Module 10 Operant Cognitive Approaches OPERANT CONDITIONING Operant

Module 10 Operant & Cognitive Approaches

OPERANT CONDITIONING • Operant conditioning – Also called instrumental conditioning – Kind of learning in which an animal or human performs some behavior – Following consequences (reward or punishment) increases or decreases the chance that an animal or human will again perform that same behavior

OPERANT CONDITIONING (CONT’D) • Thorndike’s law of effect – behaviors followed by positive consequences are strengthened – behaviors followed by negative consequences are weakened • Skinner’s operant conditioning – Operant response: can be modified by its consequences and is a meaningful, easily measured unit of ongoing behavior – Focuses on how consequences (rewards or punishments) affect behaviors – 1920 s and 1930 s discovery of two general principles • Pavlov’s classical conditioning • Skinner’s operant conditioning

OPERANT CONDITIONING (CONT’D)

OPERANT CONDITIONING (CONT’D)

OPERANT CONDITIONING (CONT’D) • Principles and procedures – Skinner box • automatically records an animal’s bar presses and delivers food pellets • efficient way to study how an animal’s ongoing behaviors may be modified by changing the consequences of what happens after a bar press – Three factors in operant conditioning of a rat • a hungry rat is more willing to eat the food reward • can thus condition the rat to press the bar • successively reinforced behaviors lead up to or approximate the desired behavior

OPERANT CONDITIONING (CONT’D)

OPERANT CONDITIONING (CONT’D) • Shaping – Facing the bar • rat is put in box • when rat faces the bar, food pellet is released • rat sniffs the food pellet – Touching the bar • rat faces and moves toward the bar • another pellet is released • rat eats then wanders; returning to sniff for a pellet, another pellet is dropped into the cup; rat places a paw on the bar, and another pellet is released

OPERANT CONDITIONING (CONT’D) • Shaping – Pressing the bar • when rat touches bar, pellet is released; rat eats and then puts paws back on bar and gets another pellet; wait for rat to push bar then release pellet • rat soon presses bar repeatedly to get pellets • rat’s behavior reinforced as it leads up to, or approximates, the desired behavior of bar pressing

OPERANT CONDITIONING (CONT’D) • Immediate reinforcement – Reinforcer should follow immediately after the desired behavior – If reinforcer is delayed, the animal may be reinforced for some undesired or superstitious behavior • Superstitious behavior – Behavior that increases in frequency because its occurrence is accidentally paired with the delivery of a reinforcer

OPERANT CONDITIONING (CONT’D) • Examples of operant conditioning – Toilet training • target behavior • preparation • reinforcers • shaping – Food refusal • target behavior • preparation • reinforcers • shaping

OPERANT CONDITIONING (CONT’D) • Operant versus classical conditioning – Operant conditioning • goal: increase or decrease the rate of some response – voluntary response: must perform voluntary response before getting a reward – emitted response: animals or humans are shaped to emit the desired responses

OPERANT CONDITIONING (CONT’D) • Operant versus classical conditioning – Operant conditioning • contingent on behavior: depends or is contingent on the consequences or what happens next • reinforcer must occur immediately after the desired response • consequences: animals or humans learn that performing or emitting some behavior is followed by a consequence (reward or punishment)

OPERANT CONDITIONING (CONT’D) • Operant versus classical conditioning – Classical conditioning • goal: create a new response to a neutral stimulus • involuntary response: physiological reflexes (salivation, eye blink) • elicited response: unconditioned stimulus triggers or elicits an involuntary reflex response, salivation, which is called the unconditioned response

OPERANT CONDITIONING (CONT’D) • Operant versus classical conditioning – Classical conditioning • conditioned response: neutral stimulus becomes the conditioned stimulus if it occurs before the conditioned response • expectancy: animals and humans learn a predictable relationship between, or develop an expectancy about, the neutral and unconditioned stimuli – classical conditioning leads to learning a predictable relationship between stimuli

REINFORCERS • Consequences – Consequences are contingent on behavior • Reinforcement – Consequence that occurs after a behavior; increases the chance that the behavior will occur again • Punishment – Consequence that occurs after a behavior; decreases the chance that the behavior will occur again

REINFORCERS (CONT’D) • Reinforcement – Positive reinforcement • refers to the presentation of a stimulus that increases the probability a behavior will occur again – Negative reinforcement • refers to an aversive stimulus whose removal increases the likelihood that the preceding response will occur again

REINFORCERS (CONT’D) • Reinforcers – Primary reinforcers • stimulus such as food, water, or sex; innately satisfying and requires no learning on the part of the subject to become pleasurable – Secondary reinforcers • stimulus that has acquired its reinforcing power through experience; secondary reinforcers are learned, such as by being paired with primary reinforcers or other secondary reinforcers

REINFORCERS (CONT’D) • Punishment – Positive punishment • presenting an aversive (unpleasant) stimulus after a response – Negative punishment • removing a reinforcing stimulus after a response • noncompliance: refers to a child refusing to obey a command/request given by a parent or caregiver • time-out: removes reinforcing stimuli after an undesirable response – removal decreases the chances that the undesired response will recur

SCHEDULES OF REINFORCEMENT • Skinner’s contributions – Schedule of reinforcement • refers to a program or rule that determines how and when the occurrence of a response will be followed by a reinforcer – Continuous reinforcement • every occurrence of the operant response results in delivery of the reinforcer – Partial reinforcement • refers to a situation in which responding is reinforced only some of the time

SCHEDULES OF REINFORCEMENT (CONT’D) • Partial reinforcement schedules – Fixed-ratio schedule • a reinforcer occurs only after a fixed number of responses are made by the subject – Fixed-interval schedule • a reinforcer occurs after the first response that occurs after a fixed interval of time

SCHEDULES OF REINFORCEMENT (CONT’D) • Partial reinforcement schedules – Variable-ratio schedule • a reinforcer is delivered after an average number of correct responses has occurred – Variable-interval schedule • reinforcer occurs after the first correct response after an average amount of time has passed

OPERANT CONDITIONING (CONT’D)

OTHER CONDITIONING CONCEPTS • Generalization – Animal or person emits the same response to similar stimuli – Tendency for a stimulus similar to the original conditioned stimulus to elicit a response similar to the conditioned response • Discrimination – Occurs during classical conditioning when an organism learns to make a particular response to some stimuli but not to others – Discrimination stimulus; cue that a behavior will be reinforced

OTHER CONDITIONING CONCEPTS (CONT’D) • Extinction and spontaneous recovery – Extinction • procedure in which a conditioned stimulus is repeatedly presented without the unconditioned stimulus • the conditioned stimulus tends to no longer elicit the conditioned response – Spontaneous recovery • tendency for the conditioned response to reappear after being extinguished, even though there have been no further conditioning trials

COGNITIVE LEARNING • Cognitive learning: attention and memory – Says that learning can occur through observation or imitation and may not involve external rewards or require a person to perform any observable behaviors • Three viewpoints – Against: B. F. Skinner (“As far as I’m concerned, cognitive science is the creationism (downfall) of psychology”) – In favor: Edward Tolman • explored hidden mental processes • cognitive map; mental representation in the brain of the layout of an environment and its features

COGNITIVE LEARNING (CONT’D) • Three viewpoints – Also in favor: Albert Bandura • focused on how humans learn through observing things • Social cognitive learning – Results from watching and modeling; doesn’t require the observer to perform any observable behavior or receive any observable reward

COGNITIVE LEARNING (CONT’D) • Learning-performance distinction – Learning may occur but may not always be measured by, or immediately evident in, performance • Bandura’s social cognitive theory – Emphasizes the importance of observation, imitation, and self-reward in the development and learning of social skills, personal interactions, and many other behaviors

COGNITIVE LEARNING (CONT’D) • Four processes – Attention • observer must pay attention to the model – Memory • observer must store or remember the information – Imitation • observer must be able to use the remembered information and imitate the model’s behavior – Motivation • observer must have some reason or incentive to imitate the model’s behavior

COGNITIVE LEARNING (CONT’D) • Insight learning – Insight • a mental process marked by the sudden and unexpected solution to a problem: a phenomenon often called the “a ha!” experience

BIOLOGICAL FACTORS • Definition – Biological factors • innate tendencies or predispositions that may either facilitate or inhibit certain kinds of learning – Imprinting • inherited tendencies or responses that are displayed by newborn animals when they encounter certain stimuli in their environment – Critical or sensitive period • a relatively brief time during which learning is most likely to occur

APPLICATIONS • Behavior modification – Treatment or therapy that changes or modifies undesirable behaviors by using principles of learning based on operant conditioning, classical conditioning, and social cognitive learning – Autism • marked by poor development in social relationships • great difficulty developing language and communicating; very few activities and interests • long periods of time spent repeating the same behaviors and following rituals that interfere with more normal functioning

APPLICATIONS – Autism • symptoms range from mild to severe • usually appear when a child is 2 to 3 years old – Biofeedback • training procedure through which a person is made aware of his or her physiological responses, such as muscle activity, heart rate, blood pressure, or temperature • after awareness of physiological responses, a person tries to control them to decrease psychosomatic problems

APPLICATIONS