Week 7 - Day 2 (Ch9 continued Observational Learning)

Quizlet: https://quizlet.com/_21l53z

Does watching others affect learning?

Teaching someone to perform a complex task requires more than reinforcing arbitrary correct behaviors
We learn many behaviors, including attitudes, through observation
 Observational learning
- ooThe acquisition or modification of a behavior after exposure to at least one performance of that behavior
Observational learning is a powerful adaptive tool for humans and other animals
There are several ways that behavior, thoughts, and attitudes can be learned through observation

Memes

ooA unit of knowledge transmitted within a culture
ooAnalogous to genes
ooTransmission of learning at the cultural level
Memes can be conditioned through association or reinforcement, but are often learned by watching the behavior of other people
- ooThrough social learning, some behaviors are passed along from one generation to the next
- ooSocial learning in Japanese macaques
  - Particular species of monkeys in Japan
  - Group of researchers were going to study them
  - The researchers would toss them sweet potatoes
  - One day, one of the monkeys washed the sweet potato off in the ocean (none of the other monkeys knew to do that)
    - Eventually all of them did it through observation

Social Learning of Fear

Researchers observed that lab-reared monkeys were not afraid of snakes the way monkeys in the wild are
- ooThis research demonstrated that animals’ fears can be learned through observation
- ooMonkeys in the lab hadn’t seen the snakes, but also weren’t around other monkeys who had that fear response that they could pick up
Social forces play a role in fear-learning in humans, too
- ooHearing something is dangerous
  - You are less likely to do it later
  - If you hear that an amusement park is dangerous, you might be scared to go there
- ooSeeing another person’s fear response
  - Dean’s wife has a fear of roaches that she developed from watching her sister have extreme fear of roaches
Demonstration and Imitation
 Modeling : the imitation of behavior through observational learning
- ooModeling is effective only if the observer is physically capable of imitating the behavior
  - If you only had one arm, it would be physically harder to imitate behavior
- ooWe are much more likely to imitate attractive, high-status, or similar models
  - If you watch reality TV, you might think it’s okay to be more dramatic since those people have high status
- ooOften occurs implicitly
Imitation is much less common in nonhuman animals than in humans
- ooThe Japanese monkeys are an anomaly
Bookmark added at 00:14 in Audio 1

Social Learning of Behavior

 Vicarious reinforcement
- ooIs a model’s behavior reinforced or punished?
 Vicarious learning
- ooLearning the consequences of an action by watching others being rewarded or punished for performing the action
  - Seeing someone else get a speeding ticket might make you drive safer
A key distinction in learning is between the acquisition of a behavior and its performance
In other words, learning a behavior does not necessarily lead to performing that behavior
What happens in the brain during imitation learning?
 Mirror neurons
- ooNo one is certain of their exact function
- ooMay serve as the basis of imitation learning
- ooMay help us explain and predict others’ behavior
- ooMay be the neural basis for empathy
  - Why is someone crying?
    - Probably because they’re sad
- ooMay play a role in humans’ ability to communicate through language
- ooWe are sure: mirror neurons track the behaviors of targets as those behaviors unfold over time
  - If you imitate someone, your same brain regions are active as the person doing the behavior
- ooIn order to imitate someone, we have to know their intention
 Bandura’s observational studies
Bandura’s studies suggest that exposing children to violence may encourage them to act aggressively
Understanding these relationships has important, real-world applications
How does aggression between spouses influence children’s relationship styles?
- ooIf children see their parents acting aggressive towards each other, how does that affect their relationships with their peers and then how does it affect their relationships down the road?
Does violent media increase aggressive behavior?
- ooThere’s a lot of research that says yes
Does violent media increase violent behavior?
- ooYES! YES! YES!
Violent media leads to long-term and short-term aggressive behavior (Anderson et al., 2003)
Even short periods of exposure to violent media lead to desensitization (Carnagey, Anderson, & Bushman, 2007)
Viewing habits at age 8 predict criminal activity and violent behavior at age 30 (Eron, 1987)
A meta-analysis of such studies suggests that, indeed, violent media increases the likelihood of aggression (Gentile, Saleem, & Anderson, 2007)
- ooA lot of evidence that it impacts behavior
Does violent media increase violent behavior?
- ooNO! NO! NO!
Competition, not violence, may have the greatest influence on aggressive behavior (Adachi & Willoughby, 2011)
Cooperative gameplay decreases aggressive cognitions (Schmierbach, 2010)
Cooperative gameplay also produces less physiological arousal (Carnagey, Anderson, & Bushman, 2007)
- ooYou become less agitated when playing with others than by yourself
Gamers scored better on several measures of adjustment and risk-taking than non-gamers (Durkin & Barber, 2002)

Chapter 7 (part 1)

Thinking and intelligence

How would you define “thinking”
- ooBookmark added at 27:20 in Audio 1
The field of psychology that focuses on thought is called cognitive psychology
Two components
- ooBrain represents information
- oo Thinking is the mental manipulation of these representations
 Cognition includes thinking and the understandings that result from thinking
Our thoughts consist of mental representations
 Analogical representations
- ooMental representations of objects (caricatures, maps, etc)
 Symbolic representations
- ooMost frequently used symbolic representations are concepts
- oo Concept
  - Mental representation
  - Musical instruments
    - Guitar
      - Has six strings
    - Violin
      - Has four strings
    - Trumpet
      - Is blown into

All of these are played

Defining attributes

In this way of thinking about concepts, a category is characterized by a list of features that determine whether an object is a member
Bachelor
- ooUnmarried and male
Not always clear
- ooA sixteen year old boy
- ooA man in his 30s who goes on several dates each week
- ooA man in a relationship of 35 years who has never married
- ooAre the above bachelors?

Prototype

Within each category, there is a best example - a prototype - for that category
Some category are more prototypical than others
- ooThe prototypes are simply members we have encountered more often

Vocab

Observational learning	The acquisition or modification of a behavior after exposure to at least one performance of that behavior
Meme	Unit of knowledge transmitted within a culture
Modeling	The imitation of behavior through observational learning
Vicarious reinforcement	Tendency to repeat behaviors for which others are rewarded
Vicarious learning	Tendency to avoid behaviors for which others are punished for
Mirror neurons	Neuron that fires when someone observes an action performed by another as though the observer were doing the action
Cognitive psychology	Psychology that focuses on thought
Thinking	Mental manipulation of the brain’s representation of information
Cognition	Includes thinking and understanding that results from thinking
Analogical representations	Mental representations of objects (caricatures, maps, etc)
Symbolic representations	Abstract mental representations that do not correspond to the physical features of objects or ideas (language is an example)
Defining attributes	Mental representations of objects (caricatures, maps, etc)
Prototype	The best example of a concept that we can think of

Week 7 - Day 2 (Ch9 continued Observational Learning)

Dean’s wife has a fear of roaches that she developed from watching her sister have extreme fear of roaches