Learning and perception
- 1. LEARNING & PERCEPTION Dr. Sushma Rathee Assistant Clinical Psychologist , PGIMER, Chandigarh Email: sushmaratheecp@gmail.com 1
- 2. Dollard and Miller’s theory of learning: • Dollard and Miller brought important perspectives into the study of learning and personality. Dollard was a sociologist with strong interests in anthropology. • Miller was trained as a learning theorist with a future in physiological psychology. Although two such men might seem an unlikely pairing, their combined perspective opened the door for eclectic approaches to psychology. • Both Dollard and Miller had also studied psychoanalysis.
- 3. Cont….. • This combination of psychoanalysis, sociology, and learning led to some of the most famous theories in psychology: 1. The frustration-aggression hypothesis, 2. Social learning, 3. Theoretical basis for understanding behavior in conflict situations. • These studies laid the foundation for social learning and cognitive personality theorists.
- 4. Cont…. • Dollard and Miller emphasized drives and habits. They also addressed theoretical differences in the strength of reinforcers and punishers, and they equated Freud’s concept of displacement to the behavioral concept of generalization. • Rather than considering psychoanalysis and behaviorism as fundamentally opposed, as Skinner had, Dollard and Miller allowed for a synthesis of these two major schools of psychology. Their vision led to influential and popular perspectives.
- 5. Learning theory: • They defined learning theory as the study of the circumstances under which responses and cue stimuli become connected. • They focused their studies on imitation and copying. • According to Miller and Dollard (1941), there are four essential factors involved in learning: the cue, the response, drive, and reward.
- 6. Cont…. • They described 3 processes of imitation: 1. Same behavior is the production of the same behavior as a model in the same circumstances, under the same cues as for the model. 2. Copying occurs when the learner tries to produce the same behavior as the model, and understands there is a discrepancy between what the model is doing, and what the learner is doing. The behavior is being done for a past reward, not the same trigger as for the model. The cues for the learner are the model’s behavior, and the reward is recognition of similarity to the model. This also produces social conformity. 3. Matched dependent behavior is like copying, with a behavior learned from a model, but the response is cued by the model, not the situational cues the model has learned, and there is a different reward. •
- 7. Cont…. • In simple terms, in the presence of an appropriate signal (the cue), the person responds with a particular behavior, if there is an adequate reward (based on learning). The entire process will not take place, however, if the individual does not want a reward (drive). • Another important aspect of social learning is that both drives and rewards can be acquired. For example, food choices are highly cultural. Would you enjoy a dinner of grubs, whale blubber, and sheep entrails, followed by a few crunchy grasshoppers for dessert? Drive Cue Response Reward
- 8. Cont…. 1). Drive: Wanting something: Freud described libido as the driving force in all activity, but Dollard and Millor used the concept of drive, taken from Hull’s work using deprivation to produce drive in animals. Drive is a need- “a strong stimulus which impels action: 1. Drive stimuli can be internal (hunger or even thoughts) 2. Drives are External (infliction of pain, discomfort in environment.) 3. Drives are primary (natural responses to physical need or discomfort). 4. Drives are Secondary (learned values for things associated with satisfaction or distress). Dollard and Millor believe ambition is fostered more powerfully in the middle class than the lower classes because of forces & models the middle class people are exposed to.
- 9. Cont….. 2.) Cue: Noticing Something: Cues are discriminative stimuli that are noticed at the time of behavior. They include sights, smells that may act as cues to a behavior. Even internal thoughts can act as cues. Cues determine “when he will respond, where, he will respond, and which response he will make.” Better learning means better connection between the cue and response- more accurate or rapid responses in the face of the cue. Cues can be entire behavior repertoires that indicate a response is necessary or expected. 3.) Response: Doing something: Responses are simply behaviors. Any behavior subject to change through learning is a response. They can be overt (voluntary physical behavior) or covert (hidden behavior such as thinking.) We choose our responses based on all the responses possible or useful in any situation- we develop a response hierarchy.
- 10. Cont… The hierarchy ranges from the most likely response to less likely responses that occur when the dominant response is blocked somehow. So responses change their position in the hierarchy. When the hierarchy is revised, it’s called the resultant hierarchy. Rewards move responses up the hierarchy, and punishment/ extinction moves them lower. 4. Reward: Getting something: They suggests that reward is impossible unless there is drive – here is the link to Freud’s libido. Rewards can be innate or learned.
- 11. The Learning Process: • A learning dilemma occurs in a situation in which the existing responses are not rewarded. If your dominant response always gets rewarded, there is no need for any learning. • Learning occurs when your dominant response doesn’t get a reward- so we are motivated to try something different- giving us an opportunity to learn something new. When the new response gets a favorable reward, the new response will more likely occur again.
- 12. Cont…. • There are ways to encourage a new response: 1. Rearranging the situation so the new response is more likely, 2. Simplifying the situation, reducing cues for the negative responses, 3. Coaxing the desired response with desirable rewards described, 4. Showing models of the desired response.
- 13. Important aspect of learning process: 1. Undesirable responses: can be eliminated by punishment, producing a change in the response hierarchy. This new behavior will occur more often if it is rewarded. 2. Extinction: occurs when a response is not rewarded. Extinction only works if the behavior truly gets no rewarding response. Well- learned responses from the past are very resistant to extinction.. 3. Spontaneous recovery: occurs when an extinguished response recurs. 4. Stimulus generalization: is the transfer of a response pattern from one environment to another which offers similar cues. 5. Discrimination: is the opposite of generalization- it means we recognize only certain cues are important to trigger a response.
- 14. Cont…. 6. Gradient of reward states: that the more closely the response is followed by reward, the more it is strengthened. 7. Gradient of punishment states: that the more immediately punishment follows misbehavior, the more effective it is in reducing the tendency to misbehave. 8. Anticipatory responses: are responses that precede reward and occur earlier and earlier. Anticipation can produce very speedy responses in recurring environments.
- 15. Four Critical Training Periods of Childhood: Dollard and Miller stated that psychosexual conflicts depicted in 3 developmental stages, but they added a fourth- conflicts around anger. 1. Feeding: It is inherently rewarding. The responses the infant makes before being fed become strengthened by the reward of food, and associations with feeding become secondary rewards- mother’s smell, touch, sounds of comfort, etc. If a child is left to cry when hunger, she/he loses the response of crying for food. These children go within and become very non-responsive. Character traits of apathy or anxiety develop. When the child is appropriately responded to, the child develops love for parents, self-respect for one’s needs, and a more sociable personality, able to give and take, since there is no great anxiety about getting basic needs met interpersonally.
- 16. Cont…. 2. Cleanliness training:, as Freud described the anal stage, has to do with toilet training. This means the child must learn to override internal drives to empty his bladder/bowels at will, and develop complex behavior such as finding a bathroom, taking off clothes, getting on the toilet, and relieving oneself according to those specific situational cues. This is very complex behavior for a 2-year-old. If there is too much criticism or too high an expectation for training, the child may learn avoidance of the parent to avoid punishment. Dollard and Miller suggest this stage be delayed until the child has enough language to produce mediating cues. Freud described anxiety/ guilt as producing the superego control. Dollard and Miller do describe anxiety/ guilt as being related to this training if it is not done sensitively.
- 17. Cont…. 3. Early sex training: relates to Freud’s phallic stage, with the Oedipal conflict producing gender role behavior and moral behavior. Dollard and Miller see this stage as also related to sexual training- as parents may punish children for masturbating when they explore their bodies. This produces anxiety around any sexual impulses. They favor a relaxed attitude around children’s explorations of their bodies, since too much control or criticism can set up fears of authority figures & inhibitions.
- 18. Cont… • 4. Anger-anxiety conflicts: It is a response to the inherent frustration of childhood. Frustration occurs in response to childhood dependency, limitations physically and mentally, & sibling control or antagonism. When frustrated, children first act out with aggression- public displays of anger. • When they are punished, they learn to be anxious about anger. This produces self-control around their angry impulses. • If parents shut down anger too completely, however, they can render their children helpless in the face of reasonable provocation which should be stopped. These children don’t learn effective assertiveness which sets good boundaries with others who would take advantage of them. • Children need to have anger described to them and to learn how to use this powerful emotion responsibly.
- 19. Cont… Conflict according to Freud was what produced aspects of personality. Dollard and Miller wanted to better understand conflict in learning terms. They related conflict to situational cues, not internal fights between the id and superego. 1. Gradient of approach- these gradients reflect the strength of the tendency to make a response, according to distance from the goal. When there are 2 responses, with different gradients toward a goal, people can be paralyzed by choice. The gradient of approach is when the tendency to approach a goal is stronger the nearer the subject is to the goal. 2. Gradient of avoidance- is when the tendency to avoid a feared stimulus is stronger the nearer the subject gets to it. The gradient of avoidance is steeper than that of approach. And an increase in drive raises the height of the entire gradient..
- 21. Four Types of Conflict: 1.Approach-avoidance conflict: is when the same goal produces feelings of approach and avoidance. The gradient to approach is less steep than the one to avoid, so in the distance, approach is more likely to be felt, but as one gets closer to the conflicted event, avoidance may become predominate. Anxiety is worst, most disabling at the cross point of the 2 gradients. 2.Avoidance-avoidance conflict: offers 2 goals and both are undesirable. In general, goals that are equally difficult to embrace produce immobilization, procrastination if possible, or escape.
- 23. Cont…. 3. Approach-approach conflict: is 2 positive goals only represent choosing the one you think offers the most pleasure. There is some anxiety at the choice point of the gradients, but it is rarely disabling. 4. Double approach-avoidance conflict: occurs when 2 choices have both desirable and undesirable aspects. Making one choice triggers its avoidance gradient, and the thought recurs that the other choice might be better. Often people stay stuck in a limbo of indecisiveness, doing nothing to promote one or the other- ultimately allowing life to remove one of the choices, as it will do.
- 27. The Frustration-Aggression Hypothesis: • They differed with Freud on aggression as due to libidinal impulses restrained by social conventions. • They explained aggression as purely the result of frustration, blocking of one’s goals, not a death instinct. • Aggression is defined as behavior intended to harm another. • Aggression is more likely when the drive is strong, or the interference is more complete, or when the frustration is repeated.
- 28. Modifications to the frustration-aggression hypothesis: • Learning responses to frustration- there are various responses to frustration, and aggression is only one. Based on past experience, it will be higher or lower on the response hierarchy. • Aggressive responses are learned as a response to frustration, as are the forms of aggression. • Displacement and catharsis – aggression can be displaced to another target, especially if the target of frustration is too threatening to confront. People who are closer to the target in some ways will more likely elicit an aggressive response. (Stimulus generalization) But displaced aggression doesn’t fully reduce the aggressive drive. • Freud suggested that catharsis- acting on the rage- can reduce aggression. Research has not found that to be so- in more competitive games, more aggression is triggered than reduced.
- 29. Role of Language in learning 1. Language provides discriminative cues for learning how to deal with situations. 2. Language enables faster learning, as children develop insight into their own motivations and outcomes of their behaviors. 3. Language also facilitates generalization of learning from one situation to the next. 4. Language also enables problem-solving skills using reason and planning. 5. People can imagine solutions and outcomes without having carefully endure the experience to see how it works out. 6. Misleading language also slows or misdirects problem solving, as when social problems are labeled to target a group, rather than targeting the inherent inequities.
- 30. Health Belief Model: • Health belief model (HBM) is a social psychological health behavior change model developed to explain and predict health-related behaviors, particularly in regard to the uptake of health services.
- 31. Cont….