Learning
Chapter Overview
• Basic Learning Concepts and Classical
Conditioning
• Operant Conditioning
• Biology, Cognition, and Learning
What do we mean by “learning”?
Learning is the process of acquiring through
experience new and relatively enduring information
or behaviors.
1) Associative Learning is learning that certain
events occur together.
2) Cognitive Learning is the acquisition of mental
information, whether by observing events, by
watching others, or through language.
Associative Learning
The process of learning associations is
conditioning, which takes two main forms:
1) Classical Conditioning
2) Operant Conditioning
Classical Conditioning
In classical conditioning, we associate stimuli that we do not
control, and we automatically respond (exhibiting respondent
behaviors). It is biologically adaptive because it helps humans and
animals prepare for good or bad events.
A stimulus is an event
or situation that evokes
a response
Operant Conditioning
In operant conditioning, we associate a response (our
behavior) and its consequence (producing operant
behaviors).
Classical Conditioning
Ivan Pavlov
(1849-1936)
• Ivan Pavlov’s early twentieth-
century experiments are
psychology’s most famous
research.
• Pavlov studied the digestive
system; recipient of Russia’s
first Nobel Prize (1904).
• An incidental observation
triggered his new direction.
Pavlov and Behaviorism
– Classical conditioning
Type of learning in which one learns to link two or
more stimuli and anticipate events.
– Behaviorism
Psychology should be an objective science that
studies behavior without reference to mental
processes.
Pavlov’s Classic Experiment
Pavlov presented a neutral stimulus (a tone) just before an
unconditioned stimulus (food in mouth). The neutral stimulus
then became a conditioned stimulus, producing a conditioned
response.
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Pavlov’s Classic Experiment
• Neutral stimulus (NS): a stimulus that elicits no response before
conditioning
• Unconditioned response (UR): an unlearned, naturally occurring
response (such as salivation) to an unconditioned stimulus (US)
(such as food in the mouth)
• Unconditioned stimulus (US): a stimulus that unconditionally—
naturally and automatically—triggers an unconditioned response
(UR)
• Conditioned response (CR): a learned response to a previously
neutral (but now conditioned) stimulus (CS)
• Conditioned stimulus (CS): an originally irrelevant stimulus, that,
after association with an unconditioned stimulus (US), comes to
trigger a conditioned response (CR)
Before Conditioning
Unconditioned stimulus and response:
a stimulus which triggers a response naturally,
before/without any conditioning
Unconditioned
response (UR):
Unconditioned dog salivates
stimulus (US):
yummy dog food
Before Conditioning
Neutral stimulus:
a stimulus which does not trigger a response
Neutral
stimulus
(NS)
No response
During Conditioning
The bell/tone (N.S.) is repeatedly presented with
the food (U.S.).
Neutral Unconditioned
stimulus Unconditioned response (UR):
(NS) stimulus (US) dog salivates
After Conditioning
The dog begins to salivate upon hearing the tone
(neutral stimulus becomes conditioned stimulus).
Did you follow the changes? Conditioned
The UR and the CR are the response:
Conditioned same response, triggered by
(formerly different events. dog salivates
neutral) The difference is whether
conditioning was necessary
stimulus for the response to happen.
The NS and the CS are the
same stimulus.
The difference is whether
the stimulus triggers the
conditioned response.
Conditioning Principles
For three decades, Pavlov’s research demonstrated
associative learning, exploring five major
conditioning processes:
1) Acquisition
2) Extinction
3) Spontaneous recovery
4) Generalization
5) Discrimination
Acquisition
Acquisition is the initial stage, when one links a neutral stimulus
and an unconditioned stimulus so that the neutral stimulus begins
triggering the conditioned response
What gets “acquired”?
The association between a neutral stimulus (NS) and an
unconditioned stimulus (US).
How can we tell that acquisition has occurred?
The unconditioned response (UR) now gets triggered by a
conditioned stimulus (CS) - drooling now gets triggered by a bell.
Timing
For the association to be acquired,
the neutral stimulus (NS) needs to repeatedly appear before the
unconditioned stimulus (US)…about a half-second before, in most
cases. The bell must come right before the food.
17
Extinction
Extinction refers to the diminishing of a conditioned response; when
an unconditioned stimulus (US) does not follow a conditioned
stimulus (CS) - If the food (US) stops appearing with the bell (CS), the
salivation (CR) decreases.
Spontaneous Recovery
Spontaneous Recovery is the reappearance, after a pause, of an
extinguished conditioned response.
• Following a rest period, presenting the tone alone might lead to a
spontaneous recovery (a return of the conditioned response
despite a lack of further conditioning).
• If the CS (tone) is again presented repeatedly without the US, the
CR becomes extinct again.
Generalization
Generalization is the tendency that once a
response has been conditioned, for stimuli
similar to the conditioned stimulus to elicit
similar responses
Pavlov demonstrated generalization by
attaching miniature vibrators to various
parts of a dog’s body, conditioning salivation
to stimulation of the thigh.
Discrimination
Discrimination is the learned ability to distinguish between a
conditioned stimulus (which predicts the US) and other
irrelevant stimuli
Ivan Pavlov conditioned dogs to drool at
bells of a certain pitch; slightly different
pitches did not trigger drooling.
Pavlov’s Legacy
• Consensus among psychologists that classical
conditioning is a basic form of learning.
• Why should we care that dogs can be conditioned
to the sound of a tone? Many other responses to
many other stimuli can be classically conditioned in
many other organisms.
• Pavlov demonstrated how a learning process can be
studied objectively.
• Classical conditioning is a basic form of learning
that applies to all species.
Pavlov, Human Health and Well-being
• Pavlov’s principles are used to influence human
health and well-being
• Areas of consciousness, motivation, emotion,
health, psychological disorders, therapy
• Addicts counseled to avoid stimuli (for example,
people and settings) that may trigger cravings
• Pairing particular taste with drug that influences
immune responses may eventually lead to immune
response from taste alone
Pavlov and Watson
John B. Watson
Pavlov’s work also
provided a basis for
Watson’s ideas that human
emotions and behaviors,
though biologically
influenced, are mainly a
bundle of conditioned
responses.
Watson and “Little Albert”
• Watson applied classical
conditioning principles in his
studies of “Little Albert” to
demonstrate how specific
fears might be conditioned.
• Watson boasted that he
could take any healthy
infant and train for any
career specialization,
regardless of any inborn
traits, but later admitted to
“going beyond his facts.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMnhyGozLyE
Operant Conditioning
– Operant conditioning is a type of learning in which
behavior is strengthened if followed by a reinforcer or
diminished if followed by a punisher.
– Actions followed by reinforcers increase; those followed
by punishment decrease.
– Operant behavior is behavior that operates on the
environment to produce rewarding or punishing stimuli.
(In contrast, classical conditioning involves respondent
behavior—automatic responses to a stimulus.)
Behavior operates on
Organisms associate
the environment to
their own actions with
produce rewarding or
consequences.
punishing stimuli.
Actions followed by
reinforcement increase;
those followed by
punishments often
decrease.
Associative Learning:
Operant Conditioning
– Child associates his “response” (behavior) with consequences.
– Child learns to repeat behaviors (saying “please”) which were
followed by desirable results (cookie).
– Child learns to avoid behaviors (yelling “give me!”) which were
followed by undesirable results (scolding or loss of dessert).
Operant Conditioning
Operant conditioning involves Reinforcement is an event that
adjusting to the consequences of strengthens the behavior it
our behaviors. Examples: follows.
• We may smile more at work For people, it may be praise,
after this repeatedly gets us attention, or a paycheck.
bigger tips.
• We learn how to ride a bike For hungry and thirst animals,
using the strategies that don’t food and water work well.
make us crash.
Response: Consequence: Behavior
balancing a ball receiving food strengthened
Thorndike’s Law of Effect
Edward L. Thorndike (1874-1949) created the Law of Effect
that states that behaviors followed by favorable consequences
(rewarded) tend to recur and vice versa.
Cat in a puzzle box Thorndike used a fish reward to entice cats to
find their way out of a puzzle box through a series of maneuvers.
The cats’ performance tended to improve with successive trials,
illustrating Thorndike’s law of effect.
B.F. Skinner (1904-1990)
– B. F. Skinner was modern
behaviorism’s most influential and
controversial figure.
– He expanded on Thorndike’s Law of
Effect
– Developed behavioral technology that
revealed principles of behavior control.
– Designed and used an operant chamber (popularly known as a
Skinner box) for experiments that included a bar (a lever) that an
animal presses (or a key or disc the animal pecks) to release a
reward of food or water, and also a device that records these
responses.
Skinner’s Experiments
– By shaping animals’ natural behaviors, Skinner was able
to teach these animals unnatural behaviors (such as
teaching pigeons to walk in a figure 8, play Ping-Pong,
and keep a missile on course by pecking at a screen
target).
– Reinforcement: Any event that strengthens the
behavior it follows.
A Skinner box
Inside the box, the rat presses a bar
for a food reward. Outside, a
measuring device (not shown)
records the animal’s accumulated
responses.
Shaping Behavior
– Everyday behaviors are continually reinforced and shaped.
– Shaping: an operant conditioning procedure in which
reinforces gradually guide behavior toward closer and
closer approximations of the desired behavior.
– With this method of successive approximations, responses
that are ever-closer to the final desired behavior are
rewarded, and all other responses are ignored.
Types of Reinforcers
Positive reinforcement
Increases behaviors by presenting positive
reinforcers. A positive reinforcer
Is any stimulus that, when presented after a
response, strengthens the response.
Negative reinforcement
Increases behaviors by stopping or
reducing negative stimuli. A negative
reinforce is any stimulus that, when
removed after a response, strengthens
the response. (Note: Negative
reinforcement is not punishment.)
Types of Reinforcers
Types of Reinforcers
Primary and Conditioned Reinforcers
• Primary reinforcer: Is unlearned; innately reinforcing
stimuli, such as those that satisfy biological needs
• Conditioned (secondary) reinforcer: A stimulus that
gains its reinforcing power through association with
primary reinforcer
Immediate and Delayed Reinforcers
• Immediate: Occurs immediately after a behavior
• Delayed: Involves time delay between desired response
of and delivery of reward
A Human Talent:
Responding to Delayed Reinforcers
• Dogs learn from immediate
reinforcement; a treat five minutes after a
trick won’t reinforce the trick.
• Humans have the ability to link a
consequence to a behavior even if they
aren’t linked sequentially in time.
• A piece of paper (paycheck) can be a
delayed reinforcer, paid a month later, if
we link it to our performance.
• Delaying gratification, a skill related to
impulse control, enables longer-term goal
setting.
Reinforcement Schedules
Reinforcement schedule is a pattern that defines how often a
desired response will be reinforced
• Continuous reinforcement schedule
– Reinforcing the desired response every time it
occurs
• Partial (intermittent) reinforcement schedule
– 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 (such as lottery or fishing)
Reinforcement Schedules
1) Fixed-ratio schedule
– Reinforcing a response only after a specified number of
responses (such as coffee rewards)
– High rate of responding
2) Variable-ratio schedule
– Reinforcing a response after an unpredictable number of
responses (such as gambling or fishing)
– High, consistent responding, even if reinforcement stops
(resists extinction)
Reinforcement Schedules
3) Fixed-interval schedule
– Reinforcing a response only after a specified time has elapsed
(such as checking mail prior to delivery or jelly before done)
– Slow responding, but rapid responding near time of
reinforcement
4) Variable-interval schedule
– Reinforcing a response at unpredictable time intervals
– Slow, consistent responding
Intermittent Reinforcement Schedules
Skinner’s (1961) laboratory pigeons produced four reinforcement
schedules. (Reinforcers are indicated by diagonal marks.)
Schedules of Partial Reinforcement
Which Schedule of Reinforcement is This?
Ratio or Interval? Fixed or Variable?
1. Rat gets food every third time it presses the lever FR
2. Getting paid weekly no matter how much work is done FI
3. Getting paid for every ten boxes you make FR
4. Hitting a jackpot sometimes on the slot machine VR
5. Checking cell phone all day; sometimes getting a text VI
6. Buy eight pizzas, get the next one free FR
7. Kid has tantrum, parents sometimes give in VR
Punishment
Punishment administers an undesirable consequence or
withdraws something desirable in an attempt to decrease the
frequency of a behavior (a child’s disobedience).
• Positive punishment
– Presenting a negative consequence after an undesired
behavior is exhibited, making the behavior less likely to
happen in the future
• Negative punishment
– Removing a desired stimulus after particular undesired
behavior is exhibited, resulting in reducing behavior in
future
Punishment
Drawbacks of Physical Punishment
Punished behavior is suppressed, not
forgotten. This temporary state may
1 (negatively) reinforce parents’ punishing
1
behavior.
Punishment teaches discrimination among
2 situations (perhaps only selectively decreasing
the undesired behavior).
3 Punishment can teach fear.
Physical punishment may increase
4 aggression by modeling violence as a way
to cope with problems.
Skinner’s Legacy: Applications of
Operant Conditioning
• At school: Electronic technologies and adaptive learning
software used in teaching and learning have helped realize
Skinner’s goal of individually paced, customized instruction
with immediate feedback.
• In sports: Behavioral methods implemented in shaping
behavior in athletic performance through first reinforcing small
successes then gradually increasing the challenge.
• At work: Rewards successfully used to increase productivity
and skill development.
• At home: Basic rules of shaping used in parenting, and to
reinforce our own desired behaviors.
Reinforcing Desired Behavior and
Extinguishing Undesired Ones
Decide how,
State a Monitor how
when, and
realistic goal often you
where you
in engage in
will work
measurable your desired
toward your
terms. behavior.
goal.
Reduce the Reinforce the
rewards desired
gradually. behavior.
Contrasting Classical and Operant
Conditioning
• Both classical and operant conditioning are forms of
associative learning.
• Both involve acquisition, extinction, spontaneous
recovery, generalization, and discrimination.
• Classical conditioning involves respondent behaviors
and operant conditioning involves operant
behaviors.
Contrasting Classical and Operant
Conditioning
Biopsychosocial Influences on Learning
Constraints on Conditioning
Limits on Classical Conditioning
Biological constraints: Evolved biological
tendencies that predispose animals’ behavior and
learning, making certain behaviors more easy to
learn than others.
Constraints on Conditioning
Limits on Classical Conditioning
– Garcia and Koelling’s
taste-aversion research
– Animals including
humans seem
biologically prepared
to learn some
associations rather
than others
– Conditioning is
stronger when the CS
is ecologically relevant
Constraints on Conditioning
Limits on Classical Conditioning
Genetic predisposition to associate CS with a US that
follows predictably and immediately is adaptive
Constraints on Conditioning
Limits on Operant Conditioning
– Nature limits species’
capacity for operant
conditioning
– Biological constraints
predispose organisms to
learn associations that are
naturally adaptive
– Instinctive drift occurs as
animals revert to
biologically predisposed
patterns
Cognition’s Influence on Conditioning
Cognition and Classical Conditioning
– Mental information that guides behavior is acquired
through cognitive learning.
– Animals learn the predictability of event (Rescorla and
Wagner, 1972).
– The more predictable the association between a
neutral stimulus and unconditioned stimulus, the
stronger the conditioned response. It’s as if the animal
learns an expectancy, an awareness of how likely it is
that the US will occur.
Cognition’s Influence on Conditioning
Cognition and Operant Conditioning
– Cognitive map is a mental
representation of the layout
of one’s environment.
– Latent learning is learning
that occurs but is not
apparent until there is an
incentive to demonstrate it.
– Development of cognitive
maps in rats (latent learning Animals, like people, can
that only becomes evident learn from experience, with or
when there is an incentive to without reinforcement.
demonstrate it).
Cognition’s Influence on Conditioning
Cognition and Operant Conditioning
– Intrinsic motivation: A desire to perform a behavior
effectively for its own sake.
– Extrinsic motivation: A desire to perform a behavior
to receive promised rewards or avoid threatened
punishment.
Biological and Cognitive Influences on
Conditioning
Cognitive Learning
Cognitive Learning refers to acquiring new behaviors and
information mentally, rather than by direct experience.
Cognitive learning occurs:
1) by observing events and the behavior of others.
2) by using language to acquire information about
events experienced by others.
Observational learning: Higher animals, especially humans,
learn without direct experience by watching and imitating
others
Observational Learning
Albert Bandura
is the pioneering researcher of
observational learning, famous for
the Bobo doll experiment
Observational learning: Higher
animals, especially humans, learn
without direct experience by
watching and imitating others
Modeling is the process of
observing and imitating a specific
behavior
Bandura’s Bobo Doll Experiment
(1961)
• Kids saw adults punching an inflated doll while narrating
their aggressive behaviors such as “kick him.”
• These kids were then put in a toy-deprived situation… and
acted out the same behaviors they had seen.
Bobo doll experiment: results
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Bandura’s Bobo Doll Experiment
(1961)
The Bobo doll experiment showed direct imitation by
children of the adult behavior
• Vicarious reinforcement and vicarious punishment
experienced by watching models
• We learn to anticipate a behavior’s consequences
in situations like those we are observing
• Our choices are affected as we see others get
consequences for their behaviors
Mirrors and Imitation in the Brain
– Mirror neurons: Frontal lobe neurons that fire only to reflect
the actions or feelings of others; provide a neural basis for
everyday imitation and observational learning
– When we watch others doing or feeling something, neurons
fire in patterns that would fire if we were doing the action or
having the feeling ourselves.
– The brain’s
mirroring of
another’s action
may enable
imitation and
empathy.
Mirrors and Imitation in the Brain
– The more we identify with someone, the more we
experience vicarious reinforcement or reward
• Ex. Observing someone winning a reward
activates reward centers as if we were given a
reward, specially if we identify or admire that
person (fMRI)
Through mirror neurons, the brain simulates and
(vicariously) experiences what we observe
Mirrors and Imitation in the Brain
– In humans, imitation is pervasive; so strong is the
human predisposition to learn from watching adults
that children will overimitate, copying even irrelevant
adult actions.
– Brain response to observing others makes emotions
contagious.
Prosocial Effects of Observational Learning
• Prosocial behavior refers to actions
which benefit others, contribute
value to groups, and follow moral
codes and social norms.
• Parents try to teach this behavior
through lectures, but it may be
taught best through modeling…
especially if kids can see the
benefits of the behavior to oneself
or others.
• Research across seven countries showed that viewing
prosocial media increased later helping behavior
• Socially responsive toddlers tend to have strong internalized
conscience as preschoolers
• Models most effective with consistent actions and words
Antisocial Effects of Observational Learning
– Abusive parents may have aggressive
children
– Watching TV and videos may teach children
• Bullying is effective tool for controlling
others
• Free and easy sex doesn’t have later
consequences
• Men should be tough; women should
be gentle
– Violence-viewing effect demonstrated
when viewing media violence triggers
violent behavior
– Watching cruelty may foster indifference.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_RMbpWARj6U
Media Models of Violence
Do we learn
antisocial
behavior such
as violence
from indirect
observations
of others in the
media?
Research shows that viewing media violence leads to
increased aggression (fights) and reduced prosocial behavior
(such as helping an injured person).
This violence-viewing effect might be explained by imitation,
and also by desensitization toward pain in others.
