PSY 301 1st Edition Lecture 19 Outline of Last Lecture I. LearningII. Classical ConditioningIII. Biological Bases of LearningIV. The Unconditioned PairV. Garcia StudyOutline of Current Lecture I. Operant ConditioningII. ReinforcementIII. Positive ReinforcementIV. Negative ReinforcementV. PunishmentVI. ExtinctionVII. Biological ConstraintsCurrent LectureDifferences between Classical &Operant Conditioning1. What is learned• A. classical: the relationship between two stimuli• B. operant: the relationship between a response and an outcome2. How a response is made• A. classical: the response is involuntarily elicited by the stimulus• B. operant: the response is voluntarily selected from a possible set of responses3. The relationship between response and reinforcement• A. classical: reinforcement is independent of the animal’s response • B. operant: reinforcement depends on the animal’s responseOperant or Instrumental Conditioning: the processes involved in learning the relationship between environmental events and the animal’s voluntary actions• 1. involves a three-term contingency:a. antecedents: cues indicating whether some consequence will occur for a behavior• b. response: the behavior being made• c. consequences: the reaction to the responseInitial research on animal thought was stimulated by Darwin’s ideas Thorndike turned to experimental research on problem solving in animals• 1. the law of effect: the effect of a response determines whether the tendency toperform that response is strengthened or weakenedThe operant chamber, or Skinner box, comes with a bar or key that an animal manipulates to obtain a reinforcer like food or water. The bar or key is connected to devices that record the animal’s response.Operant conditioning is based on the cocnept of reinforcementReinforcement: an environmental outcome which makes the associated response more probable in the future* by definition: reinforcement makes a response more likelyPositive reinforcement: a good environmental outcome to a response, which makes that response more likely in the future1. whether an outcome is good depends upon the person/animalNegative reinforcement: ends or avoids a bad environmental situation, which makes that response more likely in the future1. whether a situation is bad depends upon the person/animalPunishment, a negative environmental outcome produced by a response, which makes that response less likely to occur in the future1. not a type of reinforcement2. two kinds of punishmenta. positive punishment: the response is followed by an aversive stimulusb. negative punishment: the response is followed by the withdrawal of a desirable stimulusReinforcement is more effective with:1. More pairings of the response and the reinforcement2. Shorter delays between the response and the reinforcementExtinction: eliminating reinforcement eventually eliminates the response1. an extinguished response can be rapidly reconditioned2. an extinguished response can be spontaneously recoveredDiscrimination: animals learn to discriminate between responses that will and will not be reinforcedShaping: gradually training an animal to make a response that is not normally in its repertoire*reinforcing through successive approximationsConditioned reinforcement: conditioned (secondary) reinforcers have the same impact on behavior as primary reinforcers*An initially neutral stimulus becomes a secondary reinforcer in operant conditioning as a result of being paired with a primary reinforcer during classical conditioningSchedules of reinforcement: 1. continual reinforcement: reinforcing every responsea. produces the fastest learning2. partial reinforcement: reinforcing behavior only part of the timea. produces the greatest resistance to extinction1. Fixed-ratio schedule: Reinforces a response only after a specified number of responses. 2. Variable-ratio schedule: Reinforces a response after an unpredictable number of responses. a. hard to extinguish because of the unpredictability. Interval Schedules1. Fixed-interval schedule: Reinforces a response only after a specified time has elapsed. 2. Variable-interval schedule: Reinforces a response at unpredictable time intervals, which produces slow, steady responses. Biological constraints: a response is most easily learned if it is naturally related to the reinforcement1. animals: responses that are naturally made to a stimulus are easier to reinforce2. humans learn arbitrary relationships better than animalsCharacteristics of the learner also influence the ease of conditioning1. introverts/extraverts2. antisocial personality
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