Learning: Mechanisms, Theories, and Applications in Psychology

Topic 6: Learning

Introduction

Learning is a fundamental process in psychology, referring to the relatively permanent change in behaviour or knowledge that results from experience. This topic explores the mechanisms, types, and applications of learning, including classical and operant conditioning, cognitive approaches, and the influence of biology and media.

Unlearned Behaviours

Reflexes

• Definition: Automatic, involuntary responses to specific stimuli.

• Function: Protective and essential for survival.

• Neural Basis: Involve primitive parts of the central nervous system (CNS), such as the brainstem.

• Examples: Pupillary light reflex, startle reflex, withdrawal reflex, scratch reflex.

Instincts

• Definition: Innate drives or tendencies that lead to particular patterns of behaviour.

• Complexity: More complex than reflexes; involve movement of the organism as a whole (e.g., sexual activity, migration).

• Neural Basis: Involve higher brain centers.

• Examples: Bird migration, mating behaviours, nest building.

What is Learning?

• Definition: A relatively permanent change in behaviour or knowledge that results from experience.

• Processes: Involves acquiring skills or knowledge through experience; can involve both conscious and unconscious processes.

• Types of Learning:

  • Habituation: Decreased response to a repeated, benign stimulus.

  • Sensitization: Increased response to a repeated, often noxious stimulus.

Classical vs. Operant Conditioning

Classical Conditioning

• Definition: Learning to associate two stimuli and consequently anticipate events.

• Discovery: Ivan Pavlov's research on the digestive system of dogs led to the discovery of classical conditioning.

• Types of Responses:

  • Unconditioned Response (UCR): Unlearned, natural reaction to a stimulus (e.g., salivation to food).

  • Conditioned Response (CR): Learned reaction to a previously neutral stimulus (e.g., salivation to a bell after conditioning).

Key Components

• Neutral Stimulus (NS): A stimulus that does not elicit a response before conditioning.

• Unconditioned Stimulus (UCS): A stimulus that naturally triggers a response.

• Conditioned Stimulus (CS): Previously neutral, now triggers a conditioned response after association with UCS.

• Unconditioned Response (UCR): Natural, automatic reaction to UCS.

• Conditioned Response (CR): Learned response to the CS.

Process Example

• Before Conditioning: Food (UCS) → Salivation (UCR); Bell (NS) → No response

• During Conditioning: Bell (NS) + Food (UCS) → Salivation (UCR)

• After Conditioning: Bell (CS) → Salivation (CR)

Acquisition, Extinction, and Spontaneous Recovery

• Acquisition: The phase during which the CS and UCS are paired, leading to learning.

• Extinction: The conditioned response decreases and eventually disappears when the CS is presented without the UCS.

• Spontaneous Recovery: The reappearance of a conditioned response after a pause.

• Renewal Effect: Conditioned response reappears when returned to the original environment.

Applications

• Marketing: Pairing products with positive stimuli to elicit positive emotional responses.

• Little Albert Study: John B. Watson demonstrated that emotional responses (fear) could be conditioned in humans.

Stimulus Generalization and Discrimination

• Stimulus Generalization: After conditioning, stimuli similar to the original CS produce the same response (e.g., fear of all dogs).

• Stimulus Discrimination: Ability to distinguish between different stimuli, only responding to the specific CS (e.g., recognizing different alarm sounds).

Special Cases

• Fetishes: Sexual fixation on a nonsexual object can develop through accidental pairing of arousal and a neutral stimulus.

• Conditioned Taste Aversion: Learning to avoid a food after a single pairing with illness; shows biological preparedness and can occur after long delays.

Operant Conditioning

Definition and Principles

• Organisms learn to associate a behaviour with its consequences (reinforcement or punishment).

• Law of Effect (Thorndike): Behaviours followed by rewards are more likely to recur; those followed by punishment are less likely.

Types of Consequences

• Positive: Adding something

• Negative: Taking something away

• Reinforcement: Increases behaviour

• Punishment: Decreases behaviour

Reinforcement

• Positive Reinforcement: Adding a desirable stimulus to increase behaviour (e.g., praise, paychecks).

• Negative Reinforcement: Removing an aversive stimulus to increase behaviour (e.g., turning off a beeping seatbelt alarm).

Punishment

• Positive Punishment: Adding an aversive stimulus to decrease behaviour (e.g., scolding).

• Negative Punishment: Removing a desirable stimulus to decrease behaviour (e.g., taking away a toy).

Effectiveness of Punishment

• Only tells what not to do, not what to do.

• Can create anxiety, interfere with learning, encourage subversive behaviour, and model aggression.

Biological Influences on Learning

• Biology limits what behaviours can be learned through reinforcement.

• Evolutionary predispositions make us more likely to fear certain things (e.g., snakes vs. guns).

• Instinctive Drift: Tendency for animals to revert to innate behaviours after repeated reinforcement.

Schedules of Reinforcement

Continuous vs. Partial Reinforcement

• Continuous Reinforcement: Reinforcing a behaviour every time it occurs; leads to faster learning but also faster extinction.

• Partial Reinforcement: Only occasional reinforcement; leads to slower extinction and better maintenance of behaviour.

Partial Reinforcement Schedules

• Fixed vs. Variable:

  • Fixed: Number of responses or time between reinforcements is set and unchanging.

  • Variable: Number of responses or time between reinforcements varies.

• Interval vs. Ratio:

  • Interval: Based on time between reinforcements.

  • Ratio: Based on number of responses between reinforcements.

Schedule	Description	Example
Fixed Interval	Reinforcement at predictable time intervals	Taking medication at set times
Variable Interval	Reinforcement at unpredictable time intervals	Checking social media notifications
Fixed Ratio	Reinforcement after a predictable number of responses	Factory workers paid per item produced
Variable Ratio	Reinforcement after an unpredictable number of responses	Slot machine payouts, getting a big tip

Partial Reinforcement & Intimate Partner Violence (IPV)

• Intermittent reinforcement can contribute to decisions to stay in abusive relationships (e.g., occasional positive gestures after abuse).

Conditioning & Superstitious Behaviour

• Superstitious Behaviour: When a behaviour is accidentally reinforced by coincidence.

• Skinner's Pigeons: Pigeons repeated random behaviours that were accidentally reinforced by food delivery.

• Humans: Superstitions such as lucky jerseys or rituals before exams are examples of accidental reinforcement.

Cognitive Approaches to Learning

Latent Learning

• Learning that occurs without immediate reinforcement and is only demonstrated when there is motivation to do so.

• Example: Tolman's rats developed cognitive maps of a maze without reinforcement, but only demonstrated their knowledge when incentivized.

• Real-world Examples: Navigating new places, cooking skills, social etiquette, driving routes, emergency responses.

Observational Learning

• Learning by watching the behaviour of others (models).

• Involves four processes: (1) paying attention, (2) remembering, (3) reproducing the action, (4) being motivated to carry it out.

• Both positive and negative behaviours can be learned (e.g., Bandura's Bobo doll experiment).

Media and Social Influences on Learning

Transmission of Bias via Observing Others

• Observers can acquire biases simply by watching others interact, even without direct reinforcement.

• Implicit attitude change can occur through observation.

Media Violence & Real-World Violence

• Exposure to media violence is linked to increased aggression and desensitization to real-life violence.

• Media can lower inhibitions, distort understanding of violence, and desensitize viewers.

• Violent video games are associated with increased aggression and lower academic achievement.