Transcript Slide 1

An Introduction to
THEORIES of LEARNING
Ninth Edition
CHAPTER
15
Robert C. Bolles
and Evolutionary
Psychology
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Darwin's Theory and Evolutionary
Psychology
• Natural Selection and Adaptations
 First, there is natural variability within a
species.
 Second, only some individual differences
are heritable.
 Third (Buss et al., 1988):”Organisms
with particular heritable attributes
produce more offspring, on average,
than those lacking these attributes.”
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Darwin's Theory and Evolutionary
Psychology
• Adaptations
 Defined as a physiological or anatomical
structure, a biological process, or a
behavior pattern that, historically,
contributed to the ability to survive and
reproduce.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Darwin's Theory and Evolutionary
Psychology
• Misconceptions about Adaptations
 Evolutionary fitness, defined in terms of
reproductive success, often does not
depend on an individual’s physical
fitness as we commonly think of the
term.
 It is also important to dispel the
common notion that evolution has some
ultimate goal toward which it is headed.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Darwin's Theory and Evolutionary
Psychology
• Misconceptions about Adaptations
 Natural selection means that organisms
possessing adaptive traits in a given
environment will tend to survive and
reproduce, period.
 The current use of a biological structure
for a specific purpose does not
necessarily mean that the structure
evolved for that purpose.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Robert C. Bolles (1928—1994)
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Major Theoretical Concepts
• Bolles on Reinforcement
 Learning involves the development of
expectancies.
 Seeing lightning and expecting thunder
exemplifies a S-S, expectancy.
 Expecting to hear the sound of a bell
when a doorbell is pressed exemplifies a
R-S expectancy.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Major Theoretical Concepts
• Innate Predispositions
 Innate S-S relationship is when a young
infant displays fear of a loud noise,
suggesting that the infant expects a
dangerous event to follow.
 Innate R-S expectancies are exemplified
by the stereotyped behavior many
species of animals show in the presence
of food, water, danger….
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Major Theoretical Concepts
• Contrast Bolles with the empirical
principle of equipotentiality
 Implies that laws of learning apply
equally to any type of stimulus and any
type of response.
 Ignores the evolutionary history of a
species.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Major Theoretical Concepts
• Motivation Restricts Response
Flexibility
 Bolles placed great importance on the
motivational state of the organism.
 R-S expectancies are more limited
because motivation produces response
bias.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Major Theoretical Concepts
• The Niche Argument
 Bolles (1988): “animals have an obligation,
an imperative, to learn this and to not
learn that depending on their niche and
how they fit into the overall scheme of
things…. A learning task which capitalizes
on an animal’s a priori predisposition to
behave in certain ways is likely to be a
glowing success. That is the niche
argument.” (pp. 12–13)
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
The Biological Boundaries of
Learning
• Petrinovich and Bolles (1954): one
group of rats turned left and a second
group turned right in a T-maze.
 Half of the rats in each group were
deprived of water and were reinforced
with water; the remaining rats were
deprived of food and earned food
reinforcement.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
The Biological Boundaries of
Learning
• Petrinovich and Bolles (1954)
 Results: Thirsty rats earning water
reinforcers learned the task faster.
 Why would the kind of reinforcer (food
versus water) influence learning
efficiency?
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
The Biological Boundaries of
Learning
• Petrinovich and Bolles (1954)
 Second Experiment
• Rats were again deprived of either water
or food. They were reinforced with water
or food, respectively, for whatever choice
they initially made.
• On the second trial, they were reinforced
only for making the opposite response.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
The Biological Boundaries of
Learning
• Petrinovich and Bolles (1954)
 Second Experiment
• Third trial, they were reinforced only for
making a response opposite to the choice
on the second trial, and so on.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
The Biological Boundaries of
Learning
• Petrinovich and Bolles (1954)
 Second Experiment Results
• Hungry rats reinforced with food
performed better at the task.
• Why was water the better reinforcer in
Experiment 1 and food the better
reinforcer in Experiment 2?
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
The Biological Boundaries of
Learning
• Bolles explanation: The niche
argument
 Rats are foragers.
 Their evolutionary history prepared
them to look for water in the same
place it was previously. Water is a
stable resource.
 Their evolutionary history prepared
them to look for food in different
locations. Food is a variable resource.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Petrinovich and Bolles (1954)
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
The Biological Boundaries of
Learning
• Escape and Avoidance
 Species-specific defensive reactions
(SSDRs) include freezing, fleeing,
screaming, leaping up, and aggressing.
 The closer the response required of an
animal in an experiment is to what that
animal would do naturally in that
situation, the more readily the response
will be learned.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
The Biological Boundaries of
Learning
• Escape and Avoidance
 Rats are not likely to learn lever press
response to escape from shock.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
The Biological Boundaries of
Learning
• Operant Conditioning and the
Misbehavior of Organisms
 Animal Behavior Enterprises. By using
operant techniques, the Brelands were
able to train a wide variety of animals to
perform many different tricks
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Misbehavior of Organisms
• Brelands (1961) concluded, “It seems
obvious that these animals are trapped
by strong instinctive behaviors, and
clearly we have here a demonstration
of the prepotency of such behavior
patterns over those which have been
conditioned” (p. 684).
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Misbehavior of Organisms
• The Brelands called the tendency for
innate behavior patterns gradually to
displace learned behavior instinctual
drift.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
The Biological Boundaries of
Learning
• Autoshaping
 Pigeon was reinforced at certain
intervals, regardless of what it was
doing, and if a disk was illuminated just
prior to the presentation of the
reinforcer, the pigeon learned to peck at
the disk.
 The question is, Why did the pigeon
learn to peck at the disk when it had
never been reinforced for doing so?
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
The Biological Boundaries of
Learning
• Conditioned Taste Aversion: Garcia
and Koelling (1966)
 Group 1: Bright, noisy water ->shock:
Developed an aversion to the water
 Group 2: Bright, noisy water -> nausea:
No aversion to the water
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
The Biological Boundaries of
Learning
• Conditioned Taste Aversion: Garcia
and Koelling (1966)
 Group 3: Saccharin solution -> shock:
No aversion to saccharin
 Group 4: Saccharin solution ->nausea:
Developed an aversion to saccharin
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
John Garcia—Discovered the
Garcia Effect
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Biological Behaviorism
• Timberlake asserts that laboratory
research in learning already makes
accommodations for the natural
propensities of species
• Much lab behavior is over-determined.
• Timberlake’s overdetermination
principle is not a condemnation of
instrumental and operant procedures.
It is an important caution.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
William Timberlake
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Evolutionary Psychology and
Human Behavior
• We are still the product of thousands of
years of evolution.
• We sometimes display innate
predispositions to attend to some
stimuli rather than to others and to
learn some kinds of expectancies more
readily than others.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Evolutionary Psychology and
Human Behavior
• The Development of Phobias
 Öhman and Mineka (2001, 2003) argue
that some phobias are acquired rapidly
because they are mediated by
nonconscious, automatic learning
processes.
 We may learn fears about spiders and
snakes differently than we learn fears
about guns or identity theft.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Evolutionary Psychology and
Human Behavior
• Mate Selection
 Buss and colleagues surveyed more
than ten thousand people from thirtyseven diverse cultures to determine if
there are universal features that are
valued in potential mates.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
David M. Buss
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Evolutionary Psychology and
Human Behavior
• Characteristics Valued in a Mate
 MALES AND FEMALES VALUE MOST
HIGHLY
• Kindness–Understanding Intelligence
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Evolutionary Psychology and
Human Behavior
• Characteristics Valued in a Mate
 MALES VALUE MORE THAN DO FEMALES
• Good looks
• Youth
 FEMALES VALUE MORE THAN DO MALES
• Good Earning Capacity
• Industriousness
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Evolutionary Psychology and
Human Behavior
• Mate Selection
 Perhaps we find some people attractive
just because they smell good to us.
 (MHC) is a combination of genes that
mediates many aspects of our immune
responses–reflected in our body odor.
 We prefer the scents of people with
MHCs that are different from our own.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Evolutionary Psychology and
Human Behavior
• Language
 Natural development of Creole
languages from rudimentary Pidgin…
without instruction.
 Specific Language Impairment.
An Introduction to Theories of Learning, Ninth Edition
Matthew H. Olson | B. R. Hergenhahn
Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All Rights Reserved