《Intro to Psychology》Shishak

2、LEARNING

　　LEARNING

　　Relatively permanent changes in behavior as a function of experience.
　　-Why relatively permanent?
　　-Why experience?
　　-Are learning and performance the same?
　　-What behaviors haven’t you learned?

　　CONDITIONING—the simplest learning has two types, CLASSICAL CONDINTIONING and OPERANT CONDITIONING.

　　Classical Conditioning, also know as Respondent Conditioning, is based on antecedents, or what happens before a response. Applies to reflex, or involuntary behavior. Antecedent stimuli become associated with one another and this one that did not originally produce the response now elicits that response. Pavlov discovered this conditioning method. What behaviors have been acquired by classical?

　　Operant Conditioning is based on consequences, or what happens after a response. Applies to operant, or voluntary behavior. Responses followed by reinforcement are strengthened. Responses followed by nothing, or by punishment are weakened.

　　Pavlov’s Classical Conditioning
　　-Neutral stimulus: (NS) stimulus that does not evoke a response.
　　-Unconditioned stimulus: (UCS) a stimulus innately capable of eliciting a response.
　　-Unconditioned Response: (UCR) the unlearned, reflexive response that is elicited by an unconditioned stimulus.
　　-Conditioned stimulus: (CS) a formerly neutral stimulus that acquires the capacity to elicit a reflexive response.
　　-Conditioned Response: (CR) the learned, reflexive response to a conditioned stimulus.
　　i.e. A boy come into a room, nothing special happens. When the boy comes to the room (NS), you show him the playboy magazine (UCS), he will get excited (UCR). Repeated several times, then when the boy comes to the same room (CS) without being showed the playboy magazine, he will get excited (CR) as well.

　　Elements of Classical Conditioning
　　-Acquisition: training period during which a conditioned response must be reinforced by following the CS, or pairing it.
　　-Higher order conditioning: a well-learned CS can be used to reinforce further learning by using it as an unconditioned stimulus.
　　-Expectancies: in the informational view, learning occurs as we detect associations among events, creating expectancies about how events are related.