Copyright © McGraw-Hill Education.

Permission required for reproduction or display

5 Learning

© McGraw-Hill Education
©Karl-josefáhildenbrand/Epa/REX/Shutterstock Permission required for reproduction or display
 Chapter Preview

Classical Conditioning Cognitive Factors in

Learning

Observational
Learning

Biological, Cultural
Operant
& Psychological
Conditioning
Factors in Learning

© McGraw-Hill Education
Photo credit: © BrandX Pictures/Photostock
Permission required for reproduction or display
Learning Theory

Learning
a systematic, relatively permanent change in behavior that occurs
through experience

• Behaviorism

• Associative Learning /
Conditioning

• Observational Learning
©Phoenixns/Shutterstock

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
Types of Learning 1

Classical Conditioning Operant Conditioning

(doctor office) ©Image Source/Jupiterimages; (shot) ©Amble Design; (swimmer) ©Ryan McVay/Getty Images; (medalist) ©MJTH/Shutterstock

Performing well in swim competition (behavior)

becomes associated with getting awards (consequence).
Helps to explain voluntary behavior.

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
Types of Learning 2

Classical Conditioning Operant Conditioning

(doctor office) ©Image Source/Jupiterimages; (shot) ©Amble Design; (swimmer) ©Ryan McVay/Getty Images; (medalist) ©MJTH/Shutterstock

Control of a response [fear] is

shifted from an inborn stimulus
[shot] to a new stimulus [office].
Helps to explain involuntary behavior.

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
Classical Conditioning 1

Innate S-R Association Unconditioned Stimulus

Unconditioned Response Neutral Stimulus Acquisition/Learning
Conditioned Stimulus Conditioned Response

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
Classical Conditioning 2

Contingency: CS regularly followed by UCS

Contiguity: Time between CS & UCS

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
Classical Conditioning: Pavlov
Before Conditioning

Conditioning After Conditioning

Access the text alternative for these images

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
Classical Conditioning 3

Generalization
• CRs may also appear after various new NSs
that are similar to the CS
© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
Classical Conditioning 4

Discrimination
• CRs appear after the CS but not after other CSs.
• Discrimination generally learned by presenting other CSs
without the UCS
© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
Classical Conditioning 5

Extinction
• CR weakened by presenting the CS without the UCS
• Pavlov rang bell but did not present food; the dog stopped salivating.

Spontaneous Recovery
• CR recurs after a time
delay and without
additional learning.
• When Pavlov rang the
bell the next day, the
dog salivated.

Access the text alternative for these images

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
 Classical Conditioning 6

Phobias
Watson and Rayner (1920) – Little Albert.
Access the text alternative for these images

© McGraw-Hill Education
Photo credit: Courtesy of Professor Benjamin Harris Permission required for reproduction or display
Classical Conditioning 7

Counterconditioning
• Goal: Associate CS with new, incompatible CR
• Means: CS paired with new UCS
© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
 Classical Conditioning 8

Application
Advertising

© McGraw-Hill Education
Photo credit: © Stockbyte/Getty Images Permission required for reproduction or display
 Classical Conditioning 9

Application
Placebo Effect
• immune and endocrine responses

© McGraw-Hill Education
Photo credit: Jon Feingersh/Getty Images
Permission required for reproduction or display
 Classical Conditioning 10

Application
Taste Aversion

© McGraw-Hill Education
Photo credit: Royalty-Free/CORBIS Permission required for reproduction or display
 Classical Conditioning 11

Application
Drug Tolerance / Habituation

© McGraw-Hill Education
Photo credit: © Rick Gomez/Corbis RF
Permission required for reproduction or display
 Operant Conditioning 1

Better explains voluntary behaviors.

The consequences of a behavior

change the probability of that
behavior’s occurrence.

© McGraw-Hill Education
Photo credit: Fancy Collection / SuperStock
Permission required for reproduction or display
Operant Conditioning 2

Thorndike’s Law of Effect

• consequence strengthens or
weakens an S – R connection

B.F. Skinner
• expanded on Thorndike’s work
• shaping (reward approximations
of the desired behavior)

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
Shaping 1

Teaching a bear to spin a ball on

its nose
• Is the trick too complex for
the bear?
• No problem!
• Look for whatever the bear
already can do.
• Find the bear behavior that
is the closest approximation
to the trick, and train the
bear to do that.

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
Shaping 2

Teaching a bear to spin a ball on

its nose
• As the bear improves, keep
requiring ever closer
approximations.
• Eventually, the bear masters
the trick.

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
 Reinforcement 1

Reinforcement increases behavior.

• Positive Reinforcement
• behavior followed by rewarding
consequence
• rewarding stimulus is “added”

• Negative Reinforcement
• behavior followed by rewarding
consequence
• aversive (unpleasant) stimulus is
“removed”

Photo credits: Francisco Cruz/Purestock/SuperStock, © McGraw-Hill Education

Digital Vision/Getty Images Permission required for reproduction or display
Reinforcement 2

Reinforcement increases behavior.

What is the effect on

the behavior?

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
Reinforcement 3

Reinforcement increases behavior.

What is the effect on

the behavior?

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
Reinforcement 4

Reinforcement increases behavior.

What is the effect on

the behavior?

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
Reinforcement 5

Reinforcement increases behavior.

What is the effect on the behavior?

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
Reinforcement 6

Learned helplessness:

an organism learns it has no control over negative outcomes

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
 Types of Reinforcers

Primary Reinforcers
• innately satisfying

Secondary Reinforcers
• become satisfying through
experience
• repeated association with a
pre-existing reinforcer
• token economy

© McGraw-Hill Education
Photo credit: © Photodisc / Alamy
Permission required for reproduction or display
 Types of Reinforced Behavior

Stimulus Generalization
• stimulus “sets the occasion” for the
response
• responding occurs to similar stimuli

Stimulus Discrimination
• stimuli signal when behavior will or
will not be reinforced

Extinction and Spontaneous Recovery

• behavior decreases when
reinforcement stops
© McGraw-Hill Education
Photo credit: Royalty-Free/Corbis Permission required for reproduction or display
 Schedules of Reinforcement 1

Continuous Reinforcement

Partial Reinforcement
• fixed / variable
• ratio / interval

©Massimofusaro/Shutterstock

© McGraw-Hill Education
Photo credit: © Yvette Cardozo/Getty Images Permission required for reproduction or display
 Schedules of Reinforcement 2

Fixed Ratio (FR)

reinforcement follows
a set # of behaviors

Variable Ratio (VR)

reinforcement follows an
unpredictable # of behaviors
(for example, an average)

© McGraw-Hill Education
Photo credit: © The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc./John Thoeming, photographer Permission required for reproduction or display
 Schedules of Reinforcement 3

Fixed Interval (FI)

reinforcement follows behavior that
occurs after a set amount of time has
elapsed

Variable Interval (VI)

reinforcement follows behavior that
occurs after an unpredictable amount
of time has elapsed

Photo credit: Center for Universal Design/CDC, © McGraw-Hill Education

Ingram Publishing Permission required for reproduction or display
Schedules of Reinforcement 4

Access the text alternative for these images

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
Punishment

Punishment decreases behavior.

Positive Punishment
• behavior followed by aversive consequence
• aversive (unpleasant) stimulus is “added”

Negative Punishment
• behavior followed by aversive consequence
• rewarding stimulus is “removed”

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
 Reinforcement 7

Punishment decreases behavior.

What is the effect on

the behavior?

Photo credit: Brand X Pictures/Punchstock © McGraw-Hill Education

Permission required for reproduction or display
 Reinforcement 8

Punishment decreases behavior.

What is the effect on

the behavior?

Photo credit: Brand X Pictures/Punchstock © McGraw-Hill Education

Permission required for reproduction or display
 Reinforcement 9

Punishment decreases behavior.

What is the effect on

the behavior?

Photo credit: moodboard/Corbis © McGraw-Hill Education

Permission required for reproduction or display
Operant Conditioning

Timing of Consequences
• immediate versus delayed reinforcement
• immediate versus delayed punishment

Applied Behavior Analysis

• behavior modification

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
 Observational Learning

Learning that occurs when a person

observes and imitates behavior (modeling).

Albert Bandura – Social Cognitive Theory

Four Processes of
Observational Learning
• attention
• retention
• motor reproduction
• reinforcement

© McGraw-Hill Education
Photo credit: blue jean images/Getty Images Permission required for reproduction or display
 Cognitive Factors in Learning 1

Do cognitions matter?

Does learning involve more than

environment-behavior connections?

Purposive Behavior in Humans

• goal directed
• goal setting
• self-regulation and
self-monitoring

© McGraw-Hill Education
Photo credit: © Author’s Image/PunchStock Permission required for reproduction or display
Cognitive Factors in Learning 2

Expectancy Learning
• information value

Latent Learning/Implicit Learning

Insight Learning

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
Other Factors in Learning

Biological Constraints
• instinctive drift
• preparedness

Cultural Influences

Psychological Constraints
• mindset: fixed v. growth

© McGraw-Hill Education
Permission required for reproduction or display
 Other Factors in Learning:
Challenge your Thinking

Learning Styles

• visual, aural, kinesthetic

• Research suggests there is no

actual advantage to instruction
within one’s preferred style.

Photo credits: © Purestock RF, © John Lund/Marc Romanelli/Getty Images RF, © © McGraw-Hill Education
Steve Hix/Fuse/Getty Images RF
Permission required for reproduction or display