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GRE Psychology: Learning

Subjects : gre, psychology
Instructions:
  • Answer 50 questions in 15 minutes.
  • If you are not ready to take this test, you can study here.
  • Match each statement with the correct term.
  • Don't refresh. All questions and answers are randomly picked and ordered every time you load a test.

This is a study tool. The 3 wrong answers for each question are randomly chosen from answers to other questions. So, you might find at times the answers obvious, but you will see it re-enforces your understanding as you take the test each time.
1. Performance = Expectation x Value; expectancy-value theory; goals they expect they can meet and how important goal is






2. Opposite of stimulus discrimination; make same response to a group of similar stimuli (e.g. fire alarms may sound different but same response)






3. Ability to discriminate between different but similar stimuli (door bell is different from phone ringing)






4. Rewards after a certain period of time rather than number of behaviours; can be argued that it does little to motivate an animal'S behaviour






5. Accidental learning - unrelated items grouped together; opposite of intentional learning (e.g. dog associates car with vet)






6. The failure to generalize a stimulus






7. Simultaneous - higher-order/second-order - delayed forward - trace forward - backward






8. Differential reinforcement of successive approximations; Skinner rewarded rats first for being near lever then for touching it - reward for behaviours that brought them closer to the desired one (e.g. pressing lever)






9. Natural reinforcement - without requirement of learning; food and water






10. Decreasing responsiveness to a stimulus due to increasing familiarity






11. Rewards delivered after differing time periods; second most effective strategy in maintaining behaviour






12. Fritz Heider'S balance theory - Charles Osgood and Percy Tannenbaum'S congruity theory - Leon Festinger'S cognitive dissonance theory; what about individuals who often seek stimulation - novel experience - or self-destruction?






13. By having an apparatus (e.g. lever) - an animal controls its reinforcements (e.g. food) through behaviours (e.g. pressing) - shaping its own behaviour






14. Thorndike - precursor of operant conditioning - Cause-and-effect chain of behaviour; continue what rewards - stop what doesn'T






15. Applied expectancy-value theory to individual behaviour in large organizations (e.g. those lowest on totem pole have least motivation since little incentives)






16. Students working on a project in small groups






17. Drive to reduce cognitive dissonance - holding conflicting ideas simultaneously whether beliefs - attitudes - or actions


18. Links together chains of stimuli and responses - learns what to do in response to particular triggers (leaving a building in response to fire alarm)






19. Neutral stimulus once paired with UCS; no naturally occurring response - only with UCS pairing (e.g. light (CS) eventually produces salivation)






20. Individuals in the environment are motivated by secondary reinforcers; e.g. tokens in prisons - rehab - etc. - cashed in for more primary reinforcers (e.g. candy - books - privileges)






21. School of behaviourism






22. Attitude change - based on balance of 'Sentiment' or liking relationships - if the net affect valence multiplies out to a positive result


23. Credited with writing first educational textbook in 1903 to assess students and teaching






24. Previous learning makes learning a new task more difficult






25. Those who set realistic goals with intermediate risk feel pride with accomplishment - and want to succeed more than they fear failure - however less likely to set unrealistic or risky goals or to persist when success is unlikely






26. Punishment to decrease likelihood of a behaviour - ex: drug Antabuse to treat alcoholism






27. John Garcia - Certain associations are learned more easily than others - Nausea & food can be paired easily - but light and nausea cannot be paired






28. CS presented after UCS (e.g. food - then light); proven ineffective; accomplishes only inhibitory conditioning - harder time pairing CS with UCS later even with forward conditioning






29. Higher arousal for simple tasks (motivation) - lower arousal for complex tasks (concentration); optimal arousal is an inverted U on a graph - Y-axis: performance - X-axis: arousal - Difficult task --> upside-down U shape - Simple task --> reaches pea






30. Not-so-neutral stimulus - elicits response without conditioning (e.g. salivation)






31. Learning and behaving by imitation; Albert Bandura'S Bobo doll (children watching adults with blow up dolls)






32. Pavlovian conditioning; teaching a response (relationship) to neutral stimulus by pairing with not-so-neutral stimulus






33. Removal of a negative event that increases likelihood of a particular response; while punishment introduces a negative event to decrease likelihood of a response






34. Every correct response is met with reinforcement; quickest but most fragile learning - as soon as rewards stop coming - the animal stops performing






35. Reversal of conditioning - dissociating behaviour from a cue - Repeatedly withholding reinforcement or disassociating the behavior from a cue






36. Born with certain physiological needs - will be tension if not satisfied; when it is - return to state of homeostasis and relaxation






37. Ebbinghaus - when learning something new - rate of learning usually changes over time; can be positively or negatively accelerated






38. Operant conditioning






39. Reappearance of an extinguished response - even without further conditioning - after the child'S tantrum behaviour has been extinguished - the child may suddenly throw a tantrum again






40. Evoking responses of autonomic nervous system through training






41. Motivation to reduce internal tension - once satisfied - back to homeostasis/ relaxation; against M.E. Olds electrical stimulation of pleasure centres






42. Learning curve






43. Empty box (with a rat and a lever) - later proved the influence of reinforcement






44. Promotes extinction of undesirable behaviour - negative stimulus presented after behaviour to decrease likelihood of reoccurrence - Skinner thinks it is not effective in long run






45. Pairing of the CS and the UCS in which the CS is presented before the UCS - delayed conditioning and trace conditioning






46. Need for achievement (nAch); need to pursue success or to avoid failure - goal is to feel successful






47. Reward or positive event that increases likelihood of a particular response






48. Lewin - grouping based on co-occurence in time and space; associate certain behaviours with certain rewards and cues






49. Learning about something in general (history) for knowledge rather than learning-specific stimulus-response chains (e.g. Tolman'S experiments with animals forming cognitive maps of mazes rather than simple escape routes)






50. Type of forward conditioning; CS presented and terminated before UCS presentation