Chapter 6

Introspection process of thinking about ones own thoughts and feelings, then
talking about them; makes thoughts public and available for others to study
not reliable
- Thus psychologists study observable actions
o Behaviours that people/animals display
- Skinner thought he could change animals behaviour by providing
incentives for performing specific acts

How Did the Behavioural Study of Learning Develop
Learning when animals benefit from experience so that their behaviour is
better adapted to the environment, crucial
- Essence of learning: understanding how events are related
Conditioning environmental stimuli and behavioural responses become
connected
Classical conditioning (Pavlovian conditioning) learn that two types of
events go together
Operant conditioning (Instrumental conditioning) learn that a behaviour
leads to a particular outcome
- Other types of learning: observing others
- According to Watson (founder of behaviourism), observable behaviour
was the only valid indicator of psychological activity
- Watson believed animals and humans were born with potential to learn
anything
- John Lockes idea of tabula rasa (blank state) states that infants are born
knowing nothing, all knowledge is acquired through sensory experiences

Behavioural Responses are conditioned
- Pavlov interested in salivary reflex, automatic and unlearned response
that occurs when a food stimulus is presented to a hungry animal
- Salivation at the sight of a person or bowl is not automatic, thus must be
acquired through experience not an inborn reflex

Pavlovs Experiments
Neutral stimulus unrelated to the salivary reflex, presented with stimulus that
reliably produces the reflex
Conditioning trial pairing of neutral stimulus + reflex, repeated a number of
times
Critical trials neutral stimulus is presented alone, reflex is measured
Classical conditioning (Pavlovian conditioning) neutral stimulus elicits
reflexive response because it has become associated with a stimulus that
already produces that response
Unconditioned response (UR) response that doesnt have to be learned,
reflex that occurs without prior training
Unconditioned stimulus (US) stimulus that elicits response, reflex without
prior learning
Conditioned stimulus (CS) stimulus that elicits response only after learning
has taken place
Conditioned response (CR) response to a conditioned stimulus that ahs been
learned

Dog Experiment
1. Unconditioned Stimulus Food
Unconditioned Response - Causes dog to salivate
Neutral Stimulus Metronome clicking, doesnt cause salivation
2. During conditioning trails, metronome clicks presented to dog with food
3. During critical trials, metronome is now conditioned stimulus, and is
presented without food, dog salivates
4. Result: Metronome (conditioned response) causes dog to salivate
(conditioned response)

Acquisition, Extinction and Spontaneous Recovery
Acquisition gradual formation of an association between conditioned and
unconditioned stimuli (Ex. rain plant bloom)
Contiguity critical element in acquisition of learned association is stimuli
occurring together in time, strongest conditioning occurs when there is very brief
delay between CS and US
- Animals sometimes have to learn when associations are no longer
adaptive
- If metronome is presented too many times without food, metronome is no
longer food predictor of food, thus salivation response gradually
disappears extinction
Extinction Conditioned response is weakened when CS is repeated without
unconditioned stimulus
- CR is extinguished when conditioned stimulus no longer predicts
unconditioned stimulus
Spontaneous recovery - previously extinguished response reemerges following
presentation of CS, single pairing of CS with US will re-establish CR
- Extinction reduces strength of associative bond but doesnt eliminate it
- Extinction is form of learning that overwrites previous association

Generalization, discrimination, second-order conditioning
Stimulus generalization stimuli similar but not identical to CS will produce CR
- Adaptive because CS is rarely experienced repeatedly in identical manner
Stimulus discrimination animals learn to differentiate between 2 similar
stimuli if one is consistently associated with the unconditioned stimulus and other
is not
- CS becomes directly associated with other stimuli associated with US
second-order conditioning
- Linking reflex across a second stimulus by pairing with first stimulus
- Celebrities/Famous figures with brand names; can occur without our
awareness or intention

Phobias and Addictions have learned components
Phobia acquired fear out of proportion to the real threat, generalization of fear
experience
Fear conditioning animals can be classically conditioned to fear neutral
objects
- Without amygdala, fear conditioning doesnt happen
- 1919- prominent theory of phobia based on Freudian ideas about
unconscious repressed sexual desires
- Albert B fear response generalized to other stimuli
Counterconditioning - Exposing people to small doses of feared stimulus while
having them engage in a pleasurable task
Systematic desensitization relax muscles, imagine the feared object or
situation while continuing to use the relaxation exercises
- CS CR1 (fear)
- CS CR2 (relaxation)
- Not satisfying cravings can lead to withdrawal
Withdrawal unpleasant state of tension and anxiety that occurs when addicts
stop using dugs
- Relapse to old habits, returning to old environments because they
experience conditioned craving
- Cues lead to activation of the prefrontal cortex and various regions of
limbic system exposing addicts to drug cues extinguishes responses
- Tolerance effects are greatest when drug is taken in same location as
previous drug use occurred in body learned to expect drug in that
location
- Likely to overdose if usually large doses in a new setting on body

Classical conditioning involves more than events occurring at the same time
- Associations strength determined by factors such as intensity of
conditioned and unconditioned stimuli (Ex. greater intensity)
- Pavlov: any object or phenomenon could be converted into a conditioned
stimulus during conditioning trials
- Not all stimuli are equally effective in producing learning
o Ex. poison is easier to associate
Conditioned food aversion recalling time when eating food, then later had
illness; even if food didnt cause illness, people will avoid food, especially if food
wasnt part of usual diet can be formed in one trial
- Conditioned food aversions easy to produce with smell or taste, difficult to
produce with light or sound
Biological preparedness explains why animals fear potentially dangerous
things (ex. snakes, fire, heights)
- Aversive stimuli paired with members of own racial group vs. different
racial group easily associate negative stimuli with outgroup
- Outgroup members have been more dangerous over course of human
evolution
- Birds rely more on vision quickly learn to avoid visual cue that they
associate with illness
- Rats rely more on taste freeze/startled when CS is auditory but rise on
hind legs is CS is visual
- Hunter-gatherer societies women gathered edible vegetation, returning
home each day while men traveled longer distances to hunt animals
o Women didnt develop ability to learn their way through
environment as well as men did
- Females learn route either from map or direct experiences, tend to use
landmarks to find the way
- Men attends to and keeps track of compass direction in which they are
travelling
- If 2 events occur close together in time/space, people will form an
association between them
- Expectations of association: Persons thinking is biased because someone
else has deliberately exploited the natural tendency to make associations
guilt by association

The cognitive perspective
Cognitive perspective on learning: Animals come to predict the occurrence of
events
- Conditioned stimulus must accurately predict US
- Stimulus that occurs before US is more easily conditioned than one that
comes after it
Rescorla-Wagner model strength of CS-US association is determined by the
extent to which the US s unexpected or surprising. The greater the surprise of
the US, the more effort an organism puts into trying to understand its occurrence
so that it predicts future occurrences
- Dogs conditioned more easily with smells that are new to them
Blocking effect once learned, CS can prevent acquisition of new conditioned
stimulus
Ex. Dog learns that almond smell (CS) is good predictor of food (US), thus
doesnt need to look for other predictors
Occasion Setter trigger for CS

How does Operant conditioning differ from classical conditioning?
- Classical conditioning is passive process where person or animal
associated events that occur together in time, regardless of what person
or animal does beyond that
- Doesnt account for many times that one of the events occurs because the
person/animal has taken some action
- Instrumental done for a purpose
- Behaving in a certain way leads to reward
Operant conditioning/Instrumental conditioning leaning that behaving in
other ways keeps us from punishment
- Operant animals operate on their environments to produce effects
- Learning process in which an actions consequences determine the
likelihood that the action will be performed in the future
- Thorndikes Puzzle Box cage with trapdoor
o Trapdoor opens if animal inside it performed a specific action
o Thorndike put food deprived animals inside it (Ex. placing food
outside of box)
o Animal attempted to escape through many nonproductive
behaviours
o 5-10 minutes of struggling, animal would accidentally pull string and
door would open
o Animal pulls string more quickly on each subsequent trial
Law of effect behaviour leading to a satisfying state of affairs will more likely
occur again, behaviour leading to an annoying state of affairs will less likely occur
again

Reinforcement Increases Behaviour
- Skinner followed behaviourism like Watson
Reinforcer event that produces a learned response, stimulus that occurs after
a response and increases the likelihood that the response will be repeated
- Animal learns to press one lever to receive food
- Operant chamber Skinner Box
- Cant provide reinforcer until person/animal displays appropriate response
Shaping reinforcing behaviours that are increasingly similar to the desired
behaviour
Successive Approximation teaching animal to discriminate which behaviours
are being reinforced
- Works in children, encourages appropriate behaviour
- Most obvious reinforcers = those necessary for survival
Primary reinforcers satisfying biological needs so that one is more likely to
survive and pass along genes
Secondary reinforcers Events/objects that serve as reinforcers but dont satisfy
biological needs, established by classical conditioning
- David Premack: Reinforcers value could be determined by the amount of
time an organism engages in specific associated behaviour when free to
do anything
Premacks principle -more valued activity can be used to reinforce the
performance of a less valued activity

Both reinforcement and punishment can be positive or negative
- Reinforcement increases a behaviours probability
- Punishment decreases its probability
Positive reinforcement increases probability that a behaviour will be
repeated, may involve reward; increases frequency/harder work
Negative reinforcement - removal of stimulus
- Reinforcement increases likelihood of behaviour
- Punishment decreases likelihood of behaviour
Positive punishment decrease behaviours probability via administration of
stimulus
Negative punishment decrease behaviours probability through removal of
pleasurable stimulus
- One thing people learn from punishment is how to avoid it, they learn not
to get caught instead of how to behave appropriately
- Negative emotions (ex. fear/anxiety) may become associated via classical
conditioning with person who administers punishment
- Punishment fails to offset behaviours reinforcing aspects, reinforces
secrecy
- Physical punishment is not effective
- Poor parent-child relations, weaker moral values, mental health problems,
increased delinquency and future child abuse
- Physical punishment teaches child that violence is appropriate for adults

Operant Conditioning is Influenced by Schedules of Reinforcement
Continuous reinforcement - Fast learning, behaviour might be reinforced each
time it occurs
- In the real world, behaviour is seldom reinforced continuously (ex. animals
dont find food each time they look for it)
Partial reinforcement reinforcing behaviour intermittently
- Partial reinforcement can be administered according to either:
o Number of behavioural responses (Ex. paid by piece)
o Passage of time (Ex. paid by hour)
Ratio schedule number of times the behaviour occurs leads to greater
responding
Interval schedule reinforcement available after specific unit of time
- Partial reinforcement given by fixed or variable schedule
Fixed schedule reinforcer consistently given after specific number of
occurrences or after a specific amount of time
- Responder doesnt know how many behaviours need to be performed or
how much time needs to pass before reinforcement will occur (ex.
commission)
- Continuous reinforcement is highly effective for teaching behaviour
- If reinforcement is stopped, behaviour extinguishes quickly
Variable ratio schedule putting money into slot machine because machines
sometimes provides monetary rewards
Partial-reinforcement extinction effect greater persistence of behaviour
under partial reinforcement than under continuous reinforcement
- Learner easily detects when reinforcement has stopped
- When behaviour is reinforced only some of the time, learner needs to
repeat behaviour more times to detect absence of reinforcement
- Less frequent the reinforcement during training, greater the resistance to
extinction
- Reinforcing behaviour continuously during early acquisition and then
slowly changing to partial reinforcement

Behaviour modification use of operant conditioning techniques to eliminate
unwanted behaviours and replace them with desirable ones
- Idea that unwanted behaviours are learned and therefore can be
unlearned
Token economies earn tokens for completing tasks and lose tokens for
behaving badly, can later trade for objects or privileges
- Gives participants sense of control over environment

Biology and Cognition Influence Operant Conditioning
- Biology contrains learning, reinforcement doesnt always have to be
present for learning to take place
- Animals have hard time learning behaviours that run counter to their
evolutionary adaptation
- Animals refused to perform certain tasks they had been taught because it
went against their instinct THINK: raccoon rubbing its paws
o Rubbing behaviour not reinforced, it delayed reinforcement
o Raccoon associated coin with food, treated it the same way
o Rubbing food between paws is hardwired for raccoons
- Brain is compilation of domain specific modules
- Ants take circuitous path until it finds food, then it takes a direct path back
to the nest, even over new territory, to not risk new food
- Learning consists of specialized mechanisms (rather than universal
mechanisms) that solve the adaptive problems animals face in their
environments
- Learning can take place without reinforcement
- Reinforcement has more impact on performance than learning
Cognitive maps spatial or visual mental representation of an environment
- Ex: rats in a maze
o First group: no reinforcement
o Second group: reinforcement on every trial
o Third group: reinforcement after first 10 trials, showing fast learning
curve that caught up to group 2
Latent learning learning that takes place without reinforcement
- Rats may not reveal their learning until it is reinforced latent learning
Insight learning problem solving in which a solution suddenly emerges after
either a period of inaction or contemplation of a problem
- Predicts whether the behaviour is subsequently repeated

The value of reinforcement follows economic principles
- Reinforcements value in context of basic economy principles (like supply
and demand)
- Short supply = valued more more potent reinforcer
- Value is discounted because of the significant delay before your receive it
$100 now or $1000 next year
- Animals choose between reinforcers, particular reinforcers worth is
affected by the likelihood of its payoff and how long that payoff might take
- Addicts overlook future rewards more greatly than nonaddicts
impulsivity and self control
- Where animals choose to eat depends on likelihood that food will be
present, the energy costs associated with obtaining the food and the risks
associated with predators
- Animals are highly sensitive to the related rates of reinforcement among
different patches and will sometimes take risks in finding food
Optimal foraging theory describes how animals in the wild choose their own
reinforcement schedules
- Follows risky strategy of foraging
- Rats, when food deprived, eat especially quickly in the dark
- Eating quickly optimal for consuming large amounts of food but not
optimal for digestion
- In light, rats able to detect predators, rats eat more slowly but frequently
scan environment to check for danger
- Rats calculate to detect costs and benefits associated with different
behavioural options

Learning can be passed on through cultural transmission
- Learn many behaviours not by doing them but by observing others do
them (Ex. social etiquette)
- Enormous cultural diversity religious beliefs, values, musical taste
passed on via learning
Meme unit of knowledge transferred within a culture
- Analogous to genes selectively passed on from one generation to the
next, some die quickly like fads
- Imo the monkey washed her sweet potatoes in ocean to get off sand,
other monkeys copied Imo
- Memes can spread quickly
- Asian children perform better in school in math/science than N.A. And
EUR peers
- Westerners view ability to learn as something relatively enduring that
exists within the learner some people can learn well, others cant
- Asians see it as more adaptive because it is consistent with notion that we
can all learn if we work hard learning is incremental process, good
foundation makes later learning easier

Learning can occur through observation
Observational learning acquisition or modification of behaviour after exposure
to at least one performance of that behaviour
- Offspring can learn basic skills by watching adults perform such skills
- Children can acquire beliefs via observation; young kids are sponges
because they absorb everything that goes on around them learn by
watching as much as doing
- Albert Bandura Bobo Doll Experiment
o Adult in film either played quietly with Bobo or attacked doll
furiously
o Children who had seen more aggressive display were more than
twice as likely to act aggressively towards the doll
o Exposing children to media violence may encourage them to act
aggressively
- Susan Mineka monkeys in labs dont fear snakes but wild monkeys do
o To obtain food, monkeys had to reach past a clear box with either
snake or neutral object
o Wild monkeys did not reach, lab monkeys did
o Lab monkeys observe wild monkeys and then learned to fear snake
- People can learn to fear particular things simply by hearing that the things
are dangerous
- Social forces play important role in learning of fear
- Lear via demonstration: slow exaggerated motions to show children how
to tie their shoes
- THINK: Cheetah mothers injure prey to make it easier for cubs to
knock/kill

Animals and humans imitate others
- Humans and nonhuman animals readily imitate others actions
- Human newborns imitate facial expressions within few hours/days of birth
- Continues to imitate gestures/actions as they mature
Modeling imitation of observed behaviour, reproduce behaviours of models
- More likely to imitate actions of models who are attractive, have high
status, somewhat similar to ourselves
- Modeling will be effective only if observer is physically capable of imitating
behaviours
- Models influences may occur implicitly (without our being aware that our
behaviours are being altered)
- People might not want to admit that they have changed their ways
- Images of smokers as mature, cool, sexy shapes minds imitation
- Whether model is reinforced for performing behaviour plays role
- Bobo Doll Experiment
o No consequences for aggressive behaviour
o Reward for aggression with candy and praise
o Punishment for behaviour by being spanked/verbally reprimanded
o Rewarded were much more likely to be aggressive towards doll
than children in control group
o Those who saw the model being punished were likely to be
aggressive than control group
- Distinction in learning between acquisition of behaviour and its
performance
- Children learned behaviour but only those who saw model being rewarded
performed the behaviour
Vicarious learning people learn about actions consequences by observing
others being rewarded or punished for performing the action
- When monkey observes another monkey reaching for an object, mirror
neurons in observing monkey becomes more active
- Same mirror neurons would be activated if observing monkey performed
behaviour
- Mirror neurons activated when monkeys engage in movement that has
some goal
- Neither sight of the object alone nor sight of target monkey at rest leads to
activation of these mirror neurons (only when observing monkey does the
act)
- Every time you observe another person engage in an action, similar neural
circuits are firing both in your brain and other persons brain
- Mirror neuron function currently open to debate
- Basis of imitation learning mirror neurons firing in observers brain
doesnt always lead to imitative behaviour in observer
- Allows us to step into the shoes of people we observe so we can better
understand their actions
- Mirror neurons are neural basis for empathy emotional response of
feeling what other people are experiencing
- Humans have mirror neurons for mouth movements, stimulated when
observers see a mouth move in a way typical of chewing/speaking
- Ability to communicate through language
- Mirror neuron system evolved to allow language
- Theory that speech evolved mainly from gestures, became a way to
represent gesture
- Reading words that represent actions leads to brain activity in relevant
motor regions THINK: lick

Violence
- Direct relation between exposure to violence and aggressive behaviour
- Exposure to massive amounts of violence in movies, which misrepresent
the prevalence of violence in real life, leads kids to believe that violence is
common and inevitable
- Mentally rehearsing violent scene or observing same violent scene
enacted many times in different movies kids believe brutality is effective
way to solve problems

Biological basis of learning
- Learning involves relatively permanent changes in brain that result from
exposure to environmental events
- Experience of world changes your brain, changes reflect learning
- Similar brain activity occurs for most rewarding experiences

Dopamine Activity underlies reinforcement
- Reward synonym for positive reinforcement
- Behaviourists: reinforcement strictly as whether it increased behaviour
- Believed mental states impossible to study empirically
- Positive reinforcement works as it provides subjective experience of
pleasure
- Release of neurotransmitter: dopamine
- Dopamine plays role in reward experience
- Accidental discovery of dopamine by testing if electrical stimulation to
brain regions would facilitate learning
- Electrical stimulation to rats brains only while rats were in 1 location of
cage
- Electricity was aversive so rats would selectively avoid location
- Instead, rats came back for more shocks
Intracranial self stimulation (ICSS) rats kept shocking their brains with
electricity because it was hooked up to their dopamine receptors
Pleasure Centres - Brain regions that support ICSS, ICSS powerful reinforcer
- Rats continue ICSS until they collapse from exhaustion
- ICSS acts on same brain regions as those activated by natural reinforcers
(sex, food, water)
- Depriving animal of food/water leads to increased ICSS animal is trying
to get same reward experience from eating/drinking
- ICSS and natural reward use same neurotransmitter system dopamine
- Neurochemical basis of positive reinforcement in operant conditioning
- Interfering with dopamine eliminates self stimulation and naturally
motivated behaviours (feeding, drinking, having sex)
- Nucleus accumbens is subcortical brain region that is part of limbic system
- Experience of pleasure results from activation of dopamine neurons in
nucleus accumbens
- Enjoying food depends of dopamine activity
- Greater the dopamine release when you are more hungry food tastes
better when you are hungry
- More dopamine is released under deprived conditions
- Operant conditioning: dopamine release sets reinforcers value
- Drugs that block dopamine effects disrupts operant conditioning
- Blocker decreased the value of reinforcement
- Dopamine blockers given to people with Tourettes syndrome (motor
control disorder) to help them regulate involuntary body movements
- Drugs that enhance dopamine activation (ex. cocaine, meth) increases
stimulis reward value
- Natural reinforcers seem to signal reward directly via activation of
dopamine receptors in nucleus accumbens
- Neural stimuli that first fails to stimulate dopamine release do so readily
after being paired with unconditioned stimuli
o Trapdoor + apples dopamine release when see only trapdoor
o Anticipated monetary rewards also activate dopamine systems