Learning & Behavior - Ch. 6 - Basic Principles Of Operant Conditioning

Front 1

escape latency

Back 1

the amount of time it takes the subject to escape on each trial

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Front 2

the law of effect

Back 2

The greater the satisfaction or discomfort of the response, the greater the strengthening or weakening of the bond.

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Front 3

stop-action principle

Back 3

A version of the law of effect.

Guthrie and Horton found that, after their subjects mastered the task, there was little variability from trial to trial for a fiven subject, but considerable variability between subjects. There was a parallel between the action of the camera and the reinforcer in their experiments.

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Front 4

Skinner's superstition experiment

Back 4

accidental reinforcement.
Found that the pigeons would perform distinct behaviours, for the same reason Guthrie & Horton found (stop action principle). Whatever behaviour happened to be occurring when the reinforcer was delivered was strengthened. This accidental strengthening process is self-perpetuating - once any one behaviour develops a somewhat higher frequency of occurrence than all other behaviours, it was a greater chance of being reinforced...

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Front 5

interim behaviours

Back 5

those that are frequent in the early part of the interval, when the next reinforcer was still some time away. Ex - pecking toward the floor, turning, and moving along the front wall of the chamber.

[Occur frequently early in the interval between reinforcers]

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Front 6

Terminal behaviours

Back 6

those that seldom occurred early in the interval but increased in frequency as the time of food delivery approached. Ex- orienting toward the food magazine and pecking in the vicinity of the magazine.

[Occur frequently toward the end of the interval]

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Front 7

adjunctive behaviours

Back 7

stereotyped behaviours that arise when food or some other reinforcer is delivered at regular intervals. Another name for interim and terminal.

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Front 8

conditioned reinforcer

Back 8

a previously neutral stimulus that has acquired the capacity to strengthen responses because that stimulus has been repeaedly paired with food or some other primary reinforcer

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Front 9

primary reinforcer

Back 9

a stimulus that naturally strengthens any response it follows. Ex- food, water, sex, comfort

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Front 10

percentile schedules of reinforcement

Back 10

when a given response is reinfored if it is better than a certain percentage of the last several responses that the learner has made. Very similar to shaping, but here the rules for reinforcement are very specific, and nothing is left to the discretion of the trainer.

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Front 11

discrete trial procedure

Back 11

a trial begins each time a subject in placed in the puzzle box, and the subject can make one and only one response on each trial.

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Front 12

free operant procudures

Back 12

-operant response can occur at any time
-operant response can occur repeatedly for as long as the subject remains in the experiment chamber

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Front 13

discriminative stimulus

Back 13

a stimulus that indicates whether or not responding will lead to reinforcement

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Front 14

three-term contingency

Back 14

contingency involving a discriminative stimulus, a response, and a reinforcer or punisher. The contingency states that in the presence of a specific discriminative stimulus, a specific response will lead to specific consequences.

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Front 15

resurgence

Back 15

the reappearance of a previously reinforced response that occurs when a more recently reinforced response is extinguished. Epstein suggested that some examples of novel or creative behaviour may be the result of resurgence. See p. 133

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Front 16

generalized reinforcers

Back 16

a special class of conditioned reinforcers - those that are associated with a large number of different primary reinforcers. Ex- money.

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Front 17

response chain

Back 17

the sequence of behaviours tha tmust occur in a specificc order, with the primary reinforcer being delivered only after the final response of the sequence. Circus training ex.

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Front 18

backward training

Back 18

start with the last response of the chain and move backward

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Front 19

forward training

Back 19

start by reinforcing the first response of the chain, then gradually add the second response, the third, etc.

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Front 20

instinctive drift

Back 20

innate behaviours that are related to the type of reinforcer being used that cause an animal's performance to drift away from the reinforced behaviour and toward instinctive behaviours. Pig ex.

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Front 21

behaviour-systems analysis

Back 21

view that different reinforcers evoke different systems or collections of species-typical behaviours, which cana ccount for the types of behaviours seen in autoshaping, classical conditioning, and some operant conditioning situations.

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