Lecture 10 Notes Operant Conditioning Outline General Terminology and Data Reinforcement Skinner Box Cumulative Recorder Reinforcement Contingencies Basic Processes Shaping Extinction Stimulus Control General Classical Conditioning when the organism learns to evoke a response to a neutral stimulus the organism is passive this is like the girl on the bridge Operant conditioning assumes that the organism behaves on its own and operates in the environment organism is active Operant conditioning believes that activity can be the basis of learning Definition actions of behavior comes to be controlled by its consequences Very very powerful learning mechanism Terminology and Data Reinforcement the consequences make a behavior more likely to occur Example child does something good so parent gives candy or love Positive Reinforcement when you add something good a reward Negative Reinforcement when you take away something aversive Example child does something good so parent says you don t have to do you chores tomorrow or you don t have to eat your broccoli Can lead to relationship conflicts Many people have the same argument Argument gets resolved when one part or the other acquiesces When this happens for the acquiescing person the negative situation is removed so there is negative reinforcement For the arguing person gets what they want and is positively reinforced This behavior happens again and again Punishment the consequences make the behavior less likely to occur Knowing about the reinforcement procedure does not affect whether it works Skinner box apparatus the skinner used to contain animals It gives the animal a choice of responses rat presses lever pigeon pecks disk Cumulative Recorder records what the animals responded and when it responded want to know how frequently animal responds Reinforcement Contingencies when do you reward or reinforce the organism do you reinforce every time or some of the time if some of the time randomly or on a regular basis Continuous reinforcement is when you reinforce every time Partial or intermittent reinforcement is when you reinforce sometimes Partial reinforcement is longer lasting much harder to eliminate Partial reinforcement works well because they don t know if the reward will come so they will do it just in case the reward will come Basic Processes movie To give a sense of how powerful these learning mechanisms can be skinner made a Shows two pigeons playing ping pong Skinner got the pigeons to play ping pong by using shaping Shaping you shape the behavior by reinforcing closer and closer approximations of the behavior you want Shaping of pigeons enclose Put pigeon in enclosure with paddle When pigeons eat the peck on things so skinner places ping pong paddle in When pigeon pecks near paddle it is rewarded with food Soon pigeon will immediately start pecking near the handle so now you stop rewarding for pecking near handle and reward only for pecking on the handle Soon pigeon will just peck handle of ping pong paddle so now only reward if pigeon picks up paddle Soon pigeon will immediately pick up paddle now you throw a ping pong ball such that it bounces off the paddle and you reward the pigeon when the ball bounces off the paddle You continue to do this until pigeon will move paddle so that it will contact the Put two pigeons trained the same way and then the pigeons will hit ping pong ball ball back and forth Peck near handle Peck on handle Pick up paddle Ball hits paddle Shaping works on musical and sports behavior Shaping was used to make smart bombs by putting pigeon in the nose of a bomb to guide bomb by pecking the target repeatedly Pigeons can detect differences in small objects so they were used to identify flawed pills Shaping is used to house break animals or kids You extinguish behavior by not rewarding it but if the behavior was originally learned by partial reward not rewarding behavior is going to produce Stimulus control response comes to be controlled by other stimuli in the environment Ask parents for things when they are happy before when you asked parents for things during particular mood they said yes so do it again Reinforcement Outline General see above Schedules of Reinforcement Ratio schedules built on the number of responses you reward after x responses to produce steady responses Interval schedules based on time you reward after x amount of time has gone by the organism will learn to tell time to distinguish the reward interval Negative Reinforcement General see above Escape and Avoidance Mower s two process theory Escape is somehow removing a negative stimulus negative reinforcement Escape behavior leads to negative reinforcement Example student gets behind in class tries to catch up and feels dumb so gets behind again so you are escaping the aversive situation and negatively reinforcing yourself Escape wherever there is a chance that the negative stimulus might exist before the stimulus actually occurs Escape Avoidance Mowers two process theory dog Mower put dog in box turned on electric grid on one side that would shock dog Dog would jump over wall to other side of box where there was no grid escape behavior escaping the shock Soon as soon as you put dog in box it will jump over the wall before it ever gets shocked This is NOT escape because it is not escaping the shock avoidance the dog is avoiding being shocked
View Full Document
Unlocking...