Trial and error learning
Thorndike
1898, 1911
Thorndike’s puzzle-box experiment
• Thorndike put a hungry cat in a ‘puzzle
box’ and placed fish outside the box
where it could be seen, but was out of
reach.
• In order to escape from the box to get
the food, the cat had to operate a latch
to release a door on the side of the box.
• Through a process of trial and error the
cat learned that pushing the lever
opened the door.
Thorndike’s puzzle-box experiment
Problem to be solved
Solution tried
Solution works Solution fails
Practice solution
the organism has been
instrumental in bringing
about the solution
Trial and error learning
• A kind of learning in which one
response after another is tried (eg,
trials) and rejected as ineffective (eg,
errors), until eventually a successful
response is made.
– An organism slowly eliminates responses
that do not achieve the desired outcome,
and continues to respond in different ways
until they determine the response that
leads to the desired reward.
Instrumental learning
• The term used by Thorndike to refer to
the process whereby an organism
learns the association between
behaviour and its consequences.
– Also called operant conditioning (a term
introduced by Skinner)
Influences
• Motivation
– There needs to be a desire to attain some goal
• Exploration
– There needs to be an increase in activity – either
purposeful or random
• Incorrect or correct responses
– There needs to be a combination of incorrect and
correct responses or else it is not “trial and error”
learning
• Rewards
– There needs to be a reward for the correct behaviour
Law of effect
• Behaviour that is followed by a pleasant
consequence is strengthened
– more likely to occur again
• Behaviour that is followed by an
unpleasant consequence is weakened
– less likely to occur again
Real-life applications
• Problem-solving, especially if there are
no instructions or prior experience with
the task.
• By allowing variety of responses, lateral
thinking skills may develop.