University of Leicester Professor Graham Davies Year 1 Psychology Learning and Memory Professor Graham Davies Lecture 2 Copies of overheads Operant Conditioning
Alternative approaches to Learning: Thorndike • Trial and error learning • The ‘Puzzle Box’ • ‘Law of effect’ (1913)
Alternative approaches to Learning: Kohler • Objections to Thorndike • ‘The Mentality of Apes’ (1925) • The role of insight
Alternative approaches to learning: Skinner • ‘Behaviour of Organisms’ (1938) • Skinner Box • Operant Conditioning
The ABC of operant. conditioning A = antecedents. = The ABC of operant conditioning A = antecedents = lever, or click: (or stimulus conditions) food dispenser B = behaviour = pressing lever C = consequences = food being (what happens as a dispensed result of behaviour) (reinforcement)
Fundamentals of Operant Fundamentals of Operant Conditioning • The role of reinforcement • Primary vs. secondary reinforcement (Wolfe, 1936) • Schedules of reinforcement • Shaping-successive approximations
Biological Constraints on. Conditioning • Breland & Breland (1966) Biological Constraints on Conditioning • Breland & Breland (1966) ‘Animal Behavioural Enterprises’ Clash between instinctive and learned behaviour
Applications of operant Applications of operant conditioning • Programmed learning (Holland & Skinner, 1964) • Token economies - behaviour which earns or loses points - points exchanged for reinforcer - uses in prisons -and supermarkets!
Similarities between. classical and operant Similarities between classical and operant conditioning • Acquisition, extinction and recovery • Discrimination and generalisation
Differences between classical and operant conditioning • Autonomic vs. sympathetic • Class of response • Contingencies