Psychology: Learning and Conditioning

motor/neural reactions to specfic stimulus. Less complex than instincts, involve specfifc part of the body, involve primative centers of CNS (spinal cord, medulla), ex) babies are born with a sucking reflex

behaviors triggered by a broader range of events (aging, change of seasons), more complex than relfexes, involve the organism as a whole (sexual activity, migration), involve higher brain centers

a relatively permanent change in behavior or knowledge that results from expereience, involves accquiring skills and knowledge through behavior, involves conscious and unconscious processing

Process by which we learn to associate stimuli and consequently to anticipate events

Unlearned

learned

Pavlov conditioned dogs to saliavte at the sound of a bell by introducing food with the sound of a bell. The food made the dogs salivate (unconditioned response) and eventually the food was removed and the dogs salivated at just the sound of the bell (conditioned response)

The initial period of learning when an organisms learns to connect a neutral stimulus (bell) and an unconditioned stimulus (salivating)
Usually recquires very short time interval between the neutral stimulus and the unconditioned stimulus and the pairing must be repeated multiple times
Sometimes conditioning can occur when the interval is up to several hours and the pairing only occurs once

Decrease in the conditioned response the unconditioned stimulus (food, causes response naturually) is no longer presneted with the conditioned stimulus (bell, previously nuetral stimulus that only elicits response afrer being learned)
Ex) Food stops being presented with the bell, eventually the dog will stop salivating at the sound of the bell

Return of a previously extinguisges conditioned response following a rest period
Ex) If bell and food were reintroduced, dog would relearn to salivate at the sound of the bell much quicker

Organisms learn to associate a behavior and irs consequences
Based on the law of effect (Thorndike): Pleasent consequence/desired result --> behavior more likely to occur again
Unpleasent consequencendesired result --> behavior is less likely to occur again
Ex) we show up to work (behavior) and we get paid (pleasent consequence), so we keep showing up for work

To add something

To take something away

increasing a behavior

decreasing a behavior

A mental contrust consisiting of a collection of related concepts
When a schema is activated, we automatically make assumptions about the person/object/situation
Ex) When someone says 'office' we think of things like desks, computers, printers, staplers, etc..

Makes assumptions about how individuals in certain roles will behave
Ex) when we think of a doctor we think white coat, stethascope, etc...

a set of routine or automatic behaviors that can feel like a routine
Varies widely among cultures
Dictates behavior and makes habits hard to break
Ex) putting your seatbelt on when you get in the car

Tendancy to focus on one piece of information when making a decision or solving a problem

Tendancy to focus on info that confirms your exsisting beliefs

Leads you to believe that the event you just experienced was predictable, even though it wasnt

Early 1900s, Alfred Binet made intelligence test to use on children to determine which ones may struggle in school
Louis Standform modified Binets work by standardizing the administration of the test and testing thousands of children to develop a norm

the manner of adminstration, scoring, and interpretation of results is consistent

giving a test to a large population so data can be collected comparing groups (like age groups)
resulting data provides refrential scores that can be used to interpret future scores

Describes how data is disperesed in a population
Ex) 15 points is one SD in IQ testing so a score of 85 is one SD below the mean (average IQ is 100)

Involves the input of information into the memory system

the retention of the encoded information

getting the infromation out of memory and back into awareness

repeating something over and over so it is stored in the short term memory

Involved in fear and fear memories
processes emotional information important in encoding memories

Associated with explicit memory, recognition memory and spatial memory
Projects information to cortical regions that give memories meaning and connect them
Damage leads to an inability to process new declartive memories

Had both temperal lobes (including hippocampi) to help control seizures
declarative memory was significanly affected
could not form new semantic knowledge or episodic memories

Inability to remember new infromation after a point of trauma
Hippocampus is usally affected - causes inability to transfer info from short term to long term memory

loss of memory (partial or complete) for events that occured prior to point of trauma

organizing info into manageable bits/chunks

technique in which you think about the meaning of the new information and its relation to knowledge already stored in your memory

memory aids that help us organize information for encoding

focused on childrens cognitive growth and theorized that cognitive abilities develop through specific stages
believed children develop schemata to help them understand the world
when children learn new info they adjust their schemata through assimilation and accomodation

incorporates new information into exsisting schemata
Ex) Knows dog has four legs, fur and a tail, so when they see a different dog breed they recognize it as a dog

change scheme based on new info because the new info condtradicts/does not fit exsisting schema
Ex) Sees a cat and calls it a dog because it has 4 legs and fur, parent points out that it meows and climbs trees and is a cat, prompts child to create new shemca catergory for cat

continues into the early 20s, frontal lobe still growing may explain why adolescents engage in increased risk taking behaviors and emotional outbursts

organs specfically for reproduction, like the uterus and overies

physical signs of sexual maturations like breasts

arises from internal facotrs
behaviors are preformed because they bring personal satisfaction

arises from external factors
behaviors are preformed in order to recieve something from others

empty stomach --> stomach contracts --> hunger begins and secretion of chemical messages travel to the brain to tell us to eat
low blood glucose levels --> pancrease and liver generate chemical signals that induce hunger to start eating

increase in blood glucose --> pancrease and liver send signals to stop eating
food passes through gastrointestinal tract --> signals of fullness are sent to the brain
fat cells release leptin (satiety hormone)

prolonged, less intense, affective state
does not occur in direct response to something we experience
may not be consciously recognized or intentional

subjectiev state of being that we use to describe our feelings
relatively intense and occurs in response to an experience
consciously experienced and intentional