Observational Learning In Psychology

We are constantly learning all around us, it can be from the media or even a family member. We are grasping information voluntarily or even involuntarily. While not all the behaviors we take in are positive, our behaviors can be altered specific way. To increase or decrease a behavior, we may use punishment or reinforcement. To stimulate a response or action, the process would be classical conditioning. Observational learning can also be latent learning, which is the person or animal didn’t realize they learned an idea until they use it later on in life. We must be careful of what we do or say because the activities we demonstrate may be repeated. Classical conditioning was accidental discovery by Ivan Pavlov, a Russian physiologist while studying the digestion of dogs. Classical conditioning can be described as a set of procedures used to observe how a person or animal learns how to events relate to each other. The four types of classical conditioning are Unconditioned Stimulus (US or UCS), Unconditioned Response (UR), Conditioned Stimulus (CS), and Conditioned Response (CR). Unconditioned Stimulus is to …show more content…
There are four key factors in observational learning: Attention, Retention, Production Process and Motivation. Attention is to watch or closely note what is happening. Retention is the ability to absorb the information being presented. Production Process is to perform the action on what was retained. Motivation is how motivated are you use the information given to you. When playing softball, observational learning was the key to success. Our coach would show our team the drill, which would be attention. After he showed us we must retain the information we just watched, which is retention. The production process would be when our coach would then ask us to repeat the exact drill he showed us. Motivation depends on the person; the willingness to demonstrate the drill would be