observational learning and social learning
- observational learning = learning situations in which the learner actively monitors events and then chooses later actions based on those
- social learning = term used as a synonym for observational learning, because the primary stimuli that lead to changes in behavior are often actions of other individuals
Learning by Copying
- copying
- modeling
- copying = doing what one observes another doing
- form of observational learning
- modeling = children’s imitative acts revealed what they had learned from watching someone demonstrate an action
Learning by Copying
- True Imitation
= copying that involves reproduction of motor acts
- if someone can truly imitate: two-action test
- perspective taking ( = imagining oneself in the place of another) might be cognitive ability that is a prerequisite for learning through imitation or facilitates imitation
Learning by Copying
- Emulation
= copying that replicates an outcome without replicating specific motor acts
–> observers use different acts to achieve the observed goal
Learning by Copying
- Stimulus Matching
= copying in which stimuli are generated that can be directly compared with the originally observed stimulus
- indirect way of copying actions
Learning by Copying
- Social Learning Theory
= Bandura; broad theory of human behavior as an alternative or supplementary approach to more traditional behaviorist interpretations
- key feature:
- kinds of reinforcements and individual has experienced in the past will determine how the individual will act in any given situation
- four basic processes:
(1) presence of a model is thought to increase an observer’s attention to the situation
(2) memories for the observed situation must be stored in an accessible format, so that they can guide later actions
(3) observer must have ability to reproduce action
(4) observer must have some motivation for reproducing the observed actions - what can increase imitation:
- status or identity of model
- similarity between model and observer
- desirability of observed outcome
- observation more important than conditioning
Alternatives to Imitation
- Contagion and observational learning
- contagion = inborn tendency to react emotionally to visual or acoustic stimuli that indicate and emotional response by other members of one’s species
- observational conditioning = instances in which an individual learns an emotional response after observing it in others (e.g. phobias)
Alternatives to Imitation
- Stimulus Enhancement
= direction of one organism’s attention toward specific objects, events, or locations within an environment as a result of another organism’s action
- redirecting an individual’s attention
Social Transmission of Information
- Social Conformity
= tendency to adopt the behavior of the group
- protective functions, but can also hinder development of novel behavior patterns that might be helpful
- rapid acquisition of information
- language in humans –> faster transmission
Social Transmission of Information
- Violent Entertainment and Behavior
- strong evidence for general association between violent behavior and increased exposure to violent media
- same for prosocial behavior
- only correlated
Brain Substrates
- hypotheses how and where memories of visual scenes involving dynamic actions performed by people are formed
(1) “Visual Hypothesis”
= proposes that memories for perceived acts are stored in visual cortical neurons
(2) “Direct-Matching Hypothesis” = suggests that memories for actions are stored in cortical regions that map observed actions onto motor representations of the acts –> more support than visual hypothesis
Brain Substrates
- mirror neurons in the cortex
- mirror neurons = neurons that fire during both performance of an action ad during visual observations of that same action
- identified in monkey’s cortex
- might play role in: imitation and emulation; perceptual-motor skill learning; interpretation of actions
- have not been directly observed in humans
- indirect measures suggest that regions of human cortex behave as if they contained mirror neurons
- hypothesized that mirror neurons system provides basic mechanism for simple imitation
Brain Substrates
- hippocampal encoding of socially transmitted food preferences
- hippocampal damage: disrupts ability of animals to learn from social interactions in ways that parallel episodic memory deficits in humans suffering from amnesia
- basal forebrain cholinergic neurons that modulate cortical activity: involved in social transmission of rat’s food preferences
- neurons destroyed: rats become impaired at learning novel food preferences form demonstrator rats (anterograde amnesia)
- basal forebrain cholinergic neurons that modulate hippocampal activity
- neurons destroyed: retrograde amnesia
- rats: memory for socially transmitted information depends on hippocampus and basal forebrain
Clinical Perspectives
- Asperger‘s syndrome
= similar to autism; individuals have normal intellectual abilities but a reduced capacity for social skills; but more likely to speak fluently than individuals with autism
Clinical Perspectives
- Imitation in Autistic Individuals
- most common symptoms:
- impaired social interactions
- restricted behavior patterns
- delayed language development
- problems with perspective taking
- either can’t imitate or imitate involuntarily (echolalia)
- general problems with perspective taking
- autistic children have problems linking observed actions to actions that can be performed
- hypothesis: abnormalities might be related to abnormal function in a subset of mirror neurons, rather than a general dysfunction of cortical neural circuits involved in imitation
- broken mirror hypothesis
Clinical Perspectives
- Effects of Frontal Lobe Lesions on Imitation
- often unable to repeat actions they observe, despite having motor control necessary to perform that movements
- can radically alter a person’s behavior and personality
- reduced activity in frontal lobes –> tendency to involuntarily imitate observed actions –> activity in frontal lobe circuits normally inhibits such imitation
- less able to stop themselves from imitating observed movements
Historical Paper - Understanding Motor Events
- neurons of rostral part of inferior-premotor cortex of monkey discharge during goal-directed hand movements
- many of these neurons become active also when the monkey observes specific, meaningful hand movements performed by the experimenters
- finding indicate that premotor neurons can retrieve movements not only on the basis of stimulus characteristics, but also on the basis of the meaning of the observed actions
Supporting Document - The Myth of Mirror Neurons
- in 1990s neuroscientists at University of Parma identified the cells in premotor cortex of monkeys
- Ramachandran: started hype of mirror neurons
- argues that mirror neurons underlie empathy, help explain origin of language, prompted great leap forward in human culture
- reality:
- very controversial topic
- mirror neurons might play a role –> but are not the origin of everything
- existence of mirror neurons in humans not yet proven
