Learning

Adaptation to the Environment Learning—any process through which experience at one time can alter an individual’s behavior at a future time A relatively permanent change in behavior due to experience What is experience: environmental effects filtered through the individual’s perceptions. Behavior at a future time. What is behavior?

Behaviorism The view that psychology should restrict its efforts to studying observable behaviors, not mental processes. Founded by John Watson Thought that all human behavior is a result of conditioning or due to past experience and environmental influences. Claimed he could take any child and train him to become any type of specialist.

Classical Conditioning A type of learning where a stimulus gains the power to cause a response because it predicts another stimulus that already produces that response OR to put it simply: When an animal learns to do a natural reflexive response to something that it would normally not do the response to. Form of learning by association

Stimulus-Response Stimulus - anything in the environment that one can respond to Response – any behavior or action

Stimulus-Response Relationship

Stimulus-Response Relationship

DiscPsy p. 166 Ivan Pavlov (1849–1936)

Pavlov’s Dogs Digestive reflexes and salivation Psychic secretion Hockenbury slides (Schulman) Russian physiologist who may have first studied classical conditioning in animals. most famous research on classical conditioning received a Nobel Prize for his studies of the reflexes involved in digestion initial discovery of what is now called classical conditioning emerged from his earlier studies of digestive reflexes of dogs. Using permanently implanted tubes to collect salivary and stomach juices from dogs he found that a dog salivates differently when different kinds of food are placed in his mouth. Encountered a problem: dogs that had been given food of previous occasions in his experiments would begin to salivate before receiving food. Apparently , signals that regularly preceded food, such as sight of the food or the sound associated with its delivery, alerted the dogs to the upcoming stimulation and caused them to salivate. He called this psychic secretions and at first thought it was simply a source of experimental error but later decided to study it physiologically.

Pavlov’s Research Apparatus

Ivan Pavlov Watch “Pavlov’s Discovery of Classical Conditioning” Video #6 from Worth’s Digital Media Archive for Psychology. Click on link below to view.

Classical Conditioning UNCONDITIONED STIMULUS REFLEX ACTION will elicit a NEUTRAL STIMULUS CONDITIONED STIMULUS CONDITIONED RESPONSE elicit NO REACTION Unconditioned Response Hockenbury slides (Schulman) A neutral stimulus, a bell did not elicit the unconditioned response--salivating. An unconditioned stimulus, food, did elicit the unconditioned response--salivating. By pairing the neutral stimulus with the unconditioned stimulus a number of times, the dog became conditioned to elicit a conditioned response with only the presentation of the now conditioned stimulus--the bell. Unconditioned Response

Neutral Stimulus—Bell Does not normally elicit (cause) a response or reflex action by itself a bell ringing a color a furry object

Unconditioned Stimulus—Food Always elicits a reflex action: an unconditioned (unlearned) response food blast of air noise

Unconditioned Response —Salivation The automatic response to the unconditioned stimulus A response to an unconditioned stimulus—naturally occurring & not learned Salivation at smell of food Eye blinks at blast of air Startle reaction in babies

Conditioned (Learned) Stimulus — Bell The stimulus that was originally neutral becomes conditioned after it has been paired with the unconditioned stimulus Will eventually cause the unconditioned response by itself

Conditioned (Learned) Response - Salivation The original unconditioned response becomes conditioned after it has been caused by the neutral stimulus Usually the same behavior as the UCR

Pavlov’s Experiment

Pavlov’s Experiment

Pavlov’s Experiment

DiscPsy Figure 5.1 p. 167

Classical Conditioning Terms Aquisition Extinction Spontaneous recovery Generalization Discrimination training Extinction- lack of reinforcement of the response and the resulting decline in response rate -an operantly conditioned response declines in rate and eventually disappears if it no longer results in a reinforcer ex: rats quit pressing levers if food pellets no longer appear Extinction is not true “unlearning” of the response but rather a learned inhibition of responding The mere passage of time following extinction can partially renew the conditioned reflex; called spontaneous recovery Generalization-phenomenon in which , after conditioning, stimuli that resemble the conditioned stimulus will elicit the conditioned response even though they themselves were never paired with the unconditioned response. Discrimination training can abolish generalization between two stimuli. By not linking the unconditioned stimulus to the neutral stimulus that has been generalized to, the animal will discriminate.

Acquisition The process of developing a learned response The initial learning that takes place in the during stage of conditioning when the animal starts to associate the NS with the US.

Acquisition

Extinction The diminishing of a learned response When the CS is continually presented without the UCS then the CR will eventually begin to disappear.

Extinction

Spontaneous Recovery The reappearance, after a rest period, of an extinguished conditioned response After a period of time if the CS is presented, the CR returns. Learning may disappear but is not eliminated.

Spontaneous Recovery

Generalization Process in which an organism produces the same CR to two similar stimuli (CS) The more similar the substitute stimulus is to the original used in conditioning, the stronger the generalized response

Generalization

Discrimination Ability of an animal to not respond to a new CS that is too different from the original CS. The subject learns that one stimuli predicts the UCS and the other does not.

John B. Watson and Little Albert 11-month-old infant Watson and his assistant, Rosalie Rayner, classically conditioned Albert to be frightened of white rats Led to questions about experimental ethics To Watch a Short Video on Watson and the Little Albert experiment click HERE. (4 min)

Little Albert – Before Conditioning

Little Albert – During Conditioning

Little Albert – After Conditioning

Little Albert - Generalization

DiscPsy Fig5.2b p170

Could Little Albert’s Fear Have Been Undone? YES!!! Through Counter Conditioning! Must pair the conditioned stimulus (Rat) with something that is incompatible with fear (Candy). BEFORE: Rat Fear Candy Happy CS = CR UCS = UCR CS + UCS = UCR CS = New CR DURING: Rat Candy Happy AFTER: Rat Not Scared

Classical Conditioning & Drug Use

Responses Similar to the Drug’s Effect: Classically Conditioned Drug Effect Drugs that are regularly used to restore normal functioning produce a conditioned response (CR) similar to the drug’s effect. (see diagram below) This can result in a Placebo Response – a psychological & physiological reaction to a fake treatment or drug. You feel more alert after drinking decaffeinated coffee

Responses OPPOSITE to the Drug’s Effect: Classically Conditioned Compensatory Response Drugs that are regularly used to disrupt normal functioning produce a conditioned compensatory response (CCR) opposite to the drug’s effect. This is caused by your body naturally trying to compensate and restore normal functioning. Eventually, stimuli that reliably precede the administration of a drug cause a physiological reaction that is opposite to the drug’s effects. May be one explanation for the characteristics of withdrawal and tolerance

The Conditioned Compensatory Response

Siegel’s CCR Studies If a drug abuser does their drug in an unfamiliar setting they will run the risk of overdose because they will not have the CCR effect before they take the drug. Spontaneous recovery is a reason people relapse when they find themselves in a similar situation to the one in which they regularly used the drug.

Siegel’s Rat Study Over the course of a month, rats gradually developed tolerance to increasing amounts of heroin. Then, they were injected with an overdose of almost twice as much heroin as they had become accustomed to receiving. Rats that were injected with the heroin overdose in the same setting in which they had previously received heroin were twice as likely to survive as were rats that were injected in a different setting. Almost all the rats in the control group that had not previously been exposed to heroin died.

CCR & Drug Overdose Some heroin addicts have died after injecting their usual amount of heroin in an unfamiliar environment. Why?

Cognition and Biological Predispositions: Does Classical Conditioning change what the animal knows as well as its behavior?

Robert Rescorla (1940- ) Developed a theory emphasizing the importance of cognitive/mental processes in classical conditioning Pointed out that subjects had to determine (think) whether the NS/CS was a reliable predictor of the UCS The Bell was a reliable predictor that Food would follow.

Rescorla’s Experiment Group 1 found the tone to be a reliable predictor of the shock and as a result their heart rates increased each time they heard it. Group 2 experienced 20 random shocks with no tone in addition to the original 20 shocks with a tone. They had a much smaller fear response to the tone because it was not a reliable predictor of the shock.(pg. 200-201)

Evolutionary Perspective

Biological Preparedness & Phobias Martin Seligman We are biologically predisposed to learn things that affect our survival. We are predisposed to avoid threats our ancestors faced--food that made us sick, storms, heights, snakes, etc. People more easily acquire conditioned fear responses to pictures of snakes & spiders when paired with electric shocks than they do with flowers and mushrooms. Monkeys will learn a fear response to snakes & crocodiles but not to flowers and toy rabbits. But not modern-day threats—knives, stoves, cars, water pollution, etc. Recent studies showed that children like Little Albert could NOT be classically conditioned to fear things like wooden blocks & curtains.

Taste Aversion Rats drank flavored water (NS) and hours later were given a shot with a drug (UCS) that made them sick (UCR). The rats refused to drink the flavored water again. Subjects become classically conditioned to avoid specific tastes, because the tastes are associated with nausea. John Garcia (1917- ) **Differs from other Classical Conditioning in that: It did NOT require repeated pairings of a NS and UCS. The time span between the two was a few hours. Rats were conditioned to taste and not anything else that occurred in the hours between when they drank the flavored water and got sick.

How Taste Aversion Works: BEFORE NS = No Response UCS = UCR DURING: NS + UCS = UCR AFTER: CS = CR Flavored Water Drug Nausea Flavored Water Drug Nausea Flavored Water Avoidance