Psychology Learning Theories

A learning process where behaviour is influenced by its consequences. Rewarding behaviors increase their frequency, while unrewarded or punished behaviors decrease.

A stimulus that increases the likelihood of a behavior.

A stimulus that decreases the likelihood of a behavior.

A stimulus that signals whether a response will be reinforced.

Patterns of reinforcement, either based on time intervals (interval) or the number of responses (ratio).

Reinforcement occurs after a fixed amount of time, regardless of the number of responses.

Reinforcement occurs after varying amounts of time, making it unpredictable.

Reinforcement occurs after a specific number of responses.

Reinforcement occurs after a varying number of responses, making it unpredictable.

Learning by watching and imitating others' behaviors.

Learning that occurs but is not immediately demonstrated.

A mental representation of a physical environment.

Learning that happens without awareness of the process or outcome.

The amygdala is a brain region that plays a crucial role in learning fear responses.

Watson advocated for a behaviorist approach to psychology, emphasizing observable behaviors over internal mental processes.

A learned emotional reaction to a previously neutral stimulus, such as fear conditioning.

Behaviors followed by positive consequences are more likely to be repeated, while those followed by negative consequences are less likely.

Experiments using enclosed boxes that required animals to perform actions to escape, to study learning.

Skinner expanded on operant conditioning, focusing on reinforcement and punishment.

A classic experiment demonstrating how fear can be conditioned in humans.

Learning is the process of acquiring new knowledge, skills, or responses through experience, resulting in a relatively permanent change in the learner's state.

Habituation is a process where repeated exposure to a stimulus leads to a gradual decrease in the response.

Sensitization is a form of learning where the presentation of a stimulus increases the response to a later stimulus.

Classical conditioning is a type of learning where a neutral stimulus becomes associated with a natural response to another stimulus.

The US is a stimulus that reliably produces a natural, unlearned response in an organism.

The UR is the natural, unlearned response to an Unconditioned Stimulus.

The CS is a previously neutral stimulus that becomes associated with the US and eventually elicits a response.

The CR is the learned response that is similar to the UR but is elicited by the CS.

Acquisition is the phase in classical conditioning where the CS and US are repeatedly paired together to establish the association.

Extinction is the gradual decrease in the CR when the CS is repeatedly presented without the US.

Actions an organism takes that have an impact on the environment. It is a way of learning through consequences.

A stimulus or event that increases the likelihood of a specific behaviour.

A stimulus or event that decreases the likelihood of a specific behaviour.

Primary reinforcers meet basic needs (food, warmth). Secondary reinforcers are learned through association (money, praise).

Watson argued that psychology was failing to achieve true scientific status because its reliance on introspection was unreliable and didn't yield practical findings.

The Law of Effect states that behaviors followed by positive consequences are more likely to be repeated, while those followed by negative consequences are less likely to be repeated.

A puzzle box is a sealed enclosure that requires an animal to perform a specific action, like pressing a lever, to escape. It was used to study learning by analyzing how effectively animals learned to escape over time.

Operant conditioning is a type of learning where the consequences of an organism's behaviors determine whether the behavior will be repeated.

Fear conditioning is a type of learning where a neutral stimulus, like a white rat, becomes associated with a negative, aversive experience, like a loud noise, leading to a learned fear response to the previously neutral stimulus.

A conditioned emotional response is a learned emotional reaction to a previously neutral stimulus, such as the fear of a white rat in Little Albert's case.

The amygdala is a part of the brain that plays a central role in processing emotions, especially fear. It helps us learn and remember fear responses.

In the Little Albert experiment, Watson and Rayner demonstrated that a 9-month-old baby could be conditioned to fear a white rat by associating it with a loud noise. This showed that fear could be learned through classical conditioning.

Neurons that fire both when an individual performs an action and when they observe another individual performing the same action. These neurons are thought to play a role in observational learning.