Detailed and comprehensive Lectures notes on learning and conditioning. Covers all content received for the topic in this course.
Essential!!
To your success in academics!!
Learning: Any relatively permanent change in behaviour
- Allows us to adapt to our environment
- Results in physical change in brain
- Brought about by experience or practice
Categories of behaviour
Reflexes
- Involuntary responses to stimuli
- Very fast, reliable responses controlled by the CNS
- Eg. blush, cough, sneeze
Learned behaviour
- Consciously learned behaviours from the environment
- Eg. get a fine when speeding, therefore, you do not speed again
- Eg. get a sticker for good work so I deliver good work again to get another (i.e. reward)
Theoretical perspectives
Humanistic theories (Maslow & Rogers)
- Focus on the potential for personal growth and development in life
- Concept of self-determined potential
Abraham Maslow (Major contributor)
- Concept of self-actualisation
- Educator as a facilitator and not teacher
- Superiority of experiential learning over spectator knowledge
Behaviourist theories (Watson & Skinner)
- Emphasis on importance of scientific methodology
- Believes that only observable behaviours can be scientifically investigated
- Emotions, motivations and thoughts are considered subjective therefore cannot
be quantified or measured
- If learning has occurred, then some sort of observable external behaviour should
be apparent
Cognitive theories (Kohler & Piaget)
- What goes on in the mind determines the observed behaviour
- Emphasises that the mind influences behaviour
, - Explains learning by using internal processes such as thinking and memory
- Learning involves cognitive processes and connections from prior learning that
could be applied to the new situations
Social learning theory
- Learning can be based on the observation and imitation of other people’s behaviours
- Eg. children learn by imitating parents
Associative learning
- Formation of association between stimuli and responses
- Can be voluntary or involuntary
- Predict future from past behaviour
- Antecedent: What happens before the response
- Consequence: What happens after the response
Classical Conditioning: Involuntary, automatic behaviour
- Process by what we learn to associate events or stimuli that frequently happen together
with each other
- Learn to anticipate events
Conditions:
- CS must come before the US
- CS and US must come very close together in time (contiguity)
- CS must be paired with the US a few times for learning to take place
- CS must be distinctive
Basic principles:
Contiguity: Closeness in time between pairing o CS and US
Acquisition: Phase when NS and US are presented together
Stimulus generalisation: Response to a stimulus to original CS
Stimulus discrimination: Capacity to distinguish between similar, but distinct, stimuli
The benefits of buying summaries with Stuvia:
Guaranteed quality through customer reviews
Stuvia customers have reviewed more than 700,000 summaries. This how you know that you are buying the best documents.
Quick and easy check-out
You can quickly pay through credit card or Stuvia-credit for the summaries. There is no membership needed.
Focus on what matters
Your fellow students write the study notes themselves, which is why the documents are always reliable and up-to-date. This ensures you quickly get to the core!
Frequently asked questions
What do I get when I buy this document?
You get a PDF, available immediately after your purchase. The purchased document is accessible anytime, anywhere and indefinitely through your profile.
Satisfaction guarantee: how does it work?
Our satisfaction guarantee ensures that you always find a study document that suits you well. You fill out a form, and our customer service team takes care of the rest.
Who am I buying these notes from?
Stuvia is a marketplace, so you are not buying this document from us, but from seller anyiamgeorge19. Stuvia facilitates payment to the seller.
Will I be stuck with a subscription?
No, you only buy these notes for $12.50. You're not tied to anything after your purchase.
