March 16, 2010
Psychology 485
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvaD-
29pQBY
 Introduction
• History & Definitions
 Self-recognition
• Associative processes?
 Metacognition
• Associative processes, modeling and Behavioral
Economics
 Rene
Descartes
• Cogito ergo sum
• I think, therefore I am
 Dualism
 Cartesian
theatre
• A place in your head
where “you” are
watching things
happen
 Humans
are aware of ourselves as
animate beings
• Control of own behaviour
• Mental representation of ourselves
 Are
animals self-aware?
• Mirror tasks
 Thinking
about
thinking
 Primary vs secondary
representations
 Assessing internal
states is not enough
• Knowing that you are
hungry isn’t
metacognition
 Assessing
knowledge
states
Know a lot
• Some people know a
lot about baseball,
some don’t know much
 Do
you know how
much you know?
John is a
moderate fan of
baseball
• e.g. “I really have to
study for this midterm
tomorrow, I don’t know
anything!”
Know a little
 Do
not interpret as higher cognitive
process if lower process will suffice
 Difficult to “show” secondary
representations (especially without
language)
• Can self-awareness and metacognition be
explained through reinforcement history and/or
associative learning?


A test of self-recognition,
self-consciousness
Stages:
• Time to adjust/experience
mirror
• Tranquilize animal and paint
2 dots (visible and controlhidden)
• See if animal notices dot,
compare to control dot
 Animals
cats?
tested: chimps, dolphins, elephants, magpies,
 Epstein, Lanza
(1981)
& Skinner
• Trained pigeons to peck at blue
dot
• Experience with mirror (see
blue dot in mirror, peck at
origin)
• Blue dot on pigeon, under bib
• Peck at bib
 video
 Skinner
 Kinds
of questions we ask children
reinforces self-observation
 e.g., “are you hungry?” “what are you
doing?”
 Accurate response likely results in some
form of desired outcome (i.e.,
reinforcement of behaviour)
11
 Do
animals know when they don’t know?
• Dolpins, pigeons, rats, non-human primates
 Testing
procedure
• Some trials include the option to ‘decline’
• If animals know they don’t know, should decline
to answer
Study phase:
Short or Long tone
0.33
0.66
Choice phase:
1/3 Forced Test
2/3 Choice
Test phase:
6 pellets if correct
0 pellets if incorrect
3 pellets
 If animals have metacognition:
• Increase use of ‘decline’ option as task difficulty
increases
 Red-green  not much use of ‘decline’
 Light green-dark green  more use of ‘decline’
• Accuracy is higher on ‘chosen’ tests than ‘forced’
tests
 You choose to take the test when you know the answer
• Accuracy difference increases with task difficulty
 Can
associative processes explain higher
accuracy on ‘Chosen’ tests?
 Smith, Beran, Couchman, &
Coutinho,
2008
• Reinforcement of ‘decline’ options creates a “low
frequency tendency” to decline
• Competes with generalization gradients for each
stimulus
High
Response
Strength
Decline
Threshold
Low
Short
Subjective level of stimulus
Long
 Reinforcement
to decline option creates
a constant response-strength tendency
• Competes with response-strength of stimuli
 Winner-take-all
mechanism
 Since it is based on subjective view of
stimuli, also accounts for difference
between Chosen-Forced accuracy
 Shows
associative
processes can
explain
metacognition
 Morgan’s
canon?
 Jozefowiez, Staddon
& Cerutti, 2009
 Similar to quantitative model, but
measures
• Probability of payoff
• Risk levels (is animal risk-prone or risk-averse?)
1.0
Short response
Long response
Probability of payoff
at subjective equality
is diminished
Payoff
0
Short
Subjective level of stimulus
Long
1.0
Short response
Long response
Correct 50% of time, average
reward = 3 pellets
Decline reward = 3 pellets
Payoff
Risk Neutral
0
Short
Subjective level of stimulus
Long
1.0
Short response
Risk Averse
Payoff
Long response
Would rather guarantee
payoff of 3 than risk no
reward
0
Short
Subjective level of stimulus
Long
 More
on this next week...
 When might an animal want to guarantee
some kind of payoff?
 When might they be willing to “risk it”
for the larger payoff?
 Model
accounts for changing needs, and
metacognition
• Still doesn’t assume metacognition
 http://www.zefrank.com/theshow/archiv
es/2007/01/010807.html
 Is selfawareness/metacognition/consciousness
necessary?
• Why learn to be self-aware? Evolutionary
advantages?