Learning Psychology

• learning


  a relatively permanent change in an organism's behavior due to experience

  
• associative learning


  learning that certain events occur together.

  
• classical conditioning


  a type of learning in which one learns to link two or more stimuli and anticipate events (must be instinctual)

  
• behaviorism


  psychology: (1) should be an objective science that (2) studies behavior without reference to mental processes.

  
• unconditioned response (UR)


  the unlearned, naturally occurring reaction to US, such as salivation when food is in the mouth

  
• unconditioned stimulus (US)


  a stimulus that naturally and automatically triggers a reaction (like food)

  
• conditioned response (CR)


  the learned reaction to a previously neutral stimulus (CS)

  
• conditioned stimulus (CS)


  an originally irrelevant stimulus that, after association with an US, comes to trigger a conditioned reaction

  
• acquisition


  the "learned" behavior or response

  
• extinction


  the diminishing of a CR; when a response is no longer reinforced

  
• spontaneous recovery


  the reappearance, after a pause, of an extinguished CR

  
• generalization


  the tendency, once a response has been conditioned, for stimuli similar to the CS to elicit responses

  
• discrimination


  the learned ability to distinguish between a CS and stimuli that do not signal an US

  
• learned helplessness


  the hopelessness and passive resignation an animal or human learns when unable to avoid repeated aversive events

  
• operant conditioning


  a type of learning in which behavior is strengthened if followed by a reinforcer or diminished followed by a punisher

  
• law of effect


  Thorndike's principle that behaviors followed by favorable consequences become more likely, or where behaviors followed by unfavorable consequences become less likely

  
• operant chamber


  Skinner box containing a bar or key that an animal can manipulate to obtain food or water reinforce; attached devices record the animal's rate of bar pressing or key pecking

  
• shaping


  reinforcers guide behavior toward closer and closer approximations of the desired behavior

  
• discriminative stimulus


  a stimulus that elicits a response after association with reinforcement (in contrast to related stimuli not associated with reinforcement)

  
• reinforcer


  any event that strengthens the behavior it follows

  
• positive reinforcement


  increasing behaviors by presenting positive stimuli, such as food.

  
• negative reinforcement


  increasing behaviors by stopping or reducing negative stimuli, such as shock.

  
• primary reinforce


  an innately reinforcing stimulus, such as one that satisfies a biological need

  
• continuous reinforcement


  reinforcing the desired response every time it occurs

  
• partial (intermittent) reinforcement


  reinforcing a response only part of the time; results in slower acquisition of a response but much greater resistance to extinction than does continuous reinforcement

  
• fixed-ratio schedule


  a reinforcement schedule that reinforces a response only after a specified number of responses

  
• variable-ratio schedule


  a reinforcement schedule that reinforces a response after an unpredictable number of responses

  
• fixed-interval schedule


  a reinforcement schedule that reinforces a response only after a specified time has elapsed

  
• variable-interval schedule


  a reinforcement schedule that reinforces a response at unpredictable time intervals

  
• punishment


  an event that decreases the behavior that it follows

  
• cognitive map


  a mental representation of the layout of one's environment. (For example, after exploring a maze, rats act as if they have learned a cognitive map of it)

  
• latent learning


  learning that occurs but is not apparent until there is an incentive to demonstrate it LATER

  
• insight


  a sudden and often novel realization of the solution to a problem

  
• intrinsic motivation


  a desire to perform a behavior effectively for its own sake; INSIDE

  
• extrinsic motivation


  a desire to perform a behavior to receive promised rewards or avoid threatened punishment, OUTSIDE

  
• modeling


  the process of observing and imitating a specific behavior

  
• mirror neurons


  frontal lobe neurons that fire when performing certain actions or when observing another doing so. The brain's mirroring of another's actions may enable imitation and empath

  
• little albert


  subject in John Watson's experiment, proved classical conditioning principles, especially the generalization of fear

  
• Albert Bandura


  researcher famous for work in observational or social learning including the famous Bobo doll experiment

  
• John Garcia


  Researched taste aversion. Showed that when rats ate a novel substance before being nauseated by a drug or radiation, they developed a conditioned taste aversion for the substance.