Psychology B110

When experiences lead you to know new information, possess new skills, or demonstrate new behaviors

Learning is a relatively permanent change in behavior or knowledge

When experiences cause us to link things in the environment together

We learn to associate a neutral (meaningless) stimulus in our environment with a different, meaningful stimulus that is very important to us because of its "ability" to elicit a response

An event or signal that reliably elicits a response without prior learning

An automatic or unlearned reaction that automatically follows the unconditioned stimulus

A previously neutral or meaningless signal, that begins to produce a response after being paired

Learned reaction, acquisition occurs when the CS causes the CR; learning has occurred

The conditioned stimulus (CS) should start just before (?0.5 sec) and overlap a bit with the unconditioned stimulus (US)

Things that are similar to the conditioned stimulus (CS) also produce the conditioned response (CR)

This occurs when the same signal no longer produces the same response

When a conditioned response reemerges after extinction has occurred, after a brief rest period that is free from testing

You learn to avoid a particular food because of a previous unpleasant experience with it

Suggests that behaviors that have happy endings are repeated, and that behaviors that produce unhappy consequences will instead be avoided in the future

A type of learning in which behavior is strengthened if followed by a reinforcer or diminished if followed by a punisher.

Process that increases the probability of the behavior being repeated

The unpleasant thing doesn't even happen because you do a behavior that allows you to avoid it altogether

We will positively reinforce each little step that gets the chicken just a bit closer to playing "Mary Had a Little Lamb"

Would mean that the child has to say, "please," an exact number of times before she is given candy

Would mean that the child has to say, "please," an unpredictable number of times before she gets candy

Would mean that the child has to wait an exact amount of time after seeing the candy to say "please" before her dad will buy her candy

Would mean that an unpredictable amount of time has to pass after she sees the candy before saying "please" for her dad to buy her candy

Explains how we react less and less, until we eventually don't react at all to things that are very common in our lives

An exaggerated response to an extreme stimulus might help us stay alive

Learning can occur when we imitate others

This model conceives of memory as a computer-like system with information being entered (encoding), then retained (storage), and later being accessed (retrieval) when needed

Entry portal that captures a stimulus ever so briefly as we decide whether or not we need to pay attention to it

Register retains information for about 20 to 30 seconds, which is why it is sometimes referred to as short-term memory

Retain information in this working memory stage as long as we continue to think about it actively

Long-term memory is unlimited in its capacity and can hold information indefinitely

Happens when we do something so routinely that we do not need to dedicate a large amount of cognitive resources to it

The less skilled we are at something, the more conscious attention it require

Allows us to save information in our long-term memory storehouse for later use

Memory that we can consciously recall and overtly declare

All of the facts and general knowledge that you have accumulated over time

All personal experiences from your history

Not easily put into words and is recalled without conscious effort

Have learned how to do these things, you can demonstrate your knowledge of them, but you would likely have difficulty putting them into words

Suggests that we store concepts in our minds by connecting them to other related concepts

Processing information with intention, thinking about it deeply, coming up with examples, and connecting it to things in your own life

According to this principle, the way information is encoded affects later recall

Our memories are affected both by the environment and the emotional state we are in when we encode the information

As you can see, when you learn something, there is initially a large reduction in the amount of information that is remembered. However, after this big drop, the curve tapers off, and forgetting is much more gradual until we are left with the material that we retain indefinitely

Many times, when we feel as though we forgot something, the problem is really that we never encoded the information to begin with

Which suggests that information is not forgotten, but it is difficult or impossible to access because it competes or interferes with existing memories

Occurs when the creation of a new memory interferes with your ability to recall an old memor

Opposite experience and occurs when you have difficulty committing some new information to memory because it competes with information you already have stored

Type of motivated forgetting that involves deliberately trying to push information out of your mind

A form of motivated forgetting which occurs unconsciously

The general inability to recall events from approximately the first three years of life