PSYC1011 Chap.3 Animal Learning and Behavioural Prediction

Animal Learning and Behavioural Prediction

Learning is inferred from a relatively enduring change in behavioural potential produced by experience. Performance on one occasion can also change because of fatigue, motivation, sensory adaptation or motor limitation. Begin by naming the behaviour and time scale, then identify the experienced relation.

Avoid using learning as a circular explanation in which behaviour changed because learning occurred and learning is known only because behaviour changed.

In classical conditioning, an unconditioned stimulus produces an unconditioned response without the relevant learning history. A conditioned stimulus acquires predictive value through its relation with the outcome and later elicits a conditioned response.

The conditioned response need not be identical to the unconditioned response. Timing, contingency and informativeness matter; simple pairing language can miss that a cue adds little when the outcome is already expected.

Acquisition describes changing responding as the cue–outcome relation is learned.

Extinction exposes the conditioned cue without the expected outcome and reduces responding, but spontaneous recovery, renewal and reinstatement show that extinction is not simply deletion. The original association can remain while a new context-sensitive relation is learned.

This distinction matters when predicting relapse outside the extinction setting.

Operant conditioning concerns relations between behaviour and consequences. Reinforcement increases future behaviour; punishment decreases it. Positive and negative describe adding or removing a stimulus, not good and bad. Negative reinforcement is therefore not punishment.

The correct classification follows the observed future probability of the specified behaviour, and the same event can function differently for different people or contexts.

Schedules of reinforcement shape response patterns and persistence. Ratio schedules depend on number of responses; interval schedules depend on time. Fixed schedules are predictable; variable schedules are not.

Intermittent reinforcement can sustain behaviour because the next outcome remains possible after many unrewarded responses. A label should follow the contingency actually arranged, not a surface feature such as a weekly calendar.

Discriminative stimuli signal when a response is likely to produce an outcome. Stimulus generalisation spreads responding to similar cues; discrimination narrows it.

Shaping reinforces successive approximations to a target behaviour. These processes allow a behavioural analysis to move beyond the final visible response and ask which antecedents, actions and consequences the environment supports.

Worked phone-use analysis: an alert predicts possible social information, checking produces occasional valued messages and many checks receive nothing.

The alert can become a conditioned cue, while intermittent consequences reinforce checking. Turning off alerts changes the antecedent relation; scheduling message checks changes the operant contingency. Calling the phone addictive without specifying behaviour and evidence collapses several mechanisms into one moral label.

To revise, draw contingency diagrams and then change one relation.

Present the outcome without the cue, remove the outcome after responding, move extinction to a new context or switch from variable ratio to fixed interval. Predict both immediate performance and longer-term recovery. Finish by naming a motivational or performance factor that could mimic learning.

This is the level of discrimination required for a strong applied answer.

Observational learning adds a social route without making consequences irrelevant. Attention to a model, retention of the action, ability to reproduce it and motivation all influence performance. Vicarious consequences can change what is attempted, but the observed action is not copied mechanically.

Separate acquiring information from performing it now. This distinction prevents a demonstration in which a participant knows a response but lacks opportunity or incentive from being misclassified as no learning.

A contingency account is strongest when it predicts acquisition, transfer, extinction and recovery instead of explaining only the final observed response.

What this chapter covers

• 01

  conditioned stimulus

• 02

  reinforcement

• 03

  extinction

• 04

  distinguish classical conditioning, operant learning and non-associative change while predicting behaviour from contingencies

• 05

  Observed behavioural change can reflect performance, motivation or context as well as acquisition of a new association.

Classify a checking contingency

Key terms

conditioned stimulus

A previously neutral cue that predicts an outcome after learning.

reinforcement

A consequence that increases the future probability of the behaviour it follows.

extinction

Reduced responding when a learned predictive or response–outcome relation is no longer supported.

Animal Learning and Behavioural Prediction FAQ

Exam move

Build a construct–operation–comparison–inference map, then change one cue, contingency, measure or design feature and predict the revised result.

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