1. Chapter Five
Learning

2. What Is Learning?
Learning refers to a relatively enduring change in behavior or knowledge as a result of experience. a r of experience.
Conditioning is the process of learning associations between environmental events and behavioral responses; there are 3 kinds.
Classical conditioning
Operant conditioning
Observational learning
Classical conditioning explains how certain stimuli can trigger an automatic response.
Operant conditioning is useful in understanding how we acquire new, voluntary actions and explains how learning is a process in which behavior is shaped and maintained by its consequences.
Observational learning is when we acquire new behaviors by observing the actions of others.

3. Classical Conditioning
Basic learning process that involves repeatedly pairing a neutral stimulus with a response-producing stimulus until the neutral stimulus elicits the same response
Discovered by Ivan Pavlov while he was studying digestion
Ivan Pavlov (1849–1936) In his laboratory, Pavlov was known for his meticulous organization, keen memory, and attention to details (Windholz, 1990).
But outside his lab, Pavlov was absentminded, forgetful, and impractical, especially regarding money. He often forgot to pick up his paycheck, and he sometimes lent money to people with hard luck stories who couldn’t possibly pay him back (Fancher, 1996).
On a trip to New York City, Pavlov carried his money so carelessly that he had his pocket picked in the subway, and his American hosts had to take up a collection to pay his expenses (Skinner, 1966).
Ivan Pavlov (1849–1936)

4. From Pavlov to Watson: The Founding of Behaviorism
John B. Watson
Founded new approach called behaviorism
Advocated scientific study of objectively observed behavior
Believed all human behavior is result of conditioning and learning
Conducted controversial “Case of Little Albert”
Pavlov systematically investigated different aspects of classical conditioning. Pavlov believed he had discovered the mechanism by which all learning occurs, but he did not apply his findings to human behavior.
Watson founded behaviorism in the early 1900s, emphasizing the scientific study of observable behaviors rather than the study of subjective mental processes (Hall, 2009). His influence spread far beyond the academic world. After a scandal ended his academic career, Watson went into advertising. He also wrote many books and articles for the general public on child rearing and other topics, popularizing the findings of the “new” science of psychology (Rilling, 2000).
John Broadus Watson (1878–1958)

5. Classical Conditioning in Contemporary Advertising
Taking a cue from John Watson, classical conditioning is widely used in today’s commercials and print ads, pairing emotion-evoking images with otherwise neutral stimuli, like soft drinks or new cars. See if you can identify the UCS, UCR, CS, and CR in this striking billboard.
Are such procedures effective? In a word, yes. Attitudes toward a product or a particular brand can be influenced by advertising and marketing campaigns that use classical conditioning methods (W. Hofmann & others, 2010).

6. Other Classically Conditioned Responses
The Smell of Coffee
Drug Responses
Regular use may produce “placebo response,” in which user associates sight, smell, taste with the drug effect.
Conditioned compensatory response (CCR)—classically conditioned response in which stimuli that reliably precede the administration of a drug elicit a physiological reaction that is opposite to the drug’s effects; may be one explanation for the characteristics of withdrawal and tolerance.

7. Classically Conditioned Drug Effects: Does Just the Smell of a Starbucks Espresso Perk You Up?
Figure 5.4 Classically Conditioned Drug Effects: Does Just the Smell of a Starbucks Espresso Perk You Up? If it does, classical conditioning is at work! Pavlov (1927) suggested that administering a drug could be viewed as a conditioning trial. Just like pairing the sound of a bell with the presentation of food, if specific environmental cues are repeatedly paired with a drug’s administration, they can become conditioned stimuli that eventually elicit the drug’s effect. For a regular coffee drinker, the sight, smell, and taste of freshly brewed coffee are the original neutral stimuli that, after being repeatedly paired with caffeine (the UCS), eventually become conditioned stimuli, producing the CR: increased arousal and alertness.

8. Contemporary Views of Classical Conditioning
Reliable and unreliable signals need processing
Conditioned stimulus must be a reliable signal that predicts presentations of unconditioned stimulus
Active processing of information: animals assess the predictive value of stimuli

9. Contemporary Views of Classical Conditioning
Rescorla’s view: Pavlovian conditioning
Involves sophisticated and sensible mechanism by which organisms represent the world
Involves learning the relationships between events
The conditioned stimulus and the unconditioned stimulus are simply two events, and the organism can be seen as trying to determine the relationship between them
Leads to its characterization as a mechanism by which the organism encodes relationships between events in the world
Robert A. Rescorla (1997)

10. Evolutionary Aspects of Classical Conditioning: Biological Predispositions to Learn
John Garcia demonstrated in lab rats a classically conditioned dislike for and avoidance of a particular food that developed when the rat became ill after eating the food.
This violates standard conditioning model
Conditioned taste aversions demonstrated the importance of natural behavior patterns influenced by evolution.
One factor that helps explain Garcia’s results is biological preparedness.
Biological preparedness: Organism is innately predisposed to form associations between certain stimuli and responses
This violates standard conditioning model
Only needs one pairing
Time between CS and UCS can be several hours
Particular conditioned stimulus that is used makes a difference in classical conditioning
Behaviorists originally argued that learning principles applied to all species in the 1960s.
John Garcia (b. 1917)

11. Evolution, Biological Preparedness, and Conditioned Fears: What Gives You the Creeps?
Seligman
Phobias seem to be quite selective. Extreme, irrational fears of snakes, spiders, heights, and small enclosed places are relatively common
Humans are biologically prepared to develop fears of objects or situations— such as snakes, spiders, and heights—that may once have posed a threat to humans’ evolutionary ancestors.
Öhman and Mineka
Because poisonous snakes, reptiles, and insects have been associated with danger throughout the evolution of mammals, there is an evolved “fear module” in the brain that is highly sensitized to such evolutionarily relevant stimuli.
Bregman
Research has been unable to produce a conditioned fear response to wooden blocks and curtains.

12. Operant Conditioning: Associating Behaviors and Consequences
Operant conditioning deals with the learning of active, voluntary behaviors that are shaped and maintained by their consequences.
Thorndike
First psychologist to systematically investigate animal learning and how voluntary behaviors are influenced by their consequences
Trial and error
Law of effect
Edward Lee Thorndike (1874–1949) As a graduate student, Thorndike became fascinated by psychology after taking a class taught by William James at Harvard University. Interested in the study of animal behavior, Thorndike conducted his first experiments with baby chicks.
When his landlady protested about the chickens in his room, Thorndike moved his experiments, chicks and all, to the cellar of William James’s home—much to the delight of the James children.
Following these initial experiments, Thorndike constructed his famous “puzzle boxes” to study learning in cats.
Later in ife, Thorndike focused his attention on mproving educational materials. Among his contributions was the Thorndike-Barnhart Junior Dictionary for children, which is still published today (Thorndike & Barnhart, 1997; R. L. Thorndike, 1991).
Edward Lee Thorndike (1874–1949)

13. Operant Conditioning Thorndike and the Law of Effect
Responses followed by a satisfying effect become strengthened and are more likely to recur in a particular situation.
Responses followed by a dissatisfying effect are weakened and less likely to recur in a particular situation.
Shown above is one of Thorndike’s puzzle boxes, which were made mostly out of wood slats and wire mesh. Thorndike constructed a total of 15 different puzzle boxes, which varied in how difficult they were for a cat to escape from. In a simple box like this one, a cat merely had to step on a treadle at the front of the cage to escape.
More complex boxes required the cat to perform a chain of three responses—step on a treadle, pull on a string, and push a bar up or down (Chance, 1999).
Cats had to escape from a “puzzle” box
Process was by trial and error
Observation led to Law of Effect

14. and the Search for “Order in Behavior”
Believed that psychology should restrict itself to studying only phenomena that could be objectively measured and verified— outwardly observable behavior and environmental events
Proposed that internal thoughts, beliefs, emotions, or motives could not be used to explain behavior
Coined the term operant to describe any “active” behavior that operates upon the environment to generate consequences
Invented the Skinner box
Burrhus Frederick Skinner (1904–1990) As a young adult, Skinner had hoped to become a writer. When he graduated from college, he set up a study in the attic of his parents’ home and waited
for inspiration to strike.
After a year of “frittering” away his time, he decided that there were better ways to learn about human nature (Moore, 2005a).
As Skinner (1967) later wrote, “A writer might portray human behavior accurately, but he did not understand it. I was to remain interested in human behavior, but the literary method had failed me;
I would turn to the scientific The relevant science appeared to be psychology, hough I had only the vaguest idea of what that meant.” Bettmann/Corbis Hockenbury_
B. F. Skinner (1904–1990)
and the Search for “Order in Behavior”

15. Reinforcement: Increasing Future Behavior
Operant conditioning explains learning as a process in which behavior is shaped and maintained by its consequences.
Reinforcement occurs when a stimulus or an event follows an operant and increases the likelihood of the operant being repeated.
One possible consequence of a behavior is reinforcement.

16. Reinforcement Two forms of reinforcement
Positive: Response is followed by the addition of a reinforcing stimulus, increasing the likelihood that the response will be repeated in similar situations
Negative: Response results in the removal of, avoidance of, or escape from a punishing stimulus, increasing the likelihood that the response will be repeated in similar situations
Operant conditioning explains learning as a process in which behavior is shaped and maintained by its consequences. One possible consequence of a behavior is reinforcement.
Negative reinforcement
Aversive stimuli involve physical or psychological discomfort that an organism seeks to escape or avoid. Behaviors are said to be negatively reinforced when they let you either
(1) Escape aversive stimuli that are already present, or
(2) Avoid aversive stimuli before they occur. Escape behavior; avoidance behavior

17. Negative Reinforcement
Aversive stimuli involve physical or psychological discomfort that an organism seeks to escape or avoid. Behaviors are said to be negatively reinforced when they let you either
Escape aversive stimuli that are already present or
(2) Avoid aversive stimuli before they occur.

18. Reinforcement Two forms of reinforcing stimuli
Primary reinforcer: Stimulus or event that is naturally or inherently reinforcing for a given species, such as food, water, or other biological necessities
Secondary (conditioned) reinforcer: Stimulus or event that has acquired reinforcing value by being associated with a primary reinforcer

19. Comparing Positive and Negative Reinforcement
Process
Operant Behavior
Consequence
Effect on Behavior
Positive reinforcement
Studying to make dean’s list
Make dean’s list
Increase studying in the future
Negative reinforcement
Studying to avoid losing academic scholarship
Avoid loss of academic scholarships

20. Punishment Punishment Two types of punishment identified by Skinner
Process in which a behavior is followed by an aversive consequence that decreases the likelihood of a behavior’s being repeated
Punishment and negative reinforcement are often confused.
Two types of punishment identified by Skinner
Punishment by application: a situation in which an operant is followed by presentation of or addition of an aversive stimulus; also called positive punishment
Punishment by removal: a situation in which an operant is followed by the removal or subtraction of a reinforcing stimulus; also called negative punishment

21. Comparing Punishment and Negative Reinforcement
To identify the type of reinforcement or punishment that has occurred, determine whether the stimulus is aversive or reinforcing and whether it was presented or removed following the operant.
Process
Operant
Consequence
Effect on Behavior
Punishment
Wear a warm but unstylish flannel shirt
A friend makes the hurtful comment, “Nice shirt. Whose couch did you steal to get the fabric?”
Cut down on wearing the shirt in the future
Negative
reinforcement
Avoid the feeling of being cold and uncomfortable all day
Wear the shirt more often in the future

22. Changing the Behavior of Others: Alternatives to Punishment
Problems with Punishment
Must be applied immediately
Does not teach or promote alternative, acceptable behavior
May produce undesirable results such as hostility, passivity, fear
Results are likely to be temporary
May model aggression
Alternatives to Punishment
Strategy 1: Reinforce an incompatible behavior
Strategy 2: Stop reinforcing the problem behavior
Strategy 3: Reinforce the nonoccurrence of the problem behavior
Strategy 4: Remove the opportunity to obtain positive reinforcement

23. Operant Conditioning Terms
Discriminative Stimulus
Specific stimulus in the presence of which a particular operant is more likely to be reinforced
Shaping
Selective reinforcement of successively closer approximations of goal behavior until goal behavior is displayed
Extinction
Gradual weakening and disappearance of conditioned behavior; occurs when an emitted behavior is no longer followed by a reinforcer
Schedules of Reinforcement
Skinner (1956) found that specific preset arrangements of partial reinforcement produced different patterns and rates of responding (schedules of reinforcement).

24. Discriminative Stimuli: Setting the Occasion for Responding
In the presence of a specific environmental stimulus (discriminative stimulus)
we emit a particular behavior (operant)
which is followed by a consequence (reinforcement or punishment).
Discriminative stimulus: Specific stimulus in the presence of which a particular operant is more likely to be reinforced
If the consequence is either positive or negative reinforcement, we are more likely to repeat the operant when we encounter the same or similar discriminative stimuli in the future.
If the consequence is some form of punishment, we are less likely to repeat the operant when we encounter the same or similar discriminative stimuli in the future.

25. Key Components of Operant Conditioning
Discriminative Stimulus
Operant Response
Consequence
Effect on Future Behavior
Definition
The environmental stimulus that precedes an operant response
The actively emitted or voluntary behavior
The environmental stimulus or event that follows the operant response
Reinforcement increases the likelihood of operant being repeated; punishment or lack of reinforcement decreases the likelihood of operant being repeated.
Examples
Wallet on college sidewalk
Give wallet to security
$50 reward from wallet’s owner
Positive reinforcement: More likely to turn in lost items to authorities
Gas gauge almost on “empty”
Fill car with gas
Avoid running out of gas
Negative reinforcement: More likely to fill car when gas gauge shows empty
Informal social situation at work
Tell an off-color, sexist joke
Formally reprimanded for sexism and inappropriate workplace behavior
Positive punishment: Less likely to tell off-color, sexist jokes in workplace
Soft-drink vending machine
Put in quarters
Get no soft drink and lose money
Negative punishment: Less likely to use that vending machine

26. Shaping and Extinction
Operant Conditioning at SeaWorld. This sequence shows a SeaWorld trainer using operant conditioning principles with a dolphin that has already been shaped to perform somersaults.
Operant conditioning procedure of selectively reinforcing successively closer approximations of a goal behavior until goal behavior is displayed
Example: training an animal to perform a complex trick
Shaping
Skinner believed that shaping could explain how people acquire a wide variety of abilities and skills
Operant Conditioning at Sea- (a) (b) (c)
This sequence shows a SeaWorld trainer using operant conditioning principles with a dolphin that has already been shaped to perform somersaults.
(a) The trainer gives the dolphin two discriminative stimuli—a distinct vocal sound and a specific hand gesture.
(b) The dolphin quickly responds with the correct operant—a perfect somersault in the air.
(c) The operant is positively reinforced with a piece of fish. The same basic techniques are also used to teach seals, sea lions, walruses, and killer whales to perform different tricks on cue.

27. The Partial Reinforcement Effect
Early work by Skinner used continuous reinforcement
Schedule of reinforcement in which every occurrence of a particular response is reinforced.
Running out of food for his rats, Skinner stretched out the pellets by not rewarding every trial; the result was the discovery of the partial reinforcement effect.
Partial reinforcement effect
Behaviors that are conditioned using partial reinforcement are more resistant to extinction than behaviors that are conditioned using continuous reinforcement.

28. Schedules of Reinforcement
Skinner (1956) found that specific preset arrangements of partial reinforcement produced different patterns and rates of responding (schedules of reinforcement).
Fixed-ratio (FR) schedule
Variable-ratio (VR) schedule
Fixed-interval (FI) schedule
Variable-interval (VI) schedule
Schedule of reinforcement: The delivery of a reinforcer according to a preset pattern based on the number of responses or the time interval between responses.
Fixed-ratio (FR) schedule: A reinforcement schedule in which a reinforcer is delivered after a fixed number of responses has occurred.
Variable-ratio (VR) schedule: A reinforcement schedule in which a reinforcer is delivered after an average number of responses, which varies unpredictably from trial to trial.
Fixed-interval (FI) schedule: A reinforcement schedule in which a reinforcer is delivered for the first response that occurs after a preset time interval has elapsed.
Variable-interval (VI) schedule: A reinforcement schedule in which a reinforcer is delivered for the first response that occurs after an average time interval, which varies unpredictably from trial to trial.

29. Schedules of Reinforcement and Response Patterns
Figure 5.5 Schedules of Reinforcement and Response Patterns
Different patterns of responding are produced by the four basic schedules of reinforcement. (Left:) The predictable nature of a fixed-ratio schedule (the red line) produces a high rate of responding, with a pause after the reinforcer is delivered.
The unpredictable nature of variable-ratio schedules (purple) also produces high, steady rates of responding, but with hardly any pausing between reinforcers.
(Right:) Fixed-interval schedules (red) produce a scallop-shaped pattern of responding. The unpredictable nature of variable-interval schedules (purple) produces a moderate but steady rate of responding. Data from Skinner (1961).

30. Applications of Operant Conditioning
Clinical Psychology: Dealing with counterproductive behaviors
Sports Training: Aiding performance
Education and Working with Students: Improving grades and study habits
Business: Increasing productivity

31. Contemporary Views of Operant Conditioning
Edward C. Tolman
Cognitive processes play important role in complex behavior learning.
Although these processes cannot be directly observed, they can be experimentally verified and inferred by careful observation of outward behavior
Cognitive maps
Strengthened behavior
Today psychologists acknowledge the importance of cognitive and evolutionary factors.
Edward Chace Tolman (1898–1956) Although he looks rather solemn in this photo,
Tolman was known for his openness to new ideas, energetic teaching style, and playful sense of humor.
During an important speech, he showed a film of a rat in a maze with a short clip from a Mickey Mouse cartoon spliced in at the end (Gleitman, 1991). are an important part of learning, even in the rat.

32. Tolman: Cognitive Maps and Latent Learning
Figure 5.6 Latent Learning Beginning with day 1, the rats in group 1 received a food reward at the end of the maze, and the number of errors they made steadily decreased each day. The rats in group 2 never received a food reward; they made many errors as they wandered about in the maze. The rats in group 3 did not receive a food reward on days 1 through 10. Beginning on day 11, they received a food reward at the end of the maze. Notice the sharp decrease in errors on day 12 and thereafter. According to Tolman, the rats in group 3 had formed a cognitive map of the maze during the first 11 days of the experiment.
Learning had taken place, but this learning was not demonstrated until reinforcement was present—a phenomenon that Tolman called latent learning.
Data from Tolman & Honzik (1930b).

33. Cognitive Aspects Learned Helplessness (Seligman)
Learned helplessness is the phenomenon in which exposure to inescapable and uncontrollable aversive events produces passive behavior.
The cognitive expectation that behavior would have no effect on the environment causes a person or animal to become passive.
This is shown when researchers study behavior, athletic performance, and psychological disorders such as depression and its management.

34. Operant Conditioning and Biological Predispositions
Skinner and other behaviorists firmly believed that general laws of operant conditioning applied to all animal species.
Others (like the Brelands) found that an animal’s natural behavior patterns could influence the learning of new behaviors based on biological and evolutionary predispositions.
The principle of instinctive drift (naturally occurring behaviors that interfere with operant responses) prevented the animals from engaging in the learned behaviors that would result in reinforcement.
Keller and Marian Breland’s “IQ Zoo”
B.F. Skinner’s students Keller and Marian Breland opened their animal training business in Hot Springs, Arkansas, in 1951.
By the 1960s, the Brelands’ “IQ Zoo” was one of the most popular roadside attractions in the United States
Beyond entertainment, the Brelands were pioneers in the development of animal training and behavior modification techniques.
Marian Breland was one of the first psychologists to use positive reinforcement to teach basic self-help skills to people with developmental disabilities and also helped train marine mammals for the U.S. Navy (Bihm & others, 2010a, b).

35. Comparing Classical and Operant Conditioning
Classical Conditioning
Operant Conditioning
Type of behavior
Reflexive, involuntary behaviors
Nonreflexive, voluntary behaviors
Source of behavior
Elicited by stimulus
Emitted by organism
Basis of learning
Associating two stimuli: CS + UCS
Associating a response and the consequence that follows it
Responses conditioned
Physiological and emotional responses
Active behaviors that operate on the environment
Extinction process
Conditioned response decreases when conditioned stimulus is repeatedly presented alone
Responding decreases with elimination of reinforcing consequences
Cognitive aspects
Expectation that CS reliably predicts the UCS
Performance of behavior influenced by the expectation of reinforcement or punishment
Evolutionary influences
Innate predispositions influence how easily an association is formed between a particular stimulus and response
Behaviors similar to natural or instinctive behaviors are more readily conditioned

36. Observational Learning
The Bobo Doll Study
Bandura demonstrated the influence of observational learning in a series of experiments conducted in the early 1960s. Children watching a violent video clip seemed to imitate aggressive behavior.
The study demonstrated the principle that expectation of reinforcement (by watching someone being rewarded) can act to reinforce a behavior.
In observational learning, we learn through watching and imitating the behaviors of others.
Watching and processing information about the actions of others, including the consequences that occur, influence the likelihood that the behavior will be imitated.
Albert Bandura (b. 1925) He contends that most human behavior is acquired through observational learning.

37. Classic Bobo Doll Experiment
Bandura demonstrated the powerful influence of observational learning in a series of experiments conducted in the early 1960s. Children watched a film showing an adult playing aggressively with an inflated Bobo doll. If they saw the adult rewarded with candy for the aggressive behavior or experience no consequences, the children were much more likely to imitate the behavior than if they saw the adult punished for the aggressive behavior (Bandura, 1965; Bandura & others, 1963).
The Classic Bobo Doll Experiment Bandura demonstrated the powerful influence of observational learning in a series of experiments conducted in the early 1960s. Children watched a film showing an adult playing aggressively with an inflated Bobo doll. If they saw the adult rewarded with candy for the aggressive behavior or experience no consequences, the children were much more likely to imitate the behavior than if they saw the adult punished for the aggressive behavior (Bandura, 1965; Bandura & others, 1963).

38. Factors That Increase Imitation
You’re more likely to imitate:
People who are rewarded for their behavior
Warm, nurturing people
People who have control over you or have the power to influence your life
People who are similar to you in terms of age, sex, and interests
People you perceive as having higher social status
When the task to be imitated is not extremely easy or difficult
If you lack confidence in your own abilities in a particular situation
If the situation is unfamiliar or ambiguous
If you’ve been rewarded for imitating the same behavior in the past

39. Mirror Neurons: Imitation in the Brain?
Reflect visual processing and mentally represent and interpret the actions of others
May play a role in empathy, language, and social cognition, or contribute to autism and other social-functioning disorders (more scientific evidence needed)
Musical Mirror Neurons
Non-musicians were trained to play a piece of music by ear on a piano keyboard, then underwent a series of fMRI scans (Lahav & others, 2007).
Panel (a) shows the participants’ brain activity as they listened to the same music they had already learned to play. Even though they were not moving as they lay in the scanner, motor areas of the brain were activated (dark red). The brighter red/yellow color indicates activation in the brain’s auditory areas. Panel (b) shows participants’ brain activity while they listened to unfamiliar music utilizing the same musical notes but in a different sequence. As you compare the scans in (a) and (b), notice the extensive activation in motor-related brain regions when the participants listened to the music that they had already learned to play, as in (a). However, these motor areas were not activated when they listened to the unfamiliar music that they had never played, as in (b).
Music to the ears—and brain!

40. Applications of Observational Learning
Adolescents may engage in sexual behavior earlier if they watch shows with sexual contact.
Adolescents who view pornographic sites may have more sexual partners and engage in substance abuse.
TV shows about literacy in Mexico increased enrollment in literacy groups.

41. Do you remember the difference between correlation and causality?
Does media violence promote violence?
Some studies and major medical and psychological organizations say it does.
Other researchers argue that the data is correlational and that lab research does not address the complex causes of violence in society.