic: a simpler thinking strategy that allows us to solve problems
efficiently (rules of thumb)
• Insight: a sudden realization of a solution to a problem
• Confirmation Bias: The tendency to search for information that
supports our preconceptions and to ignore information that contradicts
our beliefs
• Fixation: The inability to see a problem from a new perspective
• Mental Set: A tendency to approach a problem in one particular way,
often a way that has been successful in the past
• Functional Fixedness: The tendency to think of things only in terms of
their usual functions
• Representative Heuristics: Judging the likelihood of things in terms of
how well they seem to represent or match prototypes
• Availability Heuristics: Estimating the likelihood of events based on
their availability in memory
• Overconfidence: The tendency to be more confident than correct
• Belief Perseverance: Clinging to one’s beliefs even in the face of
contrary evidence
• Belief Bias: The tendency for one’s past beliefs to influence one’s
present views and distort logic
• Intuition: An immediate, automatic feeling or thought that does not
include reasoning
• Framing: The way an issue is presented can significantly affect
decisions and judgments
Language
• Phonemes: The smallest distinctive sound unit
• Morphemes: The smallest unit that carries meaning
• Grammar: A system of rules that enables us to communicate with and
understand others
• Semantics: The set of rules by which we derive meaning from
morphemes, words, and sentences.
• Syntax: The rules for combining words into grammatically sensible
sentences in a given language
• Babbling: (4 months) – stage of speech of development in which the
infant utters various sounds unrelated to language
• One-word: (1-2): the child speaks in single words that carry their
meaning
• Two-word (Telegraphic): (18-24 months): Speech development
explodes and children express statements in two word phrases
• Skinner’s Operant Learning: Language is primarily reinforced
• Chomsky’s Inborn Grammar: Language naturally occurs because
humans are born with a Language Acquisition device
• Aphasia: Impairment of language, usually caused by left hemisphere
damage to Broca’s or Wernicke’s area
• Linguistic Determinism: Whorf’s hypothesis that language determines
the way we think
• Animal Thinking & Language (P. 395-401)