Learning PG Quizes
Last year, Adam's parents started letting him borrow his mom's car or his dad's motorcycle on the weekends. For a number of reasons, Adam doesn't borrow the motorcycle very often. However, last week, Adam's parents said they are selling the motorcycle and that he won't be able to ride it after that. Since then, Adam has asked to borrow the motorcycle every day. Which concept best explains Adam's behavior?
Anticipatory behavioral contrast
When Mary is told that she will not be able to play with her favorite toy in the afternoon, she spends considerably more time than usual playing with it in the morning. This is an example of:
Anticipatory behavioral contrast
Which of the following is the best definition of behavior?
Any activity that can be observed or somehow measured
Imagine you are trying to rearrange your daily schedule according to Premack's theory of reinforcement so that you are more productive and happier. How would you do this?
As much as possible, arrange your activities from lowest-probability activities to highest-probability activities.
Brielle really wants to stop drinking alcohol. Her therapist suggests that she should follow every sip of alcohol with a sip of old, sour milk. This bizarre, but likely effective, therapy is an example of:
Aversion therapy
What is the primary reason why rule-governed behavior seems to be so insensitive to changes in reinforcement contingencies?
Because we have an extensive history of following rules and receiving reinforcement, our rule-following behavior is strong and doesn't easily change when new reinforcement is introduced.
in single subject designs, what is another name for the "control" condition?
baseline
Tim loves to eat at McDonalds and Taco Bell. In fact, he used to go to McDonalds on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday; and to Taco Bell on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday (he stays at home on Sundays and orders pizza). Two weeks ago, McDonalds started offering a 2-for-1 special in which Tim can get two cheeseburgers for just $1.00. Although the prices at Taco Bell have not changed at all, Tim now only eats at Taco Bell 1 day per week. Tim's change in behavior is an example of:
behavioral contrast
When Bryan was younger, his mom used to get mad when he didn't put his clothes in the laundry basket at the end of the day. To modify Bryan's behavior, his mom hung up a big sign in his room that read, "Put your clothes in the laundry basket, ya bonehead!" and thanked him when he did. After Bryan was doing this consistently, his mom replaced the sign with a smaller sign that said the same thing. Next, she hung up a smaller sign that simply said, "Clothes." Finally, Bryan's mom was able to take down the sign altogether. What technique was Bryan's mom using to get him to put his clothes in the laundry basket?
fading
Whereas a __________ schedule of reinforcement produces a "scalloped" pattern of responding, a __________ schedule produces a high, steady rate of responding.
fixed interval, variable ratio
Whereas a __________ schedule of reinforcement produces a "break-and-run" pattern of responding, a __________ schedule produces a moderate, steady rate of responding.
fixed ratio, variable interval
Thorndike proposed that behaviors followed by satisfying outcomes will be repeated and that behaviors followed by annoying outcomes will not be repeated. This is known as the __________.
law of effect
Anticipatory Nausea and Vomiting (ANV) is a well-known phenomenon that occurs in cancer patients who are receiving chemotherapy. After receiving chemo in a hospital setting, the patients often find that they experience nausea and vomiting simply by setting foot in the hospital, even if they aren't receiving any chemo treatments that day. What are the US and UR in this example?
US = chemotherapy, UR = nausea and vomiting
Why is classical conditioning important in our lives?
Because learning how stimuli are related to each other helps us anticipate the future, which enhances our chances of survival.
What ultimately determines whether observational learning will occur?
The consequences a person receives for behaving either similarly to or differently from a model.
When discussing self-control, people often blame their willpower for their inability to control their responding. Why is this explanation faulty?
Willpower is a label for the choice a person makes, not a cause of their behavior.
What is the difference between a fixed-ratio (FR) 5 schedule and a variable-ratio (VR) 5 schedule?
With a FR5 schedule, the response requirement stays the same from trial to trial; with a VR5 schedule, the response requirement changes from trial to trial.
Putting on your sunglasses before you walk outside would be an example of __________. Putting on your sunglasses after the bright sun shines in your eyes would be an example of __________.
avoidance, escape
Imagine you are simultaneously playing two slot machines in Las Vegas. You win every 30 minutes, on average, on Slot Machine #1 and every 60 minutes, on average, on Slot Machine #2. Approximately what percentage of your time will you spend pulling the arm on Slot Machine #2?
33%
Imagine a rat in a chamber that is responding under a concurrent schedule of reinforcement. Food is available on a VI 15-sec schedule when the rat presses the right lever and on a VI 60-sec schedule when it presses the left lever. Approximately what percentage of the time will the pigeon spend pressing the right lever?
80%
What is the difference between an unconditioned stimulus and a conditioned stimulus?
An unconditioned stimulus elicits a response without any prior learning because it is biologically relevant to an organism; a conditioned stimulus elicits a response because it has been paired with another stimulus that already elicits a response.
In general, why have researchers been more interested in studying avoidance behavior than escape behavior?
Because avoidance occurs even though no aversive stimulus is present.
Why do researchers prefer experimental research methods to descriptive methods?
Because experimental research methods allow researchers to determine how one variable causes another variable to change.
Why is Hull's theory of reinforcement no longer widely accepted in the psychology of learning?
Because his theory suggested that reinforcers reduce biological drives, but many of the stimuli that function as reinforcers are not associated with biological drives.
Mary works two jobs. She recently received a raise at her first job, while she still makes the same amount of money at her second job. Mary now works harder at her first job but has started to "slack off" at her second job. What is occurring?
Behavioral contrast
Tim loves to eat at McDonalds and Taco Bell. In fact, he used to go to McDonalds on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday; and to Taco Bell on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday (he stays at home on Sundays and orders pizza). Two weeks ago, McDonalds started offering a 2-for-1 special in which Tim can get two cheeseburgers for just $1.00. Although the prices at Taco Bell have not changed at all, Tim now only eats at Taco Bell 1 day per week. Tim's change in behavior is an example of:
Behavioral contrast
When Jenny was a baby, her mom used to feed her and make all sorts of funny faces while she was doing it, which made Jenny feel happy. Now, when Jenny sees anyone make a funny face, she finds herself feeling happy. What are the CS and CR in this example?
CS = funny faces, CR = feeling happy
Campbell's basketball team has been playing terribly as of late. After losing their fifth game in a row, Coach Hoover orders Campbell and his teammates to run wind sprints for an hour. After they have finished, the coach tells everyone to go home and come back the next day ready to play. What is the discriminative stimulus for running wind sprints in this example?
Coach Hoover's order to run wind sprints.
Which of these is a good example of avoidance?
Crossing the street before someone you dislike approaches you.
Allen, who was bullied as a child, feels scared whenever he sees a group of older kids walking toward him. In these situations, he usually crosses the street and, as a result, feels less scared. This example would be best explained using which theory of avoidance?
two process theory
What does DRO stand for?
Differential reinforcement of other behavior
Imagine you are a clinician who is trying to get one of her clients to spend less time using drugs. One approach would be to take away your client's drugs, but you know that doing this might be quite difficult to accomplish. Based on what you know about the matching law, what else could you do to decrease your client's drug use?
Dramatically increase the reinforcement available for non-drug behaviors.
What is the main difference between escape and avoidance?
Escape happens after an aversive stimulus is presented whereas avoidance occurs before an aversive stimulus is presented.
In what primary way do experimental research methods differ from descriptive research methods?
Experimental research methods include the manipulation of an independent variable; descriptive research methods do not.
Imagine you are a clinician who is trying to treat a client for depression. After some analysis, you have determined that part of your client's depressed behavior is maintained by attention from her loved ones (i.e., they pay attention to her when she is really depressed, which reinforces the depressed behavior). Why might you not want to teach your client's loved ones to use an extinction procedure in this case?
Extinction might lead to an extinction burst (an unwanted increase in depressed behavior).
Imagine you are the foreman of an assembly factory and you are trying to identify which of the four most common schedules of reinforcement might be best for producing a very high rate of work in your employees. Which schedule should you use?
variable ratio
Three years ago, Susie was stung by a bee while walking to school. Unfortunately, the swing set by her house is often surrounded by bees. Oddly enough, Susie has noticed that she's now afraid of swing sets. Why is this?
Higher-order conditioning
How did Premack define reinforcement?
Higher-probability behaviors reinforce lower-probability behaviors.
Which of the following is NOT a factor that may contribute to resistance to extinction?
How much an organism likes the reinforcer that has been maintaining responding.
Which of the following is the best example of an effective personal rule?
I will run for 30 minutes every morning at 9:00 AM this semester.
Relationship experts frequently say that relationships must include an element of surprise to remain strong. What might this suggest about the type of reinforcement schedule that is likely operating in these strong relationships?
It is likely a variable reinforcement schedule, because reinforcement on a variable schedule is "surprising."
Which famous researcher was responsible for discovering and conducting the earliest systematic studies on classical conditioning?
Ivan Pavlov
Who developed the therapy known as systematic desensitization?
Mary Cover Jones
Which of the following is NOT an example of behavior?
Personality
Imagine you are a clinician who is trying to treat a client for depression. After some analysis, you have determined that part of your client's depressed behavior is maintained by attention from her loved ones (i.e., they pay attention to her when she is really depressed, which reinforces the depressed behavior). As a result, you decide that her loved ones should use a DRO procedure instead. How would they do this?
Provide positive reinforcement any time your client is showing non-depressed behavior.
The staff at E-Hall have noticed that more and more students are failing to throw away their garbage when they're finished eating. To counter this problem, the staff put up very big signs that say, "Do not leave your garbage on the tables." After 2 weeks, students are still not throwing away their garbage. Based on what you know about rules, how could the staff change their signs to increase the chances that students will begin to empty their trays when they are done eating?
Put more information on the sign, such as what the consequences will be if students do not throw away their garbage.
Which of the following is NOT a defining feature of a concurrent schedule of reinforcement?
Responding to one alternative affects the reinforcement available from the other alternative.
What is the primary advantage of using rules to produce behavior change in other people?
Rules typically "get behavior going" very quickly.
Ashley is NOT a fan of cold weather. Every morning, she checks the TV to see what the temperature is. Most of the time, if the temperature is below 30 degrees, she stays home and snuggles under a heating blanket. In this example, "below 30 degrees" is an __________ for staying home and an __________ for going out.
SD, S∆
Last year, Jess was mugged in downtown Harrisonburg. Now, the very thought of walking in downtown Harrisonburg makes her anxious. Based on your understanding of extinction, how could Jess get over her fear of walking downtown?
She could repeatedly walk around in downtown Harrisonburg.
Imagine you have treated a client for her fear of dogs by using flooding. If your client encounters a dog several months later, she may experience fear once again. What process explains your client's fear?
Spontaneous recovery
Imagine you're a clinician who is treating a client with an intense fear of German shepherds. During your first therapy session, your client told you that she became afraid of German shepherds when she was bitten by one when she was 10 years old. Oddly, though, she is not afraid of another types of dogs. What behavioral process explains why she is afraid of German shepherds but not other dogs?
Stimulus discrimination
With regard to stimulus control, a(n) __________ is a discriminative stimulus that signals the absence of reinforcement (extinction) if a particular response is made, and a(n) __________ is a discriminative stimulus that signals the availability of reinforcement if a particular response is made.
S∆, SD
Which of the following would NOT be an example of a commitment response?
Telling yourself over and over again that you're going to eat a healthy dinner tonight.
An individual usually does drugs in his bedroom apartment. One day, he decides to do drugs in his best friend's house. He finds that the drug effects are much stronger at his friend's house, even though he consumes the same amount he usually does. Which of the following models best explains why?
The compensatory-response model
Imagine a pigeon in a chamber is responding under a multiple schedule of reinforcement. At first, food is available on a VI 30-sec schedule when a green light is lit and, then, on a VI 30-sec schedule when a red light is lit. Now imagine that the first VI 30-sec schedule changes to a VI 15-sec schedule (so that the pigeon now experiences a VI 15-sec for green and VI 30-sec schedule for red). Based on what you know about behavioral contrast, which of the following best describes what will happen to the pigeon's pecking after the schedule changes?
The pigeon will spend more time pecking the green light and less time pecking the red light.
Chris loves to watch television for hours every day. If we don't allow Chris to watch television for a few days, watching television should be especially reinforcing. Therefore, watching television can be used to reinforce any other behavior. Which reinforcement theory makes this prediction?
The response deprivation hypothesis
which of the following is an example of behavior that psychologists often study?
Thinking
In what way are Skinner's and Thorndike's views of learning different?
Thorndike used a subjective definition of reinforcement; Skinner believed that reinforcement should be defined in terms of objective changes in behavior.
What ultimately determines whether you will follow rules or instructions?
Whether you receive reinforcement for following the rule.
In observational learning, the model functions as:
a discriminative stimulus
In observational learning, imitation refers to situations in which:
a model's behavior sets the occasion for similar behavior by another person.
Logan is interested in studying the effects of alcohol on remembering in humans. She decides to have one group of psychology students study a word list after consuming alcohol; a second group of English students will study the same list after consuming water. Then, Logan will simply ask participants in each group to write as many words from the list as they can remember. She thinks that students who study after drinking alcohol will remember fewer words than students who drink water. In this study, the independent variable is __________, and the dependent variable is __________.
alcohol, memory
You work for your best friend's family-owned landscaping business every day during the summer. Your friend's father, Rico, always says that, "You should arrange the plants as I say you should." Rico's statement is best defined as:
an instruction
In the three-term contingency. rules function as:
antecedents
Olivia enrolled in a psychology class, but her friend told her that the class requires writing a lot of papers (which Olivia hates). Olivia drops the class before the start of the semester. This is an example of:
avoidance
Peter took care of his girlfriend all weekend because she had the flu. Although he feels fine, Peter is afraid he might have caught the flu as well. Consequently, he decides to take some medication to inoculate himself from the flu before he gets sick. What type of behavior is Peter engaging in?
avoidance
According to the Ainslie-Rachlin model of self-control, impulsivity is defined as:
choosing the smaller, sooner reinforcer over the larger, later reinforcer.
Whereas ________ refers to a predictive relation (a correlation) between evets, _______ refers to how frequently events occur together in space or time.
contingency, contiguity
Because going out for lunch can be rather expensive, Bryan has decided that it would be cheaper (and probably healthier) to make his own lunch and bring it to school with him. As such, Bryan makes his own lunch every morning and puts it on the kitchen counter so he can grab it on his way out the door. Based on Skinner's definition of self-control, eating his homemade lunch is the __________ response, and making lunch is the __________ response.
controlled, controlling
Whereas therapies like systematical desensitization and aversion therapy use __________ to modify behavior, flooding uses __________ to change behavior.
counterconditioning, extinction
According to __________, watching a TV show about cooking is reinforcing because it allows a food-deprived person to make snacks, which ultimately reduce hunger.
drive-reduction theory
Bryan is trying to get some of his students to stop making inappropriate comments in class. Sometimes, when the students make such comments, Bryan ignores them, because attention seems to be a reinforcer. Other times, when the students make inappropriate comments, Bryan takes away their participation points. Bryan has found that both methods seem to reduce the number of inappropriate comments that students make. Ignoring the students would be an example of __________, whereas taking away participation points would be an example of __________.
extinction, negative punishment
Gradually altering the intensity of a stimulus is called:
fading
A ______ schedule consists of two or more independent schedules presented in a sequence, each resulting in reinforcement and each having its own distinctive discriminative stimulus.
multiple
About 5 minutes before "The Bachelor" comes on TV every week, Bryan turns the channel so he doesn't have to watch those annoying people. This is an example of:
negative reinforcement
Whereas ________ behavior refers to behaviors that are potentially observable by others (like running and eating), __________ behavior refers to behaviors that are only observable by the person engaging in them (like thinking and seeing).
overt, covert
Last week, Jess's philosophy teacher yelled at her in class, because she was whispering very loudly with her friend. Since then, Jess has not whispered to her friend while they are in their philosophy class.
positive punishment
Every Tuesday and Thursday, Lisa goes to her psychology of learning class because she earns two points for participating in the pair discussions. This is an example of:
positive reinforcement
researchers typically prefer reversal designs to A-B designs because:
reversal designs increase one's confidence that the IV caused changes in the DV.
"Driving 60 mph in a 25-mph zone is against the law" is an example of a(n) __________; "You shouldn't drive 60 mph in a 25-mph zone because you may get a speeding ticket" is an example of a(n) __________.
rule, instruction
Dr. Anson frequently tells his classes that he will let them out of class early. Most often, though, he keeps them for the entire class period. What could his class do to increase the correspondence between what Dr. Anson says and what he actually does?
say thank you to Dr. Anson when he tells them he will let them out early and then actually does
The extent to which people do what they say they are going to do is referred to as:
say-do correspondence
In operant conditioning, __________ refers to the tendency for a response to be emitted in the presence of stimuli that are similar to the original discriminative stimulus.
stimulus generalization
Every time Josh drives by Starbuck's and sees the "Open" sign lit up, he stops in and orders a White Chocolate Mocha. What is the discriminative stimulus in this example?
the "open" sign
John is trying to teach his dog to ring a bell that hangs on the door when it wants to go outside. The dog taps its nose on the bell, but unfortunately, John is distracted and doesn't give the dog a reward until about 15 seconds later, when it was sitting in the living room. Which of the following will most likely occur?
the dog will probably learn to sit in the living room.
According to __________, the percentage of responses emitted toward an option should equal the percentage of reinforcers obtained from that option.
the matching law
Your best friend, Indiana Jones, is terrified of snakes because he was bitten by one when he was younger. Whenever you bring your pet boa constrictor into the living room, he screams and runs into the bedroom. After seeing the boa several times without getting bit, however, he seems comfortable enough to stay in the same room with it. Your friend's change in behavior is an example of:
the process of extinction.
According to __________, choosing one smaller, sooner reward typically isn't a big deal. The problem is that these choices add up over time and become problematic.
the small-but-cumulative-effects model
Eugenia's boss gave her a compliment for working long hours on the weekend. This is an example of:
there is not enough information to determine
What does Pavlov's stimulus-substitution theory predict about the UR and CR?
they should always be the same.
