LEARNING
• A systematic, relatively permanent change in behavior
that occurs through experience.
• 2 types:
1. Associative learning: occurs when we make a
connection between two events.
• Classical and Operant Conditioning
• Conditioning: the process of learning
associations.
2. Observational learning: occurs when a person
observes and imitates another’s behavior.
OBSERVATIONAL LEARNING
• Learning that occurs when a person observes and imitates
behavior.
• Also called:
• social learning
• modeling
• vicarious conditioning
• Keywords: model, imitate
• Important people:
• Bandura
ALBERT BANDURA
• American psychologist
• Recognized the importance of
cognition in learning
• Studied observational learning
• Examined the effect
consequences has on modeling
• The Bobo Doll experiment
BOBO DOLL EXPERIMENT
• Children watched an adult model show aggressive behavior
toward a bobo doll
• Three experimental conditions:
1. The model was praised
2. The model was punished
3. The model received no consequences
• Results indicated that individuals (children) learn through
imitating others based on consequences.
MODELING REQUIREMENTS
• Bandura suggests four main processes for
observational learning to occur:
• Attention
• Retention
• Reproduction
• Motivation
• Vicarious reinforcement
• Vicarious punishment
OTHER TYPES OF LEARNING
• Latent Learning
• Insight Learning
** Both consider cognitive influences
LATENT LEARNING
• Unreinforced learning that is not immediately reflected in behavior
• Also called implicit learning
• Learning occurs without our knowledge
• We only realize it once there is an incentive involved
• Studied by Edward Tolman (1932)
• Rats were placed in a maze and were given time to wander around
• Rats that had never been reinforced quickly knew how to get to the
end of the maze when food was placed there
• Rats seem to develop cognitive maps: a mental representation of
one's physical environment (layout of maze).
• Example
• You take the bus to school every day
• Your parents buy you a car
• You know how to drive to school, even
though you’ve never driven there before
INSIGHT LEARNING
• A form of problem solving in which the organism develops a
sudden understanding of a problem’s solution.
• an epiphany
• “AHA!” moment
• Studied by Wolfgang Kohler (1925)
• Chimpanzees; stick problem and box problem
• Think outside the box
• multicultural experiences enhance insight
Kohler's chimpanzee
showed "insight" in
solving this problem.
First, the chimp
assembled a stick, then
piled up boxes, then
used the stick to reach
a banana dangling
from a tree.
BIOLOGICAL CONSTRAINTS
• Instinctive Drift: The tendency of animals to
revert to instinctive behavior that interferes with
learning.
• Studied by Keller & Marion Breland
• Pigs and raccoon examples
• Preparedness: the species-specific biological
predisposition to learn in certain ways but not others.
• Evidenced by John Garcia & Robert Koelling
• Taste aversion & snake example