• A change in behavior, resulting from experience
– Learning is central to almost all areas of human existence
• A formal learning theory from the early twentieth century
– John Watson: Focused on environment and associated effects as key determinants of
learning
– B. F. Skinner: Designed animal experiments
to discover basic rules of learning
• Critical for survival by adapting behaviors for a particular environment
– Which sounds indicate potential danger?
– What foods are dangerous?
– When is it safe to sleep?
• Non-associative learning
• Associative learning
• Learning by watching others
• Non-associative learning
– A person learning Information about one external stimulus (e.g., a sight, smell, or sound)
• Habituation: A decrease in behavioral response after lengthy or repeated
exposure to a stimulus
• Especially if the stimulus is neither harmful nor rewarding
– Sensitization: An increase in behavioral response after lengthy or repeated exposure to a
stimulus
• Heightened preparation in a situation with potential harm or reward
• Associative learning
– Understanding how two or more pieces of information are related
– Classical conditioning: Learning that two stimuli go together
• Example: Music from scary movies elicits anxiousness when heard
– Operant conditioning: Learning that a behavior leads to a particular outcome
• Example: Studying leads to better grades
• Learning by watching others
– Observational learning
, • When we learn or change a behavior after watching a person engage in that
behavior
– Modeling
• Imitating a behavior seen in others
– Vicarious conditioning
• Learning to engage in a behavior, or not, after seeing others being rewarded, or
punished, for performing that action
• Long-term potentiation (LTP)
– The strengthening of synaptic connections between neurons
– Evidence supports the idea that long-term potentiation is involved in learning and
memory
• Hippocampus
• Familiar example: Association between scary music in movies and bad things happening
• Pavlov: Nobel Prize in 1904 for research on the digestive system
• Observed that dogs began to salivate as soon as they saw bowls of food
– Salivating at the sight of a bowl is not automatic
– Behavior acquired through learning by association
• A type of learned response in which a neutral object comes to elicit a response when it is
associated with a stimulus that already produces a response
– Step 1: Presenting food causes salivary reflex
• Unconditioned stimulus (US): A stimulus that elicits a response that is innate
and does not require any prior learning (food)
• Unconditioned response (UR): A response that does not have to be learned,
such as a reflex (salivation)
– Step 2: Clicking metronome is neutral stimulus
• Neutral stimulus: Anything seen or heard; must not be associated with the
unconditioned response
– Step 3 (conditioning trials): Start of learning
• The neutral stimulus is presented along with the unconditioned stimulus that
reliably produces the unconditioned response
Dog begins to associate US (food) and neutral stimulus (metronome
– Step 4 (critical trials): Association learned
– Learning is central to almost all areas of human existence
• A formal learning theory from the early twentieth century
– John Watson: Focused on environment and associated effects as key determinants of
learning
– B. F. Skinner: Designed animal experiments
to discover basic rules of learning
• Critical for survival by adapting behaviors for a particular environment
– Which sounds indicate potential danger?
– What foods are dangerous?
– When is it safe to sleep?
• Non-associative learning
• Associative learning
• Learning by watching others
• Non-associative learning
– A person learning Information about one external stimulus (e.g., a sight, smell, or sound)
• Habituation: A decrease in behavioral response after lengthy or repeated
exposure to a stimulus
• Especially if the stimulus is neither harmful nor rewarding
– Sensitization: An increase in behavioral response after lengthy or repeated exposure to a
stimulus
• Heightened preparation in a situation with potential harm or reward
• Associative learning
– Understanding how two or more pieces of information are related
– Classical conditioning: Learning that two stimuli go together
• Example: Music from scary movies elicits anxiousness when heard
– Operant conditioning: Learning that a behavior leads to a particular outcome
• Example: Studying leads to better grades
• Learning by watching others
– Observational learning
, • When we learn or change a behavior after watching a person engage in that
behavior
– Modeling
• Imitating a behavior seen in others
– Vicarious conditioning
• Learning to engage in a behavior, or not, after seeing others being rewarded, or
punished, for performing that action
• Long-term potentiation (LTP)
– The strengthening of synaptic connections between neurons
– Evidence supports the idea that long-term potentiation is involved in learning and
memory
• Hippocampus
• Familiar example: Association between scary music in movies and bad things happening
• Pavlov: Nobel Prize in 1904 for research on the digestive system
• Observed that dogs began to salivate as soon as they saw bowls of food
– Salivating at the sight of a bowl is not automatic
– Behavior acquired through learning by association
• A type of learned response in which a neutral object comes to elicit a response when it is
associated with a stimulus that already produces a response
– Step 1: Presenting food causes salivary reflex
• Unconditioned stimulus (US): A stimulus that elicits a response that is innate
and does not require any prior learning (food)
• Unconditioned response (UR): A response that does not have to be learned,
such as a reflex (salivation)
– Step 2: Clicking metronome is neutral stimulus
• Neutral stimulus: Anything seen or heard; must not be associated with the
unconditioned response
– Step 3 (conditioning trials): Start of learning
• The neutral stimulus is presented along with the unconditioned stimulus that
reliably produces the unconditioned response
Dog begins to associate US (food) and neutral stimulus (metronome
– Step 4 (critical trials): Association learned
