Behavoral Analysis Exam 1

Taste aversion learning

**exception to short ISI rule -long ISI can still result in learning

Learning

- a relatively permanent change in *behavior* due to *experience*

within-subjects design

- participant's behavior is examined before (at baseline) some treatment, and then either during or after the treatment

between-subjects design

- participants are randomly split into different treatment groups, where the independent variable differs among groups.

Mutation

- slight changes in the DNA sequence that occur due to copying mistakes during replication, and other causes

animal psycholgoy

-*laboratory* Studied "higher" animals (rats, pigeons, monkeys, and apes) -Study animals as models for human behavior - *learning* was main focus

Repeated presentation of a musical tone is followed by a puff of air in the eye-causes eye blink. - After a few repetitions, the rabbit blinks when the tone sounds. This is ________. - The musical tone is then played repeatedly with no puff of air. Gradually, the rabbit stops blinking. This is _______

-acquisition -extinction

What other kinds of selection are there?

-artificial selection (fruit flies fed different diets) -sexual selection (

examples of inherited behaviors

-dogs fetching, birds singing, music ability

operational definition

A clear, concise detailed definition of a measure.

unconditioned stimulus

A stimulus that consistently and automatically elicits an unconditional response (UR). This is the UNLEARNED (*NATURAL*) STIMULUS Ex. sudden loud noise electric-shock smell of favorite food

Institutional Research Board (IRB)

A university or other institution appoints a panel of qualified judges who review all research proposals.

unconditioned response

An action that the US automatically elicits. This is the UNLEARNED (_*NATURAL*) RESPONSE Ex. Jumping (from loud noise) Flinching (from electric shock) Hunger ( from smelling favorite food)

Federal law that regulates treatment of animals alternative to painful procedures must be considered institutions must have a review board exclusions (not currently protected) birds, rats, mice, farm animals, frogs, fish, all invertebrates

Animal Welfare Act

Which of the following might be used as an operational definition of "attraction"? A) A feeling of affection when two people are together. B) The number of minutes during which two people touch each other over a four-hour period.

B

Which statement is more parsimonious? A) All humans have an unconscious drive towards self- destruction. or B) Self-destructive habits are caused by environmental factors, like abuse in early childhood.

B

ABA reversal design

Baseline (A), Treatment (B), Baseline (A) More convincing design, in that the behavior is more clearly controlled by the independent variable.

simultaneous conditioning

CS and US coincide completely (presented at same time)

backward conditioning

CS occurs after the US (not useful for learning)

trace conditioning

CS occurs totally before the US, so you have to remember the "trace" of the stimulus

We measure relationships between the environment and behavior, such as changes in:

Changes in: number of errors intensity speed rate fluency

The role of natural selection in the beaks of finches was the subject of research by

Charles Darwin

conditioned stimulus

Formerly a neutral stimulus, after consistent pairing with the US, elicits a similar response. This is the *LEARNED* STIMULUS Ex: Red light (neutral at first, then paired with loud noise)

"debate of mind"

Heightened interest in *apes*, primitive *peoples*, and *prehistoric* humans arose

GENUS

Homo -always capitalize genus name

Evolution by natural selection

In a given environment, certain individuals are better suited than others, with respect to a particular trait These individuals survive, and pass on that trait to future generations Ex. *peppered moths* during the industrial revolution

Watson and Rayner conditioned a baby to fear a white rat

Little Albert Experiment US-loud sound UR- fear CS- rat CR- fear

class of animals

Mammal

student of Watson, the "mother of behavior therapy"

Mary Cover Jones

Does an individual person or animal evolve?

No, generations evolve, not individuals

Does natural selection help individuals adapt to a changing environment

No, too slow (works over eons)

A compound CS that consists of a sour taste plus an electric shock is consistently paired with a drug that induces nausea (US). When presented alone the shock does not produce nausea. Is this an example of overshadowing or blocking?

Overshadowing (unless one of the pair was already a CS) Sour taste is more salient!

prior experience

Previous learning *disrupts* the CSUS contingency It's easy to ignore stimuli that occur all the time!

Order of animals

Primates

Three R's: replacement, reduction, refinement

Replacement- preferred use of non-animal methods over animal methods Reduction- use fewer animals Refinement- alleviate or minimize pain, suffering or distress, and enhance animal welfare for the animals still used.

Species

Sapiens -always italicize Latin name

delayed conditioning

The US is presented during the CS after a slight delay

peer-reviewed article

The article is forwarded to *expert* reviewers who specialize in the same field who carefully *evaluate* the quality of the submitted manuscript and check for *accuracy* and validity • *revisions* are suggested or if the article is lacking in scholarly validity and rigor it is *rejected*

conditioned response

The response elicited by the CS due to training. Usually it resembles the UR. This is the *LEARNED* RESPONSE Ex. Jumping (from the red light only)

Before conditioning, the US elicits __________ and the CS elicits ________

UR, no response

Synapse

When two dendrites grow close together, a contact point is formed. A small gap at the contact point is called the __ -messages are sent from one neuron across the __

Which type of learning theorist would be most likely to study human emotions?

a cognitivist

cumulative reader

a device used to record and analyze behavior • a pen rides on a slowly-moving piece of paper • each *action by the animal* marks a response by moving the pen • now replaced by computer software

personality

a dynamic set of characteristics which a person develops (after birth) due to *experience*

Species

a group of organisms in which individuals are capable of reproducing *fertile offspring*

latent inhibition

a stimulus that has not had any significance in the past takes longer to learn than a new stimulus. Ex. Baby crying all the time

Modal action pattern (MAP) or Fixed action patter (FAP)-

an instinctive behavioral sequence produced in response to a releasing stimulus it is indivisible and runs to completion Ex. Greylag goose egg-rolling

Kingdom of animals

animalia

Moro reflex

babies pull up their legs and arch their backs in response to sudden sounds or bumps

behaviorism

behavior should be described scientifically without attributing internal events or hypothetical constructs such as the "mind

Eye-blink conditioning First, train with tone alone as a CS for eye-blink Additional trials with tone and red light (compound CS), paired with air puff (US) Test light alone, the light alone does not cause eye blink The previous experience with the tone has ______ learning about the light.....because tone alone was a good predictor of air puff

blocked

An animal has learned that electric shock preceded nausea in the past. A compound CS that consists of a sour taste plus an electric shock is consistently paired with a drug that induces nausea (US). When presented alone the sour taste does not produce nausea. Is this an example of overshadowing or blocking ?

blocking

When the buzzer goes off on the microwave oven, Mary opens the door and eats her muffin.

buzzer is the CS; muffin is the US

Evolution

change in the inherited traits of a population of organisms through *successive generations*

5 species of apes

chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans, bonobos, humans

Theory

comprehensive explanation of observable events

change is __

constant -environment is always changing

A blinking light (CS) is paired with shock (US) to cause a fear response in a rat. The blinking light occurs twenty minutes before the shock every single time. When presented alone, the blinking light fails to elicit the fear response. Is this failure to learn related to contingency or contiguity?

contiguity

A blinking light (CS) is paired with shock (US) to cause a fear response in a rat. Fifty percent of the times that the blinking light occurs, a shock comes after it. The rest of the time the shock comes without warning. When presented alone, the blinking light fails to elicit the fear response. Is this failure to learn related to contingency or continuity?

contingency

continuity

different degrees of mentality could be ascribed to creatures

patellar reflex = (example)

doctor hitting knee with stick thing

supernormal stimulus

elicits a response more strongly than the stimulus for which it evolved Ex. herring gull chicks peck more at a red stick than a red spot, exaggerated breast size/eyes Ex. Oystercatcher incubates larger than normal eggs

Variation and natural selection are the foundations of...

evolution

Darwin's big idea

evolution by natural selection

in order to cope with change, organisms can __

evolve (does not help individuals) learn

glutamate

excitatory neurotransmitter

You answer the phone in your office hundreds of times, but it is never for you. Finally you stop answering it. This is an example of __

extinction

Richard Dawkins

gene centered view of evolution wrote "the selfish gene" in 1976 -critic of creationism and intelligent design

The tendency of some animals to hoard food is probably an example of

general behavior trait

Dendrites (branches)

grow out of the neurons when you listen to/write about/talk about/ practice something

Mutation changes can be:

have no effect (mostly!) • be *harmful* • be *advantageous*

Before learning: a hot date (US) = lust (UR) During learning: hot date (US) is paired with cologne (CS) = lust After learning: cologne only (CS) = lust (CR)

higher order conditioning

continguity

how close in time are the CS and US paired? -if the time b/w the CS and the US is short, learning is better

temperament

in-born behavioral tendencies that are repeatable across situations

Variation

individuals (at a given time and place) within a population of any organism are not all the same, due to slight *genetic differences*

Heritable traits

inherited characteristics

gaba

inhibitory neurotransmitter

Behavior can be ________ and/or ________

innate or learned

the strength of responses that occur after the CS (amplitude)

intensity

inter-stimulus interval (ISI)

interval of time b/w the CS and US -optimum ISI depends on many factors (type of resp)

Inter-trial interval (ITI)

interval of time between pairings of the CS and the US

Thorndicke

introduced experimental tests into the study of animal learning and brought comparative psychology into the laboratory

Growth of dendrites

learning

constructivism

learning is a process in which the learner actively builds new ideas from old -humans generate knowledge and meaning from their experiences

cognitivism

looks beyond behavior to explain brain-based learning (internal representations)

The cause of variation is:

mutation

ethology

natural habitat -studied "lower" animals (bees, ants) -instinctive behavior was main focus

The mechanism of evolution is

natural selection

brain cells are called

neurons

What is the purpose of evolution? Is there an end-goal or result to evolution?

no purpose- mistakes cause genetic mutations and species variation, those best suited will go on to reproduce

Learning is the mechanism by which individuals change in __

one lifetime

overshadowing

one of the components of a compound stimulus is more effective than the other in eliciting the CR

Ex. Eye blink conditioning A loud tone and a weak red light are trained together as a compound CS. When tested individually, the loud tone alone will cause eye blink, but the weak red light will not. The loud sound ___________ the weak red light

overshadows

higher order conditioning

pairing of a new neutral stimulus with an already learned CS (new stimulus becomes the CS without ever being paired with the US) Ex. cologne, love song, hot date

Which is learned, personality or temperament?

personality

You want to eliminate your conditional response to the song from the Burger King commercial, What steps would you take to produce extinction?

play the song repeatedly with no image of the breakfast sandwich

blocking

prior experience causes one part of a compound stimulus to be ineffective

Hypothesis

proposed explanation of a phenomenon

Positron emission tomography (PET)

provides a picture of brain activity using *radioactivity* from chemicals injected into the bloodstream

evolutionary psychology

psychological traits are *adaptations* that evolved to solve problems in human ancestral environments, and have been *passed down* through natural or sexual selection.

an American _______ who established "behaviorism" after doing research on animal behavior.

psychologist, John Watson

- Electroencephalographs (EEGs) and Magnetoencephalographs (MEGs)

record electrical and magnetic activity in the brain

Releasing stimulus (sign stimulus)

release a reaction that is inherited, not learned (species specific) Ex. Herring gull chicks- peck at parent's beak to obtain regurgitated food

Model action patterns are induced by events called

releasers

Spontaneous recovery refers to _.

return of CR during extinction after a time lapse

dopamine

reward system

the state or quality of an item that stands out relative to neighboring items

salience How important is the stimuli to an individual? Ex. For most of us a fire alarm has more salience than a soft whistle

comparative psychology

searches for principles that apply to the behavior of all animals, including humans. -compares cognitive processes and capacities of multiple species • examines both *unique* and *shared* behavioral traits

dishibition

sensitization of a previously habituated response -rat not being scared of loud sound anymore

David Bus

sex differences in mate selection -men portray sexual over perception bias, have false beliefs, look at human mating (men mostly murder other men over social status, etc.) sex selction, mate selection

counter conditioning

she (Mary Jones) "unconditioned fear" by pairing a pleasant stimulus with the white rat

parsimony

simple explanations (those with the fewest assumptions) are preferred over complex ones A. All humans have an unconscious drive towards self- destruction. or *B.* Self-destructive habits are caused by environmental factors, like abuse in early childhood.

stimulus

something that causes a response ex: Literally anything and everything can be considered a stimulus

Review Article

sometimes called literature reviews or secondary sources, synthesize or *analyze* research already conducted in primary sources. They generally *summarize* the current state of research on a given topic

Empirical or research article

sometimes called primary sources, report on original research. They usually describe an *experiment* and typically include sections such as an introduction, methods, results, and discussion

The temporary return of an extinguished response is called ______ __________

spontaneous recovery

social psychology

study how people's behavior is influenced by the presence of *others*

archeaology

study of human activity in the past, primarily through the recovery and analysis of the materials that they have left behind

informed consent

subjects are advised on what to expect and explicitly state that they agree to continue.

Prediction

testable statement about what will happen

Replication

testing of hypotheses must be *repeated*

extinction

the CS is repeatedly presented without the US, until the CR is *extinguished*

latency

the amount of time before a behavior starts -we measure this with UR/Cr

acquisition

the first stages of learning in which the CS and US are repeatedly paired. The CS starts to *elicit* the CR

topography

the form of the behavior

Speciation and how?

the formation of *new* and distinct species in the course of evolution How? -Reproductive isolation

Natural selection

the process by which heritable traits become more common in a population over time, because individuals possessing certain variations of those traits are *better adapted* to the *current environment*

psychology

the scientific study of human mental functions and behaviors

Darwin's Evolutionary Theory

the single most important factor in the debate on the mind Darwin thought of cognition and behavior, as adaptations of the organism just like any other physical features

pedagogy

the study and practice of how best to teach, especially as an academic subject or theoretical concept

epigenetics

the study of genetic variations that result from external or environmental factors that switch genes on and off

sociology

the study of human social behavior

anthropology

the study of humankind, past and present

sociobiology

the study of social behavior from a Darwinian evolutionary perspective -Founder E.O Wilson

Heritable traits persist...

these traits persist in a population if they make an organism more likely to *survive and reproduce*

replication results

those that anyone can obtain by following the same procedures.

Plato

thought individual differences were innate *nativism* -the bulk of our knowledge is inborn

Aristotle

thought that the mind of a newborn is like a blank slate or tabula rasa *Empiricism* - all the ideas we have are based on experience

Natural selection is the mechanism by which species change over vast amounts of __

time

general behavior traits

traits that are influenced by genes, like MAPs but they occur in numerous situations, ex: rats freeze when startled

neurotransmitters

transmit information across the synapse

compound stimulus

two or more stimuli *presented together*, often as a CS Ex. Eye blink conditioning Sound plus red light presented together (CCS) before air puff (US)

reflex

unlearned response to a stimuli relationship between an event (stimulus) and a behavior (response)

- Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI)

uses magnetic detectors to measure the amounts of hemoglobin and oxygen in different areas of the brain *during a cognitive task*

Ivon Pavlov

was a *physiologist* who won a Nobel Prize for his research on *digestion*.

What steps would you take to produce spontaneous recovery?

watch the commercial once a few days after the extinction procedure has been completed

contingency

what is the *likelihood* that the CS will precede the US? Amount of learning depends on how well the CS *predicts* the US

habituation

when a stimulus evokes *decreases* response over time

sensitization

when a stimulus evokes an *increased* response over time