Chapter 6 & 7 Review Sheet PDF

# Learning ## Chapter 5: Conditioning ### Classical Conditioning - Classical conditioning is a type of learning in which a stimulus acquires the capacity to evoke a response originally evoked by another stimulus. - Classical conditioning was pioneered by Ivan Pavlov, who conditioned dogs to saliv...

# Learning ## Chapter 5: Conditioning ### Classical Conditioning - Classical conditioning is a type of learning in which a stimulus acquires the capacity to evoke a response originally evoked by another stimulus. - Classical conditioning was pioneered by Ivan Pavlov, who conditioned dogs to salivate when a tone was presented. - Classical conditioning mainly regulates involuntary, reflexive responses. - Examples include emotional responses (such as fears) and physiological responses (such as immunosuppression). - Responses controlled through classical conditioning are said to be elicited. - Classical conditioning begins with an unconditioned stimulus (UCS) that elicits an unconditioned response (UCR). - Then a neutral stimulus is paired with the UCS until it becomes a conditioned stimulus (CS) that elicits a conditioned response (CR). #### Basic Processes - **Acquisition:** occurs when a CS and UCS are paired, gradually resulting in a CR. - Acquisition depends on stimulus contiguity, which is a temporal association between events. - **Extinction:** occurs when a CS is repeatedly presented alone until it no longer elicits a CR. - **Spontaneous Recovery:** is the reappearance of an extinguished response after a period of nonexposure to the CS. - **Generalization:** occurs when a CR is elicited by a new stimulus that resembles the original CS, as in Watson and Rayner's study of Little Albert. - **Discrimination:** occurs when a CR is not elicited by a new stimulus that resembles the original CS. - **Higher-order conditioning:** occurs when a CS functions as if it were a UCS. ### Operant Conditioning - Operant conditioning is a type of learning in which responses come to be controlled by their consequences. - E. L. Thorndike's work on instrumental learning and the law of effect provided the foundation for the study of operant conditioning. - Operant conditioning was pioneered by B. F. Skinner, who showed that rats and pigeons tend to repeat responses that are followed by favorable outcomes. - Operant conditioning mainly regulates voluntary, spontaneous responses, such as studying, going to work, telling jokes, and asking someone out. - Responses controlled through operant conditioning are said to be emitted. - Demonstrations of operant conditioning typically occur in a Skinner box where an animal's reinforcement is controlled. - The key dependent variable is the animal's response rate as monitored by a cumulative recorder, with results portrayed in graphs (steeper slopes are indicative of faster responding). #### Basic Processes - **Acquisition:** occurs when a response gradually increases due to contingent reinforcement. - **Extinction:** occurs when responding gradually slows and stops after reinforcement is terminated. - **Resistance to extinction:** occurs when an organism continues to make a response after reinforcement for it has been terminated. - **Generalization:** occurs when responding increases in the presence of a stimulus that resembles the original discriminative stimulus. - **Discrimination:** occurs when responding does not increase in the presence of a stimulus that resembles the original discriminative stimulus. - **Primary reinforcers** are inherently reinforcing, whereas **secondary reinforcers** develop through learning. ### Intermittent Reinforcement Schedules - Intermittent reinforcement occurs when a response is reinforced only some of the time. - In **ratio schedules**, the reinforcer is given after a fixed (FR) or variable (VR) number of nonreinforced responses. - In **interval schedules**, the reinforcer is given for the first response that occurs after a fixed (FI) or variable (VI) time interval has elapsed. - **Ratio schedules (FR and VR)** tend to yield higher response rates, whereas **variable schedules (VR and VI)** tend to yield more resistance to extinction. ### Distinctions Among Operant Outcomes - **Positive reinforcement** occurs when a response is followed by the presentation of a rewarding stimulus. - **Negative reinforcement** occurs when a response is followed by the removal of an aversive stimulus. - Negative reinforcement plays a key role in escape learning and avoidance learning. - **Punishment** occurs when an event following a response weakens the tendency to make that response. - Punishment may result in side effects such as negative emotional responses and increased aggressive behavior. When used for disciplinary reasons, punishment should be applied swiftly, just severe enough to be effective, explained, and not physical. ## Chapter 6: New Directions in the Study of Conditioning ### Recognizing Biological Constraints on Learning - **Instinctive drift** occurs when an animal's innate response tendencies interfere with conditioning processes. - John Garcia found that it is almost impossible to create some associations, whereas conditioned taste aversions are readily acquired in spite of long CS-UCS delays, which he attributed to evolutionary influences. - Michael Domjan argues that in studies of classical conditioning, researchers should shift their focus from arbitrary, neutral stimuli to ecologically relevant conditioned stimuli, which may yield somewhat different patterns of learning, such as more rapid acquisition and greater resistance to extinction. - Differences in the adaptive challenges faced by various species have probably led to some species-specific learning tendencies. ### Recognizing Cognitive Processes in Conditioning - Edward Tolman's research on latent learning and cognitive maps suggested many years ago that cognitive processes play a role in conditioning, but his views were ahead of their time. - Robert Rescorla showed that the predictive value of a CS influences the process of classical conditioning. - When a response is followed by a desirable outcome, the response is more likely to be strengthened if it appears to have caused the favorable outcome. - Modern theories hold that conditioning is a matter of detecting the contingencies that govern events. ### Observational Learning - Observational learning occurs when an organism's responding is influenced by the observation of others, called models. - Observational learning was pioneered by Albert Bandura, who showed that conditioning does not have to be a product of direct experience. - Both classical and operant conditioning can take place through observational learning. - Observational learning depends on the processes of attention, retention, reproduction, and motivation. - Bandura distinguishes between the acquisition of a learned response and the performance of that response, with the latter depending on reinforcement. - Observational learning can explain why physical punishment tends to increase aggression in children even when it is intended to do the opposite. - Observational learning can also explain why exposure to media violence correlates with increased aggression. ## Chapter 7: Human Memory ### Encoding - **Attention:** which entails a selective focus on certain input, enhances encoding. - **Levels-of-processing theory:** proposes that deeper levels of processing result in more durable memory codes. - **Structural, phonemic, and semantic encoding** represent progressively deeper levels of processing. - **Elaboration:** the use of visual imagery, and **self-referent encoding** can all enhance encoding and retention. ### Storage - **Information-processing theories:** propose that people have three memory stores: *sensory memory*, *short-term memory (STM)*, and *long-term memory (LTM)*. - **Atkinson and Shiffrin:** posited that incoming information passes through two temporary storage buffers before being placed into long-term memory. - The three memory stores are not viewed as anatomical structures but as distinct types of memory. ### Retrieval - **Recall:** is often guided by partial information, as demonstrated by the tip-of-the tongue phenomenon. - **Reinstating the context of an event** can often enhance retrieval efforts. - **Memories are sketchy reconstructions of the past that may be distorted.** - **The misinformation effect** occurs when recall of an event is changed by misleading postevent information. - **Imagination inflation** refers to the finding that simply asking people to vividly imagine an experience can significantly increase many subjects' belief that they actually had an experience similar to the imagined event. - **A source-monitoring error** occurs when a memory derived from one source is attributed to another source. - **Reality monitoring** involves deciding whether memories are based on one's perceptions of actual events or one's thoughts and imaginations. ### Sensory Memory - Sensory memory preserves information in its original form for a very brief time. - Memory traces in the sensory store appear to decay in about one-quarter of a second. ### Short-Term Memory - **Short-term memory:** can maintain about seven chunks of unrehearsed information for up to 20 seconds. - **Short-term memory is working memory.** - **Baddeley's model of working memory**: consists of four components: - the phonological loop, - the visuospatial sketchpad, - the central executive, and - the episodic buffer. - Some theorists view short-term memory as a tiny, constantly changing portion of LTM in a state of heightened activation. ### Long-Term Memory - **Long-term memory**: is an unlimited capacity store that can hold information indefinitely. - **Flashbulb memories** and **Penfield's ESB research**: suggest that LTM storage may be permanent, but the data are not convincing. - **Memories can be organized in a variety of ways.** ### Organization in Long-Term Memory - **Conceptual hierarchies:** A conceptual hierarchy is a multilevel classification system based on common properties among items. - **Schemas:** A schema is an organized cluster of information about an object or event. - **Semantic networks:** A semantic network consists of concepts joined by pathways linking related concepts. - **Connectionist networks:** PDP models assume that memories consist of patterns of activation in connectionist networks that resemble neural networks ## Chapter 8: Forgetting ### Measuring Forgetting - Ebbinghaus's work suggested that most forgetting occurs very rapidly, but subsequent research indicated that his forgetting curve was exceptionally steep. - Retention can be assessed with a recall measure, a recognition measure, or a relearning measure. ### Why We Forget - A great deal of forgetting, including pseudoforgetting, is due to ineffective encoding. - **Decay theory:** proposes that memory traces fade with time, but decay does not appear to be a factor in long-term memory. - **Interference theory:** asserts that people forget information because of competition from other material, which has proven easy to demonstrate. - **Forgetting:** is often due to retrieval failure, which may include repression. ### The Repressed Memories Controversy - Recent years have seen a surge of reports of recovered memories of previously forgotten sexual abuse in childhood. - Many clinicians accept these recovered memories, arguing that it is common for people to bury traumatic memories in their unconscious. - Many memory researchers are skeptical of recovered memories because they have demonstrated that it is easy to create inaccurate memories in laboratory studies. - Although it is clear that some therapists have created false memories in their patients, it seems likely that some cases of recovered memories are authentic. ### Physiology of Memory - **Anatomy of memory:** - The study of amnesia and other research has suggested that the hippocampal region may play a key role in the consolidation of memories. - The amygdala may be crucial to the formation of memories of learned fears. - **Neural circuitry of memory:** - Some theorists believe that memories may correspond to localized neural pathways in the brain. - These pathways may depend on increases in neural excitability at specific synapses, which is called long-term potentiation. - **Biochemistry of memory:** - Some theorists argue that memories may correspond to alterations in neurotransmitter activity at specific synapses. ### Proposed Memory Systems - **Declarative memory:** The declarative memory system handles recall of factual information, such as names, dates, events, and ideas. - **Procedural memory:** The procedural memory system handles recall of actions, skills, and operations, such as riding a bike or typing. ### Semantic Versus Episodic Memory - **The semantic memory system:** contains general knowledge that is not temporally dated. - **The episodic memory system:** handles temporally dated recollections of personal experiences. ### Prospective Versus Retrospective Memory - **Prospective memory:** involves remembering to perform actions in the future. - **Retrospective memory** involves remembering events from the past or previously learned information. ## Key Themes - People's experience of the world is highly subjective. - Behavior is determined by multiple causes. - Psychology is characterized by theoretical diversity.