Learning theories

• what is classical conditioning


  classical conditioning is learning by association and refers to the conditioning of refelxes.
• what did pavlov (1927) do

  studied the salvation reflex in dogs and found dogs started to salivate before the food bucket arrived, often at the sights of the food bucket or the sound of the bell. This shows that dogs had learnt to associate new external stimuli (sights and sound) with the original stimulus (food). This shows us that animals can learn by association.
• what is an unconditioned stimulus


  any stimulus producing a natural, unlearned response
• what is an unconditioned response


  a response that occurs naturally without any form of learning
• what is a neutral stimulus

  an enviromental stimulus that doesnt produce a response
• what is a conditioned stimulus

  a stimulus that has been associated with an unconditioned stimulus
• what is a conditioned response


  a behaivour that is shown in response to a learned stimulus
• what is extinction in classical conditioning


  The removal of a behaivour this happens when the Conditioned Stimulus is continually presented without the Unconditioned Stimulus and so slowly learning to disassociate the two stimuli.
• what is spontaneous recovery in classical conditioning

  if the Conditioned stimulus is once again paired with the Uncondtioned Stimulus following extinction, then the behaivour will quickly be learned again
• what is stimulus generalisation in classical conditioning

  the stimulus triggering a reaction.if similar stimulus, it will likely produce a conditioned response
• what is discrimition in classical conditioning

  Over a period of time , learning only occurs in response to a specific stimulus.
• CLASSICAL CONDITIONING - strength - research evidence

  There is research evidence which is highly controlled, For example, Pavlov found dogs learned an association between the bell and the food therefore produced a reflex (salvation) at the sound of the bell This supports the idea that behaivours can be learnt through the association of a learned stimulus
• CLASSICAL CONDITIONING - strength - RL appliactions

  The principles of CC have real life applications. For example treatments such as systematic desensitisation for phobias which works on the principles of CC are very effective. therefore although it might be too simplistic to explain all behaviours, it is useful.
• CLASSICAL CONDITIONING - weakness - generalisability

  However Pavlov and other studies looking at Classical Conditioning , use animals, this can be problematic because animals have less higher order of thinking and a less developed cerebral cortex. Therefore It may be hard to generalise behaivours learnt through association
• CLASSICAL CONDITIONING - weakness - simplistic


  it only explains one aspect of how we might learn and could be too simplistic by not taking into account our thought processes and motivation For example Social Learning Theory suggests that learning occurs through observing role models This is a weakness as Classical conditioning may not be the best explanation of how we learn more complex behaviours which do not simply occur due to a stimulus and response
• who is the classic study for learning theories

  Watson and Raynor
• Watson and Raynor: AIM


  To find out if classical conditioning works on humans and if a fear response can be conditioned into a 9 month old baby boy. Another aim is to see if the fear response will be generalised to other animals and objects and how long the conditioning lasts.
• Watson and Raynor: PROCEDURE

  A nine month old boy, albert, was tested with a white rat, a rabbit, cotton wool, and a few other stimuli to see if he were to have a fear reaction. He didn't, so these are therefore neutral stimuli.The researcher checked his fear response at the sounded of banging an iron bar. This noise caused albert to cry, showing the noise was an unconditioned stimulus, making the crying an unconditioned response.At 11 months old, albert was conditioned by showing him the white rat three times. Each time he was shown the rat, the iron bar was strikes. Albert began to whimper. A week later, the same process happened again, banging the bar whilst showing the white rat.
• Watson and Raynor: RESULTS

  when the rat was presented on its own, albert whimpered. After one last conditioning, the next time he was shown the rat alone, he cried. Suggesting that the Neutral Stimulus is now a Conditioned Stimulus and albert crying is a Conditioned Response. Albert experienced generalisation of response as he suffered the same fear (crying and crawling away) for other white fluffy objects including a rabbit and a Santa mask.
• Watson and Raynor: conclusions


  They concluded that they had successfully conditioned albert to fear the rate and that he had generalised the fear to white fluffy objects and transferred it to other situations.The conditioning lasted over a month, and Watson predicted that the fear responses would last a lifetime.
• Watson and Raynor : EVALUATION- strength/weakness - generalisability

  only used one child however albert was picked due to normalcy, so his reactions should have been the same of any baby.
• Watson and Raynor : EVALUATION- strength/weakness -Validity


  strength - the study had many careful controls, making it have high internal validity. for example watson hid behind a curtain when striking the iron bar so that Albert would associate the noise with the rat, not with him or the bar or the hammer. weakness - The setting for the experiment lacks ecological validity because Albert was away from his playroom and familiar faces.
• Watson and Raynor: evaluation - strength: reliability

  - high reliability as it has standardised procedures and was precisely documented and filmed which ensures high inter-rater reliability. Although the study has never been replicated, it could be done easily.
• Watson and Raynor: evaluation - weakness : ethics


  Watson and Raynor they deliberately caused stress to an infant and ignored the fact the child was upset and scared. And as they weren't able to remove conditioned reactions, he could have been left with long term phobias.
• what is operant conditioning

  opernt conditioning is learning through the consequences of actions for example what happnens after a particular behaivour will determine whether it will be repeated or stopped . this behaivour is usually voluntary (happens consciously)
• in operant conditioning actions can either be ..... or ......

  reinforced or punished
• what are the two types of reinforcement in operant condiotion - define them

  positive reinforcement - rewarding the subject by adding something they like. negative reinforcement - rewarding the subject by removing/avoiding an aversive stimulus
• what are the two types of punishment in operant conditioning - define them

  positive punishment - punishing the subject by adding an unpleasant / adversive stimulus negative punishment - punishing the subject by removing a desirable stimulus.
• operant conditioning - what is primary reinforcement - give eg


  stimuli which are naturally reinforcing because they satisfy a need (e.g. Food)
• operant conditioning - what is secondary reinforcement - give eg


  stimuli that are reinforcing through association with a primary reinforcer i.e. Does not directly satisfy a need but may be the means to do so (e.g. Money)
• what is behaviour modification

  its a therpay that has its theoretical basis in operant conditioning. the intention is to get rid of undesirable behaivour by removing the reinforcer. the intention is also to replace original behaviour with a desirable behaviour and reinforce it.
• what is behaivour shaping

  at the start of a behaviour-shaping exercise, very general desired behaviours related to what you want to see are rewarded. Once this behaviour has been shown, the rewards become more selective so that only behaviours a little closer to the exact desired behaviour you wish to see are reinforced.
• Operant conditioning - Evaluation - strength : research evidence

  Skinner’s (1948) animal studies showed that rats would press a lever to receive a reward, Therefore this supports the idea behaviour can be learned through reward and consequences.
• Operant conditioning - Evaluation - strength : application

  Mestel and Concar (1994) found a token economy programme to be successful in treating cocaine addicts who were given shopping vouchers as rewards for staying “clean”. Therefore the principles of OC can be useful
• Operant conditioning - Evaluation - weakness: oversimplified


  It could be said that Skinner’s observations only account for observable behaviours and do not account for any unobservable behaviours, for example mental and emotional states, such as anger or happiness, making his explanations limited and oversimplified. It also ignores the role of biology an our genes.
• Operant conditioning - Evaluation - weakness: animals vs human anatomy

  Animals obviously have different anatomy and physiology and their day-to-day experiences are very different from humans; for example, animals do not reflect on their learning experiences with logic, patience or feelings like humans do. A fundamental difference between a rat and a human is language. A human can stop a behaviour simply by being told that no more rewards will be given.
• what is social learning theory

  social learing theory is a way of explainung behaviour that includes both direct and indirect reinforcement. albert bandura agreed that much of our behaivour is learned from experiance.
• social learning theory : describe the 4 mediation processes in order

  1. ATTENTION - the person must pay attention to the model. 2. RETENTION - the person must be able to remember the bahaviour that has been observed. 3. MOTOR REPRODUCTION - person must have the ability to replicate the behaviour that the model has demonstrated. 4. MOTIVATION - learner must want to show the behaivour they have learnt. this could be due to internal motivation. but it can also be helped by vicarious reinforcement.
• SLT - what is vicarious reinforcement

  Vicarious reinforcement involves learning through observation of the consequences of actions for other people.​ When a learner observes a role model receiving reinforcement, the learner is motivated to imitate the behaviour as if they had been reinforced themselves.
• Social learning theory - evaluation - strength: researcher evidence

  Bandura’s studies showed that children would imitate an aggressive model who demonstrated aggression against an inflatable doll, especially if the model was the same sex and was rewarded for doing so. This supports the idea that behaviour is acquired through observation and imitation.