What kind of theories are behaviourist?
Deterministic theories mainly - meaning that they believe something causes another thing to occur, for example environmental determinists would believe that the environment causes behaviour. They were very focused on the external, almost to a fault, and did not study the internal. (Input - output model)
Describe the origins of behaviourism.
It was a reaction against psychoanalysis. They wanted to make the study of psychology more scientific and testable. This meant moving away from the unconscious and the speculation/assumptions surrounding it. They wanted to study overt behaviour.
Who first studied classical conditioning? How?
Ivan Pavlov was one of the first people to study it. He was interested in salivation, particularly whether or not it was an innate response and he studied dogs to learn more about it.
What did Pavlov notice about dogs that caused him to dig deeper?
He noticed that they began to salivate when the food was brought in the room. Which was weird because one would expect that salivation generally occurs to break down food that is already in your mouth. This pattern suggests that learning was involved.
What is classical conditioning?
When a neutral stimulus produces a response after being paired with a stimulus that naturally produces a response; first studied by Ivan Pavlov.
Explain the process of simultaneous conditioning.
Example: Pavlov’s dogs and the metronome.
- Dogs salivate when food is brought in by the researchers. This is the unconditioned stimulus (food) and the unconditioned response. (salivation).
- Dogs listen to a ticking metronome and don’t react. This is the neutral stimulus and the neutral response.
- During conditioning (a trial), the metronome is paired with the food again and again.
- As soon as the dog salivates when it just hears the metronome, it is now exhibiting a conditioned response and the metronome is now a conditioned stimulus.
What is second order conditioning?
A type of learning in which a CS is paired with a stimulus that became associated with the US in an earlier procedure. (So, the metronome is paired with a black square to cause the dog to salivate. The dog salivates at the sight of the black square even though it was never associated with the food.)
What is the unconditioned stimulus? (UCS or US)
Something that reliably produces a naturally occurring reaction in an organism.
What is the unconditioned response? (UCR or UR)
An unlearned, naturally occurring, reflexive action that is produced by an unconditioned stimulus.
First order response - Occurs without conditioning
What is the neutral stimulus? (NS)
A stimulus that does not have an initial tendency to elicit the UCR. (metronome)
What is the conditioned stimulus? (CS)
A previously neutral stimulus that has through conditioning acquired the capacity to evoke a conditioned response.
What is the conditioned response? (CR)
A learned reaction to a conditioned stimulus. It occurs as the result of a previous conditioning.
What is a trial?
Any presentation of a pair of stimuli.
Elicit
Draw forth
Explain Little Albert’s study.
They wanted to see if they could condition humans, and see if they could condition something as complex as emotion.
-They presented little Albert with a series of different animals and he was indifferent to them all. (White dog, rat, and bunny.)
- Then they played a loud noise and this caused him to cry. The loud noise was the US and his crying was the UR
- They then presented the rat and the loud noise at the same time over and over until Albert cried at the sight of the rat alone. (Created a CS and CR)
What is the acquisition phase?
The phase when the NS and US are presented at the same time to produce the CS. (Note…NS only changes to CS when a CR is produced)
Explain the principle of extinction.
There is a gradual weakening and disappearance of a conditioned response tendency. The gradual elimination of a learned response that occurs when the US is no longer presented. (The dog won’t always salivate to a metronome if its not always paired with the unconditioned stimulus.)
Explain the principle of spontaneous recovery.
The tendency of a learned behaviour to recover from extinction after a rest period.
Return of the CR to the CS after extinction
Response rate is higher than previous extinction phase but not as high as acquisition phase.
Explain the principle of generalization.
The process by which the conditioned response is observed even though the CS is slightly different from the original one used during acquisition.
Tendency of an organism to respond in the same way to stimuli similar to the CS
CS = white rat…show white bunny - fear (Baby albert generalized that they were similar enough.)
Explain the principle of discrimination.
The capacity to distinguish between similar but distinct stimuli. Organisms respond in a different way to similar stimuli.
White rat - fear
White dog - no fear
How are drug overdoses connected to classical conditioning?
When someone begins using drugs consistently, they often do so in the same location. When the body is injected with a drug, it makes accommodations to be able to function with the drug in the system. If the drug is used more and more in the same location, one will begin to associate that location with the drug and the body may begin making the accommodations before the drug is even injected, allowing the body to tolerate more and more drug. But, when the person uses the drug in a different location, the body does not know to activate the same responses and cannot handle the volume of drug anymore.
Explain the three different types of conditioning.
Simultaneous conditioning - The NS and US are presented at the same time to produce the CS
Short-delay conditioning - The NS is presented slightly after the US is presented. (But the UCS keeps going)
Trace conditioning - The NS is presented first and then taken away. Then the US is presented. (Requires more memory from the learner)
Neuroscience: What did we learn from an eye-blink study on rabbits?
During classical conditioning there was cerebellum activation. (Involved in things like balance.)
Looked at trace and delayed conditioning and found that the hippocampus was engaged. (The memory was involved.)
Behaviourists are okay with doing this now because we actually have scientific ways of studying the mind.
When doing fear conditioning - the amygdala is always activated. Involved in fear conditioning.
Explain the Rescorla-Wagner model of classical conditioning. How did it change our understanding?
They felt that expectation was an important part of classical conditioning. The dogs had learned to expect that when they heard the metronome they would also receive food. Despite the fact that Pavlov brought the food, they did not have the same expectation for him as he also interacted with them in other tasks. They are also conditioned to respond in more than one way. They will also wag their tails, beg, etc.
