TWO SCHOOLS OF THOUGHT

Cognitive

• "learning is knowledge"
• focuses on internal characteristics
• emphasizes the role of memory and thinking

Behavioral

• "learning as behavior"
• focuses on changes in behavior that occur as a result of experience
• emphasizes stimuli and response behaviors

SUMMARY OF LEARNING THEORIES

Reasoning
individuals use thinking to restructure and recombine existing information and new information to form new associations and concepts

Iconic rote learning
two or more concepts become associated without conditioning and without reasoning

Vicarious learning (modeling)
behaviors are learned by watching the outcomes of others' behaviors or by imagining the outcome of potential behavior

Operant (instrumental) conditioning
a response that is given reinforcement is more likely to be repeated when the same situation arises in the future

Classical conditioning
a response elicited by one object will be elicited by the second object if both objects frequently occur together

BEHAVIORAL LEARNING
a process in which experience with the environment leads to a relatively permanent change in behavior or the potential for a change in behavior

Three major approaches:

• classical conditioning

• operant conditioning

• vicarious learning

CLASSICAL CONDITIONING

• stimulus =======> response

• behavior is 'elicited'

OPERANT CONDITIONING

• behavior =======> reward (or punishment) [or positive/negative reinforcement]

• behavioral response is 'emitted'

• behavior is caused by altering the consequences that follow the behavior

CLASSICAL CONDITIONING

unconditioned stimulus (UCS)
any stimulus capable of eliciting autonomically an unconditioned response (note that it can be possible for an unconditioned or 'unconditional' stimulus to have previously been conditioned)

unconditioned response (UCR)
the reflexive, involuntary response elicited by an unconditioned stimulus

conditioned stimulus (CS)
a previously neutral stimulus that, when paired with an unconditioned stimulus, may elicit a conditioned response

conditioned response (CR)
the response elicited by the conditioned stimulus when classical conditioning occurs

OPERANT CONDITIONING

operant
naturally occurring actions of an organism in the environment

reinforcements
stimuli that occur after the behavior, affecting the likelihood that the behavior will be emitted again by an organism

extinction
the disappearance of a response due to lack of reinforcement