Psych 1 Chapter 4

8/3/2019 Psych 1 Chapter 4

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Chapter 4; The Mind & Consciousness 10/9/2011 12:12:00 PM

Consciousness

Refers to moment by moment subjective experiences

o Thoughts and observations about our immediate surroundings

o Two components;

Contents of consciousness level of consciousness

o completely personal and subjective; everyone experiences the world in their

own way

qualia

o describes the properties of our subjective experiences and our perceptions of

things

o difficult to study empirically

fMRI

researches can use it to tell whether a person is looking at a striped pattern that is

moving up or a sentence, etc .

Dualism

Rene Descartes: the mind is separate from the body

Modern day psychological scientists now reject dualism and state that the brain and

mind are inseparable

Frank Tong (1998)

Did a study of the relationship between consciousness and neural responses in the

brain

Participants were shown images in which houses were superimposed on faces

Neural activity increased within the temporal lobe‟s fusiform face area when

participants reported seeing a face, but neural activity increased within temporal lobe

regions associated with object recognition when participants reported seeing a house

FINDINGS: suggested that different types of sensory information are processed by

different brain regions

William James

One of the first American psychologists

Conscious experience is a continuous stream of thoughts that often floats from one

thought to another

Cannot focus on multiple things at once

Automatic tasks- driving road you know very well, mind wanders and you forget you

are even driving but you still do it without an issue-- > automatic processing

Paying too much attention can actually interfere with these actions



Difficult and unfamiliar tasks require much greater conscious effort-- > controlled

processing

Steven Laureys (2007)

Cognitive neuroscientist

Persistent vegetative state (comas): the longer you are in this state the less chancethere is of you waking up

o E.g. Terri Schiavo (15 years in a coma)

Minimally Conscious State: people make some deliberate movements, such as

following an object with their eyes, may attempt to communicate

o E.g. Jan Grzebski woke up from a 19 year long coma; he remembers events

that went around him while he was in his coma

Ethical Issues

Whether or not brain evidence should be used in determining the end-of-life decisions

o Emerging evidence indicates that stimulating the thalamus increases

awareness among those in minimally conscious states, but when to use this

procedure is still debatable

Corpus Callosum

The major connection between the hemispheres

o Sometimes cut in order to treat epilepsy

Split Brain

When the corpus callosum is severed and the brain‟s halves are almost completely

isolated form each other

Split-brain patients do not immediately appear to have any problems

Michael Gazzaniga & Roger Sperry

Series of tests on the first split-brain participants

Results: found that just as the brain had been split in two, so had the mind

Two pictures flashed on a screen briefly and simultaneously, the patient will report

that only the picture on the right was shown

This is because the left hemisphere sees only the picture on the right side, so it is the

only picture a person with a split brain can talk about

Mute right brain cannot articulate a response

Right brain can act on perception however, if the picture on the left was a spoon, the

right hemisphere can easily pick out an actual spoon from a selection of objects using

the left hand (which is controlled by the left hemisphere) — the left hemisphere still

doesn‟t know what the right one saw



Splitting the brain- produces two half brains- each with their own perceptions,

thoughts and consciousness

Left Hemisphere

Dominant for language

Hopeless with spatial relationshipsThe Interpreter

A left hemisphere process that attempts to make sense of events

o Interprets/ explains the right hemisphere‟s actions

Strongly influences the way we view and remember the world

Left Brain: tends to “compress” its experiences into a comprehensible story and to

reconstruct remembered details based on the basics of the story

Right Brain: seems to simply experience the world and remember things in a manner

less distorted by narrative interpretation

Blindsight

Person who experiences some blindness because of damage to the visual system that

continues to show evidence of some sight, but is unaware of being able to see at all

o Typically only loses a portion of the visual field

Amygdala

Visual information arrives here

One theory suggests that the amygdala processes visual information very crudely and

quickly to help identify potential threats

FOUR F‟s Global Workspace Model

Posits that consciousness arises as a function of which brain circuits are active

You experience your brain regions‟ output as conscious awareness

No single area of the brain is responsible for „general awareness‟

Hemineglect

This type of patient is not aware of missing part of the visual world

Patients‟ unawareness of their visual deficits supports the idea that consciousness

arises through the brain processes active at any point in time

Prefrontal Cortex- “I understand plans”

Frontal Motor Cortex- “I‟m all about movement”

Parietal Lobe- “I‟m aware of space”

Temporal Lobe- “I see and hear things”

Occipital Lobe- “ I see things”



Sleep

Many brain regions are more active during sleep than during wakefulness

Conscious experience of the outside world is largely turned off, but to some extend

people remain aware of their surroundings

when you sleep your mind is at work, analyzing potential dangers, controlling bodilymovements, shifting body parts to maximize comfort

o e.g. when you sleep next to a small child or pet — you never roll onto them

EEG

Machine used to reveal that the brain does not go to sleep itself- it is active

1920s this was discovered

Beta Waves

Alert wakefulness

Alpha Waves

Just before sleep

Stages of Sleep

Stage 1:

o Theta waves

o Have the feeling where you are falling, or jerking

o If awakened would probably deny you were even sleeping

Stage 2:

o Breathing becomes more regular

o Less sensitive to external stimulationo Now actually asleep

EEG would still show theta waves, but also show occasional bursts of

increased activity called sleep spindles and large waves called k-

complexes

K-complexes can be triggered by abrupt noise

As people age and sleep lighter, EEGs show less sleep spindles

Stage 3 and 4

o Progression into deep sleep

o Delta waves: large regular brain patterns

o Slow-wave sleep

Hard to wake

Mind does still process some information in stage 4 (mind evaluates

potential dangers)

REM sleep (paradoxical sleep)



o Rapid eye movement after the sleep cycle reverses and a flurry of beta wave

activity ensues

o Sleeping body--- active brain

o Neurons in occipital cortex and brainstem regions are more active during

REM sleep than during waking hourso Usually as morning approaches

Sleeping Disorders

Insomnia

A disorder characterized by an inability to sleep, usually associated with depression

Preferred treatment is cognitive-behavioral therapy: helps patients overcome their

worry of lack of sleep

Pseudo insomnia

Dreaming that you are not sleeping

Sleep apnea

A person stops breathing for temporary periods of time while asleep

o Leads to lack of oxygen and sleep disruption

o Most common for middle aged men and with obesity

Narcolepsy

A sleep disorder in which people fall asleep during normal waking hours

Muscle paralysis that occurs with REM sleep- may just collapse or go limp

Genetic condition that affects the neural transmission of a specific neurotransmitter inthe hypothalamus

REM Behavior Disorder

Normal paralysis that accompanies REM sleep is disabled so that people act out their

dreams while sleeping

o Most often seen in elderly males

Somnambulism

Sleep walking

Stage 4 sleep

Unihemispherical sleep

Dolphins‟ cerebral hemispheres take turns sleeping

3 General Explanations for Sleep’s Adaptiveness

restoration

circadian cycles



facilitation of learning

1. Restoration

a. Restorative Theory: sleep allows the brain and body to rest and repair themselves

b. Sleep allows the brain to replenish glycogen stores and strengthen the immunesystem

c. Over a long period of time sleep deprivation causes:

i. Mood problems, decreased cognitive performance, inattentiveness,

reduced short-term memory, etc.

o Microsleeps: when people fall asleep during the day for periods ranging form

a few seconds to a minute, caused by chronic sleep deprivation

Sleep deprivation can however help people overcome depression, lack of sleep leads

to increased activation of serotonin receptors

2. Circadian Rhythms

brain/ physiological processes that are regulated into patterns

o e.g. body temperature, hormone levels, sleep/wave cycles operate according to

circadian rhythms

o controlled by the cycles of light and dark

circadian rhythm theory: sleep has evolved to keep animals quiet and inactive during

times of the day when there is greatest danger, usually when it is dark

3. Facilitation of Learning

sleep is involved in the strengthening of neural connections that serve as the basis of learning

o circuits wired together during the waking period are consolidated and

strengthened during sleep

Stickgold & Colleagues

Found participants improved at a complex task only if they had slept for at least 6

hours following training

Researchers decided that learning the task required neural changes that normal occur

only during sleep

Sleep, especially REM sleep, promotes development of brain circuits for learning is

also supported by the changes in sleep patterns that occur over the life course

Pineal Gland

Tiny structure

Secretes melatonin, which travels through the bloodstream and affects various

receptors in the body and the brain



SLEEPLESS

Gene that influences sleep

This gene regulates a protein that reduces action potentials in the brain

Loss of the protein leads to an 80% reduction in sleep

Giusseppe Moruzzi & Horace Magoun

Found that stimulating the reticular formation in the brainstem leads to increased

arousal in the cerebral cortex

Low levels of activity in the reticular formation produce sleep and high levels

produce awakening

RETICULAR FORMATION= TRIGGERS AROUSAL

What triggers sleep?

The basal forebrain is involved in inducing non-REM sleep

Dreams

Altered state of consciousness

Images and fantasies are confused with reality

Average person spends six years of his/her life dreaming

REM Dreams

Likely to be more bizarre

Involve intense emotions, visual and auditory hallucinations

Illogical contents

REM is more likely linked with the dreams‟ content than producing the dream state

Dream contents come from activation of brain structures associated with motivation,

emotion and reward and visual association areas

Non REM Dreams

Dull

Mundane activities

Manifest Content

Freud

The plot of a dream, the way dreams are remembered

Latent Content

What a dream symbolizes

Hobson‟s Activation Synthesis Hypothesis

Claimed random neural stimulation can activate mechanisms that normally interpret

visual input



Theory of dreaming that says neural stimulation from the pons activates mechanisms

that normally interpret visual output

Using this perspective, dreams are epiphenomenal= the side affects of mental

processes

Amygdala activation= source of dreams‟ emotional content Deactivation of frontal lobe= dreams‟ delusional and illogical aspects

Antti Revonsuo

Evolutionary account wherein dreams sometimes simulate threatening events to allow

people to rehearse coping strategies

Altered Consciousness

Distur bances in a person‟s sense of control over their body

Diminished or enhanced levels of self awareness

Level of awareness changes as a result of the time of day as well as the person‟s

activities

Types:

1. Hypnosis

A person responding to suggestions, experiences changes in memory, perception,

and/or voluntary action

Post Hypnotic Suggestion: usually accompanied by an instruction not to remember

anything

Post hypnotic suggestions can at least subtly influence behaviors

Study done by Wheatley & Haidto Hypnotized into feeling a strong dislike for a neutral word, participants judged

stories more harshly that contained this word more often than others

NO RELIABLE EVIDENCE THAT PEOPLE WILL DO THINGS UNDER

HYPNOSIS THAT THEY FIND IMMORAL OR OTHERWISE OBJECTIONABLE

The dissociation theory of hypnosis: hypnotic state as an altered state (trancelike) in

which conscious awareness is separated from other aspects of consciousness

Hypnotic Analgesia: a form of pain reduction

o In clinical settings, hypnosis is effective in dealing with immediate pain

o May work more by changing people‟s interpretations of pain than by

diminishing pain ;people feel the sensations associated with pain by they feel

detached from these sensations

2. Meditation

a. mental procedure that focuses attention on an external object or on a sense of

awareness



b. Two forms

i. Concentrative meditation

1. focus attention on one thing

a. breathing pattern, mental image, or a specific phrase

(mantra)ii. Mindfulness meditation

1. Let your thoughts flow freely, paying attention to your thoughts

but not recognizing them

iii. Transcendental Meditation

1. Best known

2. Meditation with great concentration for 20 minutes twice a day

a. Reduces blood pressure

b. Decreases stress

c. Changes in hormonal responses underlying stress

o Results:

Long-term meditation brings about structural changes in the brain that

help maintain brain function over the life span

One study found that the gray matter in the brain that contains

the neurons did not diminish over time (as the patient aged) in

participants who practiced Zen meditation

3. Immersion in an action

a. During most of our daily activities, of course, we are consciously aware of only asmall portion of both our thoughts and our behaviors

b. Runner‟s High: due to endorphins and a shift in consciousness

i. Music when exercising= distraction from physical exertions

c. Religious Ceremonies= decrease consciousness/ awareness of outside world

o lose themselves in religious ecstasy (dancing/ chanting/ prayer, etc.)

Flow:

o an experience that is so engrossing and enjoyable that is worth doing for its

own sake even though it may have no consequence outside itself

An optimal experience in that the activity is completely absorbing and

completely satisfying; person will lose track of time, problems, etc.

Escapist Entertainment

Simple entertainment people use to escape themselves and their daily lives,

o E.g. World of Warcraft, alcohol, unsafe sex, and extremes such as suicides



Drugs & The Consciousness

Psychoactive Drugs: mind-altering substances that change the brain‟s neurochemistry by

activating neurotransmitter systems

Common types:o Stimulants

o Depressants

o Narcotics

o Hallucinogens

Marijuana

Most widely used illegal drug in America

Psychoactive ingredient: THC

THC produces a relaxed mental state, uplifted or contented mood, and some

perceptual and cognitive disorders

Users must learn how to appreciate the drug’s affects

o First time users won‟t notice affects as much as veteran users

Cannabinoid receptors: activated by naturally occurring THC- like substances

o Activation of these receptors enhances mental activity and can alter pain

perception

o * large concentration of these receptors are in the hippocampus (why it affects

our memory)

Stimulants

Increase behavioral and mental activity

o Caffeine

o Nicotine

o Amphetamine

o Cocaine

Effects

o Activate the sympathetic nervous system (increases heart rate and blood

pressure)

o Improves mood

o Restlessness

o Disrupts sleep

Works by interfering with the normal reuptake of dopamine by the releasing neuron,

allowing dopamine to remain in the synapse and prolonging the effects

Cocaine



John Pemberton (pharmacist) who initially put cocaine in soda water for easy

ingestion, creating Coca Cola

Amphetamines

Synthesized using simple lab methods

History of use for weight loss and staying awake Negative side effects:

o Insomnia, anxiety, heart problems & hair loss

Extremely addictive; seldom used for legitimate purposes

Meth

First developed as a nasal decongestant in the early „20s

Easy to make from OTC drugs

Blocks the reuptake of dopamine

o Increases the release of dopamine and yields much higher levels of dopamine

in the synapse

o Meth stays in the body and the brain much longer than other drugs

o Damages the various brain structures and ultimately depletes dopamine levels

o Damages temporal lobe and the limbic system= leads to memory loss and

emotional instability in long term users

MDMA (Ecstasy)

Energizing effect similar to those caused by stimulants, but also causes slight

hallucinations

Less dopamine release and more serotonin release

Serotonin release is what causes the ecstasy‟s hallucinogenic properties

Long term use leads to memory problems and a diminished ability to perform

complex tasks

Opiates

Heroin, morphine, codeine

Increase dopamine activation in the nucleus accumbens and binding with opiate

receptors

o Produces feelings of relaxation, analgesia, and euphoria

o Rush of intense pleasure

Used to be used to relieve pains

Alcohol

Overall cost of problem drinking in the U.S. is more than $100 billion annually

Men drink a lot more

Women



o Do not metabolize alcohol as quickly as men and have generally smaller body

volumes so they consume less alcohol than men

4 Factors that Affect Gender Related Drinking Differences:

1. Powero symbol of male power

2. Sex

o expect doing so will enhance sexual performance

3. Risks

o men enjoy taking risks much more than women do

4. Responsibilities

o men can ignore their social responsibilities when drinking

Emotional Effects of Alcohol

Moderate doses of alcohol are associated with a more positive mood, larger doses are

associated with a more negative mood

Alan Marlatt (199)

People view alcohol as a “magic elixir”

o Capable of increasing social skills, sexual pleasure, confidence and power

Jay Hull & Charles Bond (1986)

Study on how expectations about alcohol profoundly affect behavior

Some participants received tonic water and alcohol others just tonic water

RESULTS:o The belief that one has consumed alcohol leads to letting go of any

inhibitions regarding various social behaviors such as sexual arousal and

aggression, whether or not the person has consumed alcohol

Physical Dependence

Physiological state in which failing to ingest a substance leads to symptoms of

withdrawal

Withdrawal

Characterized by anxiety, craving and tension

Tolerance

Physical dependence is associated with tolerance

Dopamine

Addiction researchers now widely accept that dopamine activity in the limbic system

underlies the rewarding properties of taking drugs and is central to addiction

Insula



Important for craving and addiction, this region becomes active when addicts view

images of a drug use

Psychological Dependence

Refers to habitual and compulsive substance use despite the consequences

FINAL: We cannot ignore environment when we try to understand addiction



Chapter 6; Learning 10/9/2011 12:12:00 PM

Learning

relatively enduring change in behavior, on that results from experience

understanding how events are related

Associations

Develop through conditioning: a process in which environmental stimuli andbehavioral responses become connected

Conditioning

1. Classical Conditioning

o (Pavlovian Conditioning)

o when we learn that two types of events go together

e.g. we watch a movie and our heart beats faster

2. Operant Conditioning

o (Instrumental Conditioning)

o when we learn that a behavior leads to a particular outcome

e.g. studying leads to better grades

Watson

Founded behaviorism (school of though based on the belief that animals and humans

are born with the potential to learn just about anything)

Argued that Freudian theory was unscientific and ultimately meaningless, scorned

science that wasn‟t based of observations

Environment and its associated effects on animals were the sole determinants of

learningPavlov‟s Experiments

Classical Conditioning

o Neutral Stimulus unrelated to the salivary reflex, such as a ringing bell is

presented along with a stimulus that reliably produces the reflex, such as food

This pairing is known as a conditioning trial (repeated a certain

number of times)

Critical Trials: bell sound is presented alone and the salivary reflex is

measured

Under these conditions the sound of the bell on its own produced

salivation


Unconditioned Response

o The salivation elicited by the food

Unconditioned Stimulus



o Food

Conditioned Stimulus

o Ringing bell produced salivation only after it was associated with the

following appearance of food

Conditioned Responseo Salivary reflex that occurs when the conditioned stimulus is present to the CR

The conditioned response is usually weaker than the unconditioned response

Acquisition

Gradual formation of an association between the conditioned and unconditioned

stimuli

Extinction

A process in which the conditioned response is weakened when the conditioned

stimulus is repeated without the unconditioned stimulus

Inhibits the associate bond of the CR and CS

Type of learning that overwrites previous association

Spontaneous Recovery

A previously extinguished response reemerges following the presentation of the

conditioned stimulus

Stimulus Generalization

when stimuli similar but not identical to the CS produce the CR

o this process is adaptive because in nature the CS is seldom experiencedrepeatedly in an identical fashion

Stimulus Discrimination

Animals learn to differentiate between two similar stimuli if one is consistently

associated with the unconditioned stimulus and the other is not

Second-Order Conditioning

When a CS becomes directly associated not with an unconditioned stimulus but rather

with other stimuli associated with the US, a phenomenon

Powerfully influences many of our beliefs and attitudes, most of it occurs implicitly

without our awareness or intention

Phobia

An acquired fear out of proportion to the real threat

Amygdala and Fear

Most important brain structure for fear conditioning



Watson proposed that phobias could be explained by simply learning principles such

as classical conditioning ii

Counterconditioning

o A technique based on exposing people to small doses of the feared stimulus

while having to engage in a pleasurable task Systematic Desensitization

o Formal treatment developed by Joseph Wolpe

o Based on counterconditioning; believed that repeated exposure to the feared

stimulus is more important than relaxation in breaking the fear connection

Drug Addiction

o Presenting heroin addicts or cocaine addicts with cues associated with drug

ingestions leads to cravings

o Brain imaging studies have found that such cues lead to activation of the

prefrontal cortex and various regions of the limbic system, areas of the brain

involve din the experience of a reward

Shepard Siegel

o Conducted research showing that drug tolerance is a process by which addicts

need more and more of a drug to experience the same effects

o Research has shown that tolerance effects are greatest when the drug is taken

in the same location as pervious drug use, presumably because the body has

learned to expect the drug in that location and then to compensate for the drug

by altering neurochemistry or physiology to metabolize ito Siegel‟s findings imply that if addicts take their usual large doses in novel

settings, they are more likely to overdose, because their bodies will not

respond sufficiently to compensate for the drugs


o Pavlov‟s explanation for classical conditioning was that any two events

presented in contiguity would produce a learned association

o The association‟s strength was determined by factors such as the intensity of

the conditioned and unconditioned stimuli

o Greater intensity would increase learning

Challenges to Pavlov‟s theory: some conditioned stimuli would more

likely produce learning than others and that contiguity was not

sufficient to create CS-US associations

Evolutionary Significance

o Not all stimuli are equally effective in producing learning



Conditioned Food Aversion

o Eating a novel food and getting sick, even when the illness occurs hours after

eating is so strong that a food aversion can be formed in one trial

o Easy to produce with smell or taste but not easy to produce with light or sound

Martin Seligman (1970)o Argued that animals are genetically programmed to fear specific objects;

refers to this programming as biological preparedness

People in conditioning experiments where average stimuli are paired

with members of their own racial group and an outside racial group,

people are more likely to associate the negative stimuli with the other

racial group

o People are predisposed to wariness of other-group members

Gender Differences in Learning

Women will more likely use landmarks and memorize a series of terms when

navigating through space; males will more likely keep track of cardinal directions

The Cognitive Perspective

Classical conditioning is a means by which animals come to predict the occurrence of

events

Psychological scientists‟ increasing consideration of mental processes such as

prediction and expectancy is called the cognitive perspective of learning

Robert Rescorla (1966)

One of the first studies highlighting cognition‟s role in learning

Argued that for learning to occur the conditioned stimulus must accurately predict the

unconditioned stimulus

o A stimulus that occurs before the US (unconditioned stimlulus) is more easily

conditioned than the one that comes after it

o Even though the two are both contiguous presentations with the US (close to it

in time) the first stimulus is more easily learned because it predicts the US

Across all conditioning situations, some delay between the CS and the US is optimal

for learning

Rescorla-Wagner Model

The strength of the CS-US association is determined by the extent to which the US is

unexpected or surprising

The greater the surprise of the US, the more effort an organism puts into trying to

understand its occurrence so that it can predict future occurrences

Blocking Effect



Once learned a conditioned stimulus can prevent the acquisition of a new conditioned

stimulus

Occasion Setter

A trigger for the CS

Classical vs. Operant Conditioning Classical conditioning=passive process in which a person or animal associates events

that occur together in time

Instrumental Actions

Actions done for a purpose

Instrumental Conditioning/ Operant Conditioning

Not behaving in other ways keeps us from punishment, and behaving in certain ways

gets us rewards

Learning process in which an action‟s consequences determine the likelihood that the

action will be performed in the future

B.F. Skinner

Psychologist most associated with this type of learning selected the term operant to

express the concept of animals operating on their environments to produce effects

30 years after James & Thorndike- developed more formal learning theory based on

their law of effect

o Reinforcer: describe an event that produces a learned response

Reinforcer is a stimulus that occurs after a response and increases the

likelihood that the response will be repeated

The Skinner Box

o Asses operant conditioning

o An animal in a cage is taught to press one lever or key to receive food, the

other lever or key to receive water

Early stages Skinner used a maze and had a rat take specific turn to get

access to the food (the reinforcer)

After the rat completed the trial- he returned it to the beginning of the

maze

Operant chamber: was developed because Skinner got tired of

retrieving the rats

came to be known as the Skinner Box

William James & Edward Thorndike

Puzzle box= small cage with a trapdoor

o Trapdoor would open if the animal did a specific action



Positive & Negative Reinforcement

Positive Reinforcement

Increases the probability that a behavior will be repeated

o Usually involves a reward

Negative Reinforcement Increases behavior through the removal of a stimulus

o Decreases the likely of a behavior

Positive Punishment

Decreases the behavior‟s probability through the administration of a stimulus

o i.e. a rat getting shock for pressuring a lever is an example of positive

punishment

Negative Punishment

Decreases the behavior‟s probability through the removal of a pleasurable stimulus

o i.e. teens whose driving privileges are revoked for speeding may be less likely

to speed the next time they are driving

Continuous Reinforcement

fast learning

behavior might be reinforced each time it occurs

Partial Reinforcement

used more commonly; reinforcing behavior intermittently

Ratio Schedule

Based on the number of times the behavior occurs, as when a behavior is reinforcedon every third or tenth occurrence

Interval Schedule

Based on a specific unit of time, when a behavior is reinforced when it is performed

every minute or every hour

Ratio Reinforcement

o Leads to greater responding than does interval reinforcement

Fixed Schedule

Reinforcer consistently is given after a specific number of occurrences or after a

specific amount of time

o E.g. whether factory workers are paid by the piece or by the hour

They usually are paid according to a fixed rate, earning the same for

each piece or for each hour

Rate of reinforcement is entirely predictable

Variable Schedule



Reinforcer is given at different rates or at different times

Responder does not know how many behaviors need to be performed or how much

time needs to pass before reinforcement will occur

o i.e.

a salesperson receives a commission only when a customer agrees topurchase a product

Partial-Reinforcement Extinction Effect

The greater persistence of behavior under partial reinforcement under continuous

reinforcement

o Less frequent reinforcement during training, the greater resistance to

extinction

Parents use this with toilet training

Behavior Modification

Use of operant-conditioning techniques to eliminate unwanted behaviors and replace

them with desirable ones

Token Economies

Prisons, mental hospitals, schools use this

Tokens reinforce behaviors; receive tokens for good behavior and lose them for

misconduct

o Tokens can be traded in for objects or privileges

Biology and Cognition Influence Operant Conditioning

B.F. Skinner believed all behavior could be explained by straightforward conditioningprinciples

Marian & Keller Breland (1961)

Husband & wife team of psychologists who used operant-conditioning techniques to

train animals for commercials

Robert Bolles (1970)

Argued that animals have built-in defense reactions to threatening stimuli

Conditioning is the most effective when the association between the behavioral

response and the reinforcement is similar to the animal‟s built in predispositions

Randy Gallistel (200)

Argues that various learning mechanisms have evolved to solve specific problems

Point: learning consists of specialized mechanisms (rather than universal

mechanisms) that solve the adaptive problems animals face in their environments

Acquisition/ Performance Distinction

Cognitive Map



A visual/ spatial mental representation of an environment

Latent Learning

Learning that takes place in the absence of reinforcement

Edward Tolman

Early cognitive theoristo Argued that reinforcement has more impact on performance than learning

o Experiments in which rats had to learn to run through complex mazes to

obtain food

o Believed that the rats developed cognitive maps that helped them learn to find

food quickly

To test this he studied 3 groups of rats who task was to travel through a maze to a

“goal box” containing food (the reinforcer)

o 1st group: no reinforcement; wandered aimlessly around the maze

o 2nd group: reinforcement on every trail and learned to find the goal box

quickly

o 3rd group: started receiving reinforcement only after the first 10 trials, then

showed an amazingly fast learning curve and immediately caught up to the

group that had been continuously reinforced

Results: implies that the rats had learned a cognitive map of the maze and used it

when the reinforcement began

Latent Learning

Tolman‟s term

Refers to learning that takes place without reinforcement

Insight Learning

Form of problem solving in which a solution suddenly emerges after either a period

of inaction or contemplation of the problem

o Focus on a problem for a while and then suddenly you know the answer

Meme

The term evolutionary psychologists use for transmitted cultural knowledge

Analogous to genes- they are selectively passed on from one generation to the next

Can be conditioned through association or reinforcement, many are learned by

watching others‟ behaviors

Observational Learning

Acquiring or modifying of a behavior after exposure to at least one performance of

that behavior = a powerful adaptive tool

Bandura‟s Observational Studies



Albert Bandura in the 1960s conducted many observational studies

Showed preschool kids a film of an adult playing with a large doll called Bobo

o In the film, the adult would either play quietly with Bobo or attacked the doll

furiously, whacking it and throwing it around the room

o When the kids were allowed to play with a number of toys (including theinflatable Bobo doll) those who had seen the more aggressive display were

more than twice as likely to act aggressively toward the doll

Results: exposing children to media violence may encourage them to act aggressively

Susan Mineka

Lab monkeys do not fear snakes, whereas monkeys in the wild do

Set out to determine whether or not monkeys could develop a phobia of snakes

Monkeys after putting them among wild monkeys and having the lab monkeys

witness their reactions to snakes- quickly developed a fear of snakes

Social forces play an important role in the learning of fear

Vicarious Reinforcement

Key distinction in learning is between the acquisition of behavior and its performance

Modeling

Imitation of observed behavior

Models‟ influences on behavior often occur implicitly; without our being aware that

our behaviors are being altered

Vicarious Learning

Learning that occurs when people learn the consequences of an action by observingothers being rewarded or punished for performing the action

Mirror Neurons

Neurons that are activated during observation of others performing an action

o E.g. a study showed that when a monkey observes another monkey reaching

for an object, mirror neurons in the observing monkey‟s brain become

activated

Also activated when the observing monkey does this observed

behavior

Every time you observe another person engaging in an action, similar neural circuits

are firing both in your brain and in the other person‟s

Some theorists speculate that mirror neurons may help us explain and predict others‟

behavior

o Mirror neurons may allow us to step into the shoes of people we observe in

order to better understand those people‟s actions



One speculation is that mirror neurons are the neural basis for empathy

Mouth Movements

People also have mirror neurons for mouth movements which are stimulated when

observers see a mouth move in a way typical of chewing or speaking

o Are important for humans‟ ability to communicate through language Rizzolatti & Arbib (1998)

Proposed that the mirror neuron system evolved to allow language

Mirror neurons may create a link between the sender and receiver of the message

Media & Violence

Adolescents who played certain types of violent video games showed decreased

activation in the prefrontal brain region (which is involved in inhibition,

concentration and self control) and more activation in the amygdala (which is

involved in emotional arousal)

Dopamine Activity Underlies Reinforcement

Generally positive reinforcement works because it provides the subjective experience

of pleasure

o Neural basis of this reinforcement is the release of the dopamine

o Dopamine is involved in motivation and emotion

plays an important role in the experience of reward and is crucial for

positive reinforcement

Peter Milner & James Olds

Early 1950s

Were testing whether electrical stimulation to a specific brain region would facilitate

learning

Wanted to see whether the learning they observed was caused by brain activity or by

the aversive qualities of the electrical stimulus

Intracranial Self-Stimulation: (ICSS) wanted to see whether the rats would press a

lever to self-administer shock to specific sites in their brains

o The rats did do this, pressing the level hundreds of times per hour

o Referred to brain regions that support ICSS as pleasure centers

ICSS was a powerful reinforcer

ICSS

Acts on the same brain regions as those activated by natural reinforcers

Dopamine serves as the neurochemical basis of positive reinforcement in operative

conditioning



ICSS activates dopamine receptors, interfering with dopamine eliminates self-

stimulation as well as naturally motivated behaviors

Nucleus Accumbens Activations

Subcortical brain region that is part of the limbic system

Experience of pleasure usually results from activation of dopamine neurons in thenucleus accumbus

o Enjoying food depends on dopamine activity

Hungrier you are= the more you enjoy food

This is because more dopamine is released under deprived

conditions

Drugs & Dopamine

Drugs that block dopamine‟s effects often disrupt operant conditioning

Dopamine blockers decrease the value of the reinforcement

o Often given to individuals with Tourette‟s syndrome to help them regulate

their involuntary body movements

Habituation and Sensitization Are Simple Models of Learning

Learning involves relatively permanent changes in the brain that result from exposure

to environmental events

Richard Semon

1904

proposed that memories are stored though changes in the nervous system

Engram: storage of learned materialDonald Hebb

Proposed that learning results form alterations in synaptic connections

Said that when one neuron excites another, some change takes place so that the

synapse between the two neurons strengthens

Summed up as “cells that fire together wire together”

LTP process also supports this claim

Eric Kandel

Used the aplysia (small marine snail- simple vertebrae) to study the neural basis of

two types of simple learning

o Habituation: a decrease in behavioral response following repeated exposure to

non threatening stimuli

o Sensitization: an increase in behavioral response following exposure to a

threatening stimulus



E.g. you are studying and smell something burning- you do not get

used to this smell, you focus greater attention on the smell in order to

determine whether or not there is an actual fire

Leads to heightened responsiveness to other stimuli

Orienting Response: when an animal encounters a new stimulus and pays attention toit

Research on Aplysia

o Shown that alterations in the functioning of the synapse lead to habituation

and sensitization

o For both types of simple learning, presynaptic neurons alter their

neurotransmitter release

o Reduction in neurotransmitter release leads to habituation

o An increase in neurotransmitter release leads to sensitization

Long-Term Potentiation is a Candidate for the Neural Basis of Learning

Long-Term Potentiation

Is the strengthening of the synaptic connection so that postsynaptic neurons are more

easily activated

Demonstrate:

o Researchers establish the extent to which electrically stimulating one neuron

leads to an action potential in a second neuron

o Then provide intense electrical stimulation to the first neuron

o Then a single electrical pulse is re-administered to measure the extent of thesecond neuron‟s activation

o LTP occurs when the intense electrical stimulation increases the likelihood

that stimulating one neuron leads to an action potential in the second neuron

LTP as the Cellular Basis for Learning & Memory

LTP effects are most easily observed in the hippocampus

The same drugs that improve memory also lead to increased LTP and those that block

memory also block LTP

Behavioral conditioning produces neurochemical effects nearly identical to LTP

NMDA Receptor

type of glutamate receptor

opens only if a nearby neurons fires at the same time

involved in LTP process

Fear Conditioning & the LTP

Recent evidence proves that fear conditioning may induce LTP in the amygdala



Joseph LeDoux

Demonstrated that the auditory fear conditioning and LTP induction lead to similar

changes in amygdala neurons, a finding that suggests fear conditioning might produce

long-lasting neurons through LTP induction



Chapter 7; Attention & Memory 10/9/2011 12:12:00 PM

Memory

The nervous system‟s capacity to acquire and retain usable skills and knowledge,

allowing organisms to benefit from experience

Attention & What is Remembered

To get information into a memory; a person needs to attend We have the ability to direct something in ourselves (attention) to some information

at the cost of paying less attention to other information

Visual Attention is Selective & Serial

Anne Treismann

Theory on attention and recognition: we automatically identify “primitive” features

such as color, shape, orientation, and movement within an environment

Separate systems analyze objects‟ different visual features

Parallel Processing

Allows us to process information from different visual features at the same time by

focusing on targets over distractors

We can attend selectively to one feature by effectively blocking the further processing

of the others

Serial

Searching for two features

o You need to look at the stimuli one at a time

Effortful

Takes longer and requires more attentiono E.g. imagine trying to find all the red Xs in a display of differently colored Xs

and Ys= would be called a conjunction task

Conjunction Task

Because the stimulus you are looking for is made up of two simple features

Auditory Attention Allows Selective Listening

Attention is limited so it is hard to perform two tasks at the same, especially if they

rely on the same mechanisms

E.C. Cherry

Cocktail phenomenon

o You can focus on a single conversation in the midst of a chaotic cocktail

party, yet a particularly pertinent stimulus, such as hearing your name

mentioned in another conversation can capture your attention

Shadowing: a technique Cherry used to examine selective-listening

Selective Attention Can Operate at Multiple Stages of Processing



Donald Broadbent

Filter theory to explain the selective nature of attention, he assumed people have a

limited capacity for sensory information and let only in the most important

information

Attention=a gate that opens for important informationChange Blindness

The common failure to notice large changes in environments

Demonstration of how inattentive we can be

Proves that we can only pay attention to a limited amount of information and that

large discrepancies exists between what people think they see and what they actually

see

Basic Stages of Memory

Memory‟s processes can be thought of as operating through three distinct phases over

time

o 1. The Encoding Phase

occurs at the time of learning

o 2. The Storage Phase

can last a fraction of a second or as long as a lifetime

3 storage systems (depending on how long they store information)

o 3. The Retrieval Stage

reaching into our memory storage to find or retrieve a memory

Richard Atkinson & Richard Shiffrin in 1968

Psychological Scientists and Memory

o Describe it as a 3 part system

Sensory memory

Short-term memory

Working memory

Long-term memory

o Modal Memory model

Sensory Memory is Brief

Temporary memory system

Lasts only a fraction of a second and closely tied to the sensory systems

Occurs when a light, a sound, an odor, a taste or a tactile impression leaves a

vanishing trace on the nervous system for a fraction of a second

George Sperling (1960)

Provided the initial empirical support for sensory memory



Concluded: the visual memory persisted for about one-third of a second, after which

the sensory memory trace faded progressively until it was no longer accessible

Sensory memories allow us to experience the world as a continuous stream rather

than in discrete sensations

Working Memory is ActiveShort-term memory

A limited capacity memory system that holds information in awareness for a brief

period

Working Memory

An active processing system that keeps different types of information available for

current use

Memory system that combines information from different sources

also called immediate memory

consists of our fleeting thoughts, changing feelings, etc.

lasts for about 20 to 30 seconds then disappears unless you actively prevent that from

happening by thinking about or rehearsing the information

Memory Span and Chunking

George Miller noted that the limit is generally 7 items (known as memory span)

More recent research says that estimate may be too high, and varies among

individuals

Chunking

Process of organizing information into meaningful units to make it easier toremember

Working Memory‟s Four Parts

WM is not a single storage system but is an active processing unit that deals with

multiple types of information

o Alan Baddeley developed model of an active memory system

Central executive

Presides over interactions among the phonological loop

Is the boss; encodes information from the sensory systems

filters important information and stores it

Phonological loop

Encodes auditory information

Active whenever a person tries to remember words by reading

them

Visuospatial sketchpad



Processes visual information; object‟s features and where they

are located

Episodic buffer

Holds temporary information about oneself

Drawing heavily on long-term episodic memoryLong-Term Memory

The relatively permanent storage of information

Only information that helps us adapt to the environment is typically transformed into

a long-term memory0

LTM VS WM

They are different in two important ways; duration and capacity

Serial Position Effect: involves two separate effects

Ability to recall items from a list depends on the order items are presented with

o 1. Primacy effect: the better memory people have for items at the beginning of

a list

o 2. Recency Effect: people‟s better memory for the most recent items, the items

at the end of a list

Overlearning: when you go over material multiple times (a.k.a exams) leads to improved

memory

Distributed Practice: material studied in multiple sessions over a longer period of time

Mass Practice: cramming- not as effective

Explicit Memory Involves Conscious Effort

most basic distinction between memory systems is the division of memories we are

consciously aware of from memories we acquire without conscious effort or intention

and do not know we know

Implicit Memory

we have memories of which we have no conscious knowledge of

does not require conscious attention but happens automatically without deliberate

effort

Explicit Memory

Involves the processes we use to remember information we can say we know

Can be divided into episodic and semantic memory

Declarative Memory

Cognitive information received in explicit memory

o Knowledge that can be declared; can involve concepts, visual images, or both



Episodic Memory

Memory for one‟s personal past experiences

o Includes information about a time and place

Semantic Memory

Represents the knowledge of facts independent of person experienceImplicit Memory Occurs without Deliberate Effort

Classical conditioning employs implicit memory

False Fame Effect

o Psychologist Larry Jacoby had research participants read aloud a list of made

up names

o Participants were told it was a project about pronunciation but the next day he

had the same people participate in an apparently unrelated study

They were asked to read a list of names and decide whether each

person was famous or not

Participants misjudged some of the made-up names from the pervious

day as being those of famous people

Knew they had heard the names before but could not remember where

implicit memory lead them to assume the familiar names were those of

famous people

Procedural Memory/ Motor Memory

o Example of implicit memory that involves motor skills, habits and other

behaviors employed to achieve goals (e.g. muscle movements) Riding a bike

Prospective Memory

Remembering to do something at some time in the future

Temporal

Time based

Codes

Representations of what our perceptual experiences are transformed into

*Memories are stored as representations

Retrieval often involves an explicit effort to access the contents of memory storage

Retrieval is involved in explicit and implicit memory systems

Fergus Craik and Robert Lockhart

Developed an influential theory of memory based on depth of elaboration

Levels of processing model



o More deeply an item is encoded them ore meaning it has and the better it is

remembered

o Proposed that different types of rehearsal lead to differential encoding

Maintenance Rehearsal

Simply repeating the item over and overElaborative Rehearsal

Encodes the information in more meaningful ways, such as thinking about the item

conceptually or deciding whether it refers to oneself

Schemas Provide an Organizational Framework

Schemas

o Structures in long-term memory that help us perceive, organize, process, and

use information

o Help us sort out incoming information and guide our attention to an

environment‟s relevant features

o We construct new memories by filing in holes within existing memories;

interpreting meaning based on past experiences

Networks of Association

One highly influential set of theories about memory organization is based on these

networks

Activation one node increases the likelihood that closely associated nodes will also be

activated

The closer the nodes the stronger the association between them and the more likelythat activating one will activate the other

Node

A unit of information

Retrieval Cue

Can be anything that helps a person sort through the vast data in long-term memory to

access the right information

Easier to recognize than to recall information

o E.g. Is its easier to recognize a correct answer than to recall it on a multiple

choice test

Encoding Specificity

Almost anything can be a retrieval cue

Endel Tulving’s Encoding Specificity Principle: any stimulus encoded along with an

experience can later trigger a memory of the experience

Context Dependent Memory



When the recall situation is similar to the encoding situation

Based on things such as physical location, odors and background music

State Dependent Memory

Enhancement of memory when internal states match during encoding and recall

What Brain Processes Are Involved in Memory? Karl Lashley

o Spent much of his career trying to localize memory

o Engram: refers to physical site of memory storage

o Did a study on rats in a maze, after removing certain parts of their cortices (all

different)

o He tested how much of the maze learning the rats retained after surgery

o RESULTS: the size of the area removed rather than its location was most

important in predicting retention

o Concluded that memory is distributed throughout the brain rather than

confined to any specific location= equipotentiality

o Partially right

Donald Hebb

“neurons that fire together wire together”

different brain regions are responsible for storing different aspects of information

Studies of H.M;

o Regions within the temporal lobes are important for the ability to encode new

memoriesTemporal Lobes

Are important for declarative memory (being able to say what you remember)

Less important for implicit memory (such as motor learning and classical

conditioning)

Cerebellum

How motor actions are learned and remembered

Amygdala

Responsible for one type of classical conditioning, fear learning

The Medial Temporal Lobes Are Important for Consolidation of Declarative Memories

Middle Section of Temporal Lobes

important for declarative memory (also known as medial section)

Consists of numerous structures relevant to memory (including amygdala and

hippocampus)



Damage to this region= anterograde amnesia (inability to store new explicit

memories)

Responsible for coordinating and strengthening the connections among neurons when

something is learned

Consolidation How immediate memories become lasting memories

Hypothetical process involving the transfer of contents from immediate memory into

long-term memory

Reconsolidation

Neural processes involved when memories are recalled and then stored again for later

retrieval

o E.g. taking a book out of the library

Our memories change when we use them and are not accurate reproductions of what

was experienced

Spatial Memory

Important memory function of the hippocampus

Spatial memory is the memory for the physical environment

o E.g. directions, locations of objects, cognitive maps

o Morris Water Maze Test

Role of the hippocampus in spatial memory is supported by place cells

o Place cells (in the Morris Water Maze Test) are neurons that only fired when a

rat returns to a specific location* In both humans and rodents one important role of sleep is to consolidate memoires

Frontal Lobes Involved in Memory

Encoding:

Episodic memory, working memory, spatial memory, time sequences, and various

aspects of encoding and retrieval

Brain imaging studies have provided evidence that the frontal lobes are crucial for

encoding

Deep encoding= higher chance of frontal activation

o Activation of frontal lobes= higher chance of being remembered

Working Memory:

WM holds information temporarily so it can be used to solve problems, understand

conversations and follow plans



Frontal regions become active when information is being retrieved from long-term

memory into working memory or encoded from working memory into long term

memory

Neurochemistry Underlies Memory

Research has shown that various of neurotransmitters can weaken or enhancememory

o Memory modulators: what these neurons are known as

Epinephrine

Secreted into the bloodstream from the adrenal glands (near the kidneys)

o Is the hormone that is secreted when a person/ animal is excited or scared

Initially believed that epinephrine affected memory because it causes a release of

glucose, which enters the brain and influences memory storage

Glucose

When we learn something new, we drain glucose from key parts of the brain that are

associated with memory and learning

Role as a memory enhancer was proven in a study in which old people received a

memory test after consuming lemonade with sweetener (glucose)

Those who drank the lemonade better remembered what they studied

Amygdala & Neurochemistry of Emotion

Amygdala has norepinephrine receptors and is involved in the memory of fearful

events

Emotional Memory

Activates the right amygdala in men and the left amygdala in women

Women have better memory than men for emotional events

PTSD

Mental health disorder that involves frequent and recurring unwanted thoughts related

to the trauma, including nightmares, intrusive thoughts, and flashbacks

o Hyper vigilant to stimuli associated with their traumatic event

Forgetting

Inability to retrieve memory from long-term storage

We forget far more than we remember

Not being able to forget is as maladaptive as not being able to remember

Normal forgetting helps us remember and use important information

Hermann Ebbinghaus

Provided compelling evidence that forgetting occurs rapidly over the first few days

but then levels off



(late 19th century study on the individual level)

the difference between the original learning and relearing is “savings”= time and

effort saved because of what you remembered

Daniel Shacter (1999)

seven sins of memoryo Transience: reduced memory over time

forgetting

o Absentmindedness: reduced memory due to not paying attention

forgetting

o Blocking: inability to remember needed information

forgetting

o Misattribution: assessing a memory to the wrong source

distortion

o Suggestibility: altering a memory because of misleading information

Distortion

o Bias: influence of current knowledge on our memory for past events

distortion

o Persistence (PTSD): resurgence of unwanted or disturbing memories that we

like to forget

Undesirable

Transience is Caused by Interference

Proactive Interference: when prior information inhibits the ability to remember newinformation

Transience is the pattern of forgetting over time

Retroactive Interference: new information inhibits the ability to remember old

information

o If you memorize a new locker combination you may forget the old one

Blocking is Temporary

Drawing a “blank”

Often occurs because of interference from words that are similar in some ways

o Such as the sound or meaning and that keep recurring

E.g. calling an acquaintance Margaret when her name is Melanie

Absentmindedness Results from Shallow Encoding

Absentmindedness: the inattentive or shallow encoding of events

o E.g. forgetting where you left your keys

o Cultures and Change Blindness



East Asians live in highly independent societies so they are more

likely to attend to an event‟s context than U.S. citizens

Amnesia

Is a deficit in long term memory resulting from disease, brain injury or trauma

Result from damage to the medial temporal lobes, damage to other subcorticalareas(e.g. the thalamus) can also lead to amnesia

Two basic types

o Retrograde

People lose past memories for events, facts, people, or even personal

information

o Anterograde

Inability to form new memories

E.g. when someone wakes up from a coma and has no idea where they

are

Flashbulb Memories

Refers to vivid memories for the circumstances in which one first learned of a

surprising and consequential or emotionally arousing event

o Brown and Kulik‟s term

Martin Conway

Shown that better memory for the flashbulb experience occurs among those who

found the news surprising and felt the event was important

o E.g. students in the UK experienced stronger flashbulb memories for theThatcher resignation than students in the U.S.

Von Restorff Effect

When a distinctive event might simply be recalled more easily than trivial events

however inaccurate the result

Source Misattribution

The misremembering of the time, place, person or circumstances involved with a

memory

o Examples:

false fame effect

sleeper effect

Cryptomnesia

example of source misattribution

when a person thinks he or she has come up with a new idea, but really has retrieved

an old idea from memory and failed to attribute the idea to its proper source



Evidence also shows that children can be induced to remember events that did not

actually occur ( in lab settings )

Memory Bias

In which people‟s memories for events change over time to be consistent with current

beliefs or attitudesMnemonics

Strategies for improving memory

Ways to study more effectively

o Practice

o Elaborate the material

o Overlearn

o Get adequate sleep

o Use verbal mnemonics

o Use visual imagery



Chapter 8; Thinking & Intelligence 10/9/2011 12:12:00 PM

Thinking

Ability to use information rapidly

Cognition

Brain represents information and that the act of thinking (cognition) is directly

associatedRepresentations

Form the basis of human thought, intelligence and the ability to solve everyday life‟s

complex problems

Analogical Representations

Type of representation

Have characteristics of actual objects

o Include maps which correspond to geographical layouts, and family trees

which depict direct relationships between relatives

Symbolic Representations

Usually words or ideas

Are abstract and do not have relationships to physical qualities of objects in the world

Reasoning

Using information to determine if a conclusion is valid or reasonable

Decision Making

Attempting to select the best alternative among several options

Problem Solving

Finding a way around an obstacle to reach a goalDeductive Reasoning

Using a belief or rule to determine if a conclusion is valid (Follows logically from the

belief or rule)

Use logic

Inductive Reasoning

Using examples or instances to determine if a rule or conclusion is likely to be true

o You reason from the specific to the general

Psych 1 Chapter 4

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