Study Guide for Schwartz et al.
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Psychology of Learning (PSY375) - Dr. M. Plonsky
Study Guide
for Schwartz, B., Wasserman, E. A., & Robins, S. J. (2002).
Psychology of Learning and Behavior
(5-th ed.). NY: Norton.
This guide is color keyed to likelihood that the material will be on the exams, with
burgundy being Highly likely, dark blue being Possible, and light blue being Unlikely to
be found on the exams.
1. Human Nature, Science, & Behavior Theory
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Understanding
Understanding & science
Causes, generalizations, & laws
Experimentation: The tool of science
Science & human nature
Psychology, behavior theory, & learning
Philosophical background of behavior theory
Descartes & Hobbes: Man as machine
Associationism
Biological background of behavior theory
Darwin & evolution
Emergence of behavior theory
Single event learning: Habituation
Event-event learning: Pavlovian conditioning
Behavior-event learning: Operant conditioning
Learning about humans by studying animals
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2. Single Event Learning: Habituation
Separating habituation from sensory adaptation & motor fatigue
Evidence for a learning explanation
Application: Response recovery in everyday life
Conditions that produce habituation
Mechanisms of habituation
Dual-process theories
Neuroscience & learning
A memory theory of habituation
3. Pavlovian Conditioning: Basic Phenomena
The classic conditioning experiment
Acquisition & extinction
Scope of Pavlovian conditioning research
Eyeblink conditioning
Conditioned fear
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Neuroscience: Mechanisms of eyeblink conditioning
Application: Causes & treatments of phobia
Conditioned keypecking
Taste aversion learning
Control procedures in studies of Pavlovian conditioning
Application: Food aversions in cancer patients
Temporal relations between CS & US
Delay conditioning
Simultaneous conditioning
Temporal conditioning
Backward conditioning
Other variables affecting Pavlovian conditioning
CS & US
Qualitative relations between CS & US
Constraints on learning
Unbiased environments
Unbiased environments & substitutability
4. Pavlovian Conditioning: Causal Factors
Necessary conditions for Pavlovian conditioning
Contingency
Locating the US in time
Informativeness, redundancy, & blocking
Application: Predictiveness, fear, & anxiety
Pavlovian conditioning & inhibition
Inhibition in the nervous system
Conditioned inhibition of behavior
Detecting inhibition
External inhibition & disinhibition
Indirect measures of inhibition
Direct measures of inhibition
Conditions producing inhibition
Extinction
Conditioned inhibition training
Negative contingency training
Inhibition of delay
Discrimination & generalization
Excitatory & inhibitory generalization gradients
Backward conditioning
Necessary conditions for inhibition
Application: Experimental neurosis
5. Pavlovian Conditioning: Explanations
Rescorla-Wagner theory
Compound stimuli
Contingency
Inhibition
A surprising prediction
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Conditioning & changes in CS effectiveness
Latent inhibition
Learned irrelevance
Another look at blocking
Neuroscience: Mechanisms underlying CS processing
Surprise & CS salience
Status of the Rescorla-Wagner theory
Rehearsal & conditioning
Blocking
Effects of single event exposure on conditioning
CS Preexposure (latent inhibition)
US preexposure
Theories of extinction
6. Pavlovian Conditioning: Storage & Response Output
What is learned in conditioning?
Manipulating representations
Neuroscience: A neural distinction between URs & CRs
Conditioned inhibition: What is learned?
The Pavlovian conditioned response (CR)
The adaptive function of the conditioned response
CRs that oppose URs
Opponent process theory
Challenges to the conditioned opponent model
Role of conditioning in human drug abuse
Using conditioning principles to treat addiction
Extinction
Counterconditioning
Competing response training
Association: The process unifying diverse CRs
7. Operant Conditioning: Basic Phenomena
The law of effect
The behavior-consequence relation
Some methodological issues
Measuring the operant response
The conditioning chamber
What is operant behavior?
Which operant behaviors should be studied?
Conditioning & extinction
Creating behavioral units
The form of the behavioral unit
Constrained operant-reinforcer learning
The dancing chicken
The miserly raccoon
Application: Shaping new behavior
The nature of reinforcement
Reinforcer relativity
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Application: Eliminating behavior
Neuroscience: Mechanisms of reward
Conditioned reinforcement
Establishing a conditioned reinforcer-predictiveness
Observing responses
Token reinforcers
The functions of conditioned reinforcers
Applications of token reinforcement
Application: Token reinforcement in education
Negative side effects of reinforcement?
8. Operant Conditioning: Causal Factors & Explanations
What produces conditioning: Contiguity or contingency?
Evidence for contiguity
Superstition
Another look at superstition
Another look at contiguity & conditioning
Contingency learning
Contingency learning in infants
Learned helplessness
Application: Learned helplessness & depression
Contingency learning in general
How do animals form contingency judgments?
Operant conditioning: What is learned?
Response-reinforcer learning
Stimulus-reinforcer learning
Stimulus-response associations
9. Aversive Control of Behavior
Conditioned suppression
Punishment
Effectiveness of punishment
Does punishment work?
Maximizing the effects of punishment
Punishment & general suppression
Application: Effectiveness of punishment
Negativity of punishment
Avoidance behavior
Discrete-trial signaled avoidance
Neuroscience: Mechanisms of avoidance learning
Shock postponement
Theories of aversive control
Two-factor theory
Operant theory
Cognitive theory
Biological theory
Application: Eliminating avoidance behavior
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10. Maintenance of Behavior
Schedules of intermittent reinforcement
Fixed-Interval (FI) schedules
Variable-Interval (VI) schedules
Fixed-Ratio (FR) schedules
Variable-Ratio (VR) schedules
Can schedules of reinforcement maintain behavior?
Patterns of behavior maintained by reinforcement schedules
Schedules of reinforcement in the natural environment
Fixed Ratios
Variable Ratios
Variable Intervals
Fixed Intervals
Study of choice: Concurrent schedules of reinforcement
Matching law
Matching law in operation
Application: Procrastination
Matching & maximizing
Neuroscience: Brain stimulation can be used to study choice behavior
Choice & foraging
Operant behavior & economics
Concept of demand
Demand & income
Substitutability of commodities
Open & closed economic systems
11. Stimulus Control of Operant Behavior
Pervasiveness of stimulus control phenomena
Discrimination & generalization
Procedures for studying stimulus control
Process of discrimination
Predictiveness & redundancy
Discrimination training as a stimulus selector
Discrimination training & incidental stimuli
Transfer of training
Process of generalization: Excitation & inhibition
Peak shift
Transposition & the nature of perceptual judgment
Neuroscience: Mechanisms of auditory discrimination learning
Compound stimulus control
Configural stimulus control
Positive patterning
Negative patterning
Biconditional discrimination
12. Interactions Between Pavlovian & Operant Conditioning
Distinguishing Pavlovian & operant conditioning
Operant conditioning of reflexive responses
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Pavlovian conditioning of voluntary behavior
The omission procedure
Pavlovian contingencies & operant behavior
Types of Pavlovian-operant combinations
Studies of Pavlovian contingencies & operant behavior
Pavlovian conditioned states as information
Pavlovian & operant conditioning: One underlying process?
Competition between operant responses & Pavlovian CSs
Occasion setting in Pavlovian & operant conditioning
13. Behavior & Conceptualization
Discrimination & generalization in a new light
From discrimination & generalization to conceptualization
Natural concepts
Presence versus absence of objects from natural concepts
Discriminating objects in multiple natural concepts
Conceptualization via primary or secondary generalization
Nonsimilarity-based conceptualization by pigeons
Joint category learning by pigeons
Abstract concepts
Matching-to-sample by pigeons
Oddity learning by pigeons
14. Memory & Cognition
Remembering & language
Remembering & knowing
Delayed matching-to-sample
Basic methods & findings
Trace theory
Complexity & flexibility of memory
Memory loss?
Selective attention
Spatial memory
Neuroscience: Mechanisms of spatial learning
Control by time
Control by number
15. Human Learning & Cognition: Learning About Causes
Conditioning & causation causality detection
David Hume & causality
Causation as a psychological impression
Conditions of causation
A mechanical model of causality perception
Factors that affect causal judgments
Comparative psychology of causal association
Empirical investigations of human causality detection
Contingency
Application: Inhibition in human contingency judgments
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Study Guide for Schwartz et al.
Reconciling disparate results
Temporal contiguity
Application: The illusion of control
Cue competition
Application: Blocking in human learning
Learning & cognition: A theoretical perspective
Application: Why people believe weird things
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