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7C: Attitude and Behavior Change

Learning as curves: acquisition rising and extinction falling, four reinforcement schedules drawn side by side, a message taking one of two routes.

17 topics · 67 questions

Each topic is a path, not a menu: work down it in order and every question builds on the one above. Click any of them to watch the answer draw itself.

7C. Habituation and Dishabituation

  1. How it worksHow does a response shrink with each repetition of the same harmless stimulus and recover when it changes?
  2. Common mistakeWhy isn't habituation the same thing as a sense organ adapting?
  3. Going furtherWhat happens to habituation when the stimulus is presented once a day instead of once a second?
Your turnhard1 of 3
An orienting response to a repeated harmless tone has an amplitude of 75 arbitrary units on the first presentation, and each further presentation produces a response 36 percent smaller than the one before it. What is the amplitude on the fourth presentation?

7C. Classical Conditioning: the Stimuli and the Responses

  1. How it worksHow does a neutral stimulus become a conditioned stimulus by riding alongside an unconditioned one?
  2. How it worksWalk me through unconditioned stimulus, unconditioned response, conditioned stimulus and conditioned response in order.
  3. Worked exampleShow me which element is which when a chemotherapy patient feels sick at the sight of the clinic door.
  4. Common mistakeWhy isn't the conditioned response always identical to the unconditioned one?
Your turneasy1 of 3
After 31 pairings of a bell with food, a dog produces 7 drops of saliva to the bell presented alone, compared with 21 drops to the food itself. What percentage of the unconditioned response does the conditioned response reach?

7C. Acquisition, Extinction and Spontaneous Recovery

  1. How it worksHow does pairing strength climb during acquisition and fall once the unconditioned stimulus stops arriving?
  2. Worked exampleShow me one response curve across acquisition, extinction, a rest period and spontaneous recovery.
  3. Going furtherWhat happens to the timing of the pairing when the bell follows the food instead of preceding it?
  4. Common mistakeWhy isn't extinction the erasure of the original learning?
Your turnhard1 of 3
At the end of acquisition a conditioned response measures 91 units. Repeated presentations of the conditioned stimulus without the unconditioned stimulus drive it down to 18 units. After a rest of 7 days with no further trials, the first presentation produces 55 units. What percentage of the extinguished response has come back on its own?

7C. Generalization and Discrimination

  1. How it worksHow does a generalization gradient spread the response across stimuli that resemble the original?
  2. Worked exampleShow me the gradient narrowing as similar tones are repeatedly presented without any shock.
  3. Common mistakeWhy isn't generalization a failure of learning?
Your turnhard1 of 3
A pigeon trained to peck at a 1000 hertz tone responds 88 times a minute to that tone, and the rate falls by 7 responses a minute for every 100 hertz of difference from it. What response rate does the generalization gradient predict at 1573 hertz?

7C. Operant Conditioning: Positive and Negative Reinforcement

  1. How it worksHow do adding and removing a stimulus cross with increasing and decreasing behavior to make four cells?
  2. Worked exampleShow me which cell a seatbelt alarm that stops when you buckle belongs in.
  3. Worked exampleShow me which cell an umbrella that keeps rain off you belongs in.
  4. Common mistakeWhy isn't negative reinforcement a form of punishment?
Your turneasy1 of 3
A rat presses a lever 13 times an hour at baseline. A loud noise is then turned on continuously and switched off for a minute whenever the lever is pressed, and the rate rises to 77 presses an hour. By what percentage has pressing increased?

7C. Punishment

  1. How it worksHow do positive and negative punishment each suppress a response without teaching a replacement?
  2. Common mistakeWhy isn't a harsher punishment a more effective one?
  3. Going furtherWhat happens to the suppressed behavior once the punisher is no longer present?
Your turneasy1 of 3
A behaviour occurs 54 times a week. A punisher is introduced and the rate falls to 8 times a week while the punisher is in place. By what percentage has the behaviour been suppressed?

7C. Primary and Conditioned Reinforcers

  1. How it worksHow does a neutral token become reinforcing by being paired with something that already is?
  2. Going furtherWhat happens to a token economy when the tokens stop being exchangeable for anything?
  3. Common mistakeWhy isn't something reinforcing because a person says they like it?
Your turneasy1 of 3
On a ward token economy, 11 tokens can be exchanged for one item from the shop. A patient earns 180 tokens over a week. How many items can they exchange them for?

7C. The Four Schedules of Reinforcement

  1. How it worksHow do fixed and variable crossed with ratio and interval produce four distinct response patterns?
  2. Worked exampleShow me four cumulative response curves drawn side by side with the reinforcers marked on each.
  3. Worked exampleFind which schedule a factory paid per 20 assembled units is running and where the pauses fall.
  4. Common mistakeWhy isn't a fixed-interval schedule producing a steady rate of responding?
  5. Going furtherWhat happens to each of the four patterns the moment reinforcement stops completely?
Your turneasy1 of 3
A factory pays a worker one bonus for every 32 units assembled, which is a fixed-ratio schedule. The worker assembles 757 units during a shift. How many bonuses does the shift earn?

7C. Shaping and Operant Extinction

  1. How it worksHow does reinforcing successive approximations move the criterion closer to the target behavior?
  2. Worked exampleShow me the steps that shape a rat from wandering a box to pressing a lever on cue.
  3. Going furtherWhat happens to the rate of a behavior in the burst right after reinforcement is withdrawn?
  4. Common mistakeWhy isn't an intermittently reinforced behavior easier to extinguish than a continuously reinforced one?
Your turneasy1 of 3
A behaviour is running at 33 occurrences an hour under continuous reinforcement. Reinforcement is stopped, and in the first hour afterwards the rate rises to 80 occurrences. By what percentage has the rate risen during this burst?

7C. Escape and Avoidance Learning

  1. How it worksHow does escape learning turn into avoidance once a warning signal arrives before the aversive event?
  2. Common mistakeWhy isn't successful avoidance giving the person any chance to unlearn the fear?
  3. Going furtherWhat happens when escape is blocked repeatedly and the animal stops trying at all?
Your turnhard1 of 3
Early in training a dog crosses the barrier 11 seconds after the shock begins. Once a tone has reliably preceded the shock, the dog crosses 7 seconds before the shock would have begun. By how many seconds has the response moved earlier?

7C. The Role of Cognition in Associative Learning

  1. How it worksHow does latent learning build a cognitive map that stays invisible until there is a reason to use it?
  2. How it worksWalk me through a conditioned stimulus needing to predict the outcome rather than merely accompany it.
  3. Going furtherWhat changes about conditioning when the unconditioned stimulus is just as likely without the cue?
  4. Common mistakeWhy isn't simple contiguity in time enough to produce conditioning?
Your turnmedium1 of 3
In a contingency experiment the unconditioned stimulus follows the tone on 82 percent of trials on which the tone is presented, and also occurs on 35 percent of the intervals in which no tone is presented. What is the contingency, measured as the difference between the two probabilities in percentage points?

7C. Biological Predispositions and Instinctive Drift

  1. How it worksHow does evolutionary preparedness make some stimulus pairings learnable and others nearly impossible?
  2. Common mistakeWhy isn't any neutral stimulus equally conditionable to any outcome?
  3. Worked exampleShow me a raccoon trained to deposit coins drifting back to rubbing them together instead.
  4. Going furtherWhat happens to a trained behavior that competes with a species-typical response over many sessions?
Your turneasy1 of 3
Of 110 rats given a novel flavoured water followed 6 hours later by illness, 94 percent refused that flavour when it was offered again, after a single pairing. How many rats formed the aversion?

7C. Observational Learning and Bandura's Modeling

  1. How it worksHow do attention, retention, reproduction and motivation gate whether an observed act gets copied?
  2. Worked exampleShow me the Bobo doll study with models who were rewarded, punished and neither.
  3. How it worksWalk me through the difference between learning a behavior and choosing to perform it.
  4. Common mistakeWhy isn't seeing a model punished enough to prevent the behavior from being learned?
  5. Going furtherWhat changes about imitation when the model is similar to the observer or high in status?
Your turnmedium1 of 3
Children who watched a model punished for aggression produced a mean of 9 imitative aggressive acts in free play. When the same children were then offered an incentive to show what the model had done, the mean rose to 23 acts. By what percentage did the incentive raise their performance?

7C. Mirror Neurons, Vicarious Emotion and Applications

  1. How it worksHow does a neuron that fires both when you act and when you watch build a bridge to another person's state?
  2. How it worksWalk me through observed behavior producing vicarious reinforcement that changes the observer's odds of acting.
  3. Going furtherWhat happens to prosocial behavior in children after watching a model who helps?
  4. Common mistakeWhy isn't mirror neuron activity by itself an explanation of empathy?
Your turneasy1 of 3
Of 687 neurons recorded in the premotor cortex of a macaque, 19 percent discharged both when the animal grasped an object itself and when it watched the experimenter grasp one. How many neurons showed that property?

7C. The Elaboration Likelihood Model

  1. How it worksHow do motivation and ability route a message down the central route or the peripheral route?
  2. Worked exampleShow me one advertisement processed by a buyer who cares deeply and one who barely cares.
  3. Common mistakeWhy isn't a peripherally produced attitude change as durable as a centrally produced one?
  4. Going furtherWhat happens when a strong argument is delivered with a distracting soundtrack playing?
  5. Ties togetherHow does the central route connect to attitudes that actually predict later behavior?
Your turnmedium1 of 3
Attitude change produced by careful examination of the arguments retains 79 percent of its initial size after six months, while change produced by a celebrity endorsement retains 20 percent. How many times more durable is the first?

7C. Social Cognitive Theory and Behavior Change

  1. How it worksHow does self-efficacy grow from mastery experiences, vicarious models, persuasion and read arousal?
  2. How it worksWalk me through person, behavior and environment each changing the other two in a closed loop.
  3. Common mistakeWhy isn't self-efficacy the same thing as general self-esteem?
  4. Ties togetherHow does self-efficacy connect to the locus of control shaping which situations get entered?
Your turnmedium1 of 3
In a model of self-efficacy, four sources are weighted to a total of 100 points. Mastery experience is given 53 points, vicarious experience 22 points and verbal persuasion 17 points. How many points are left for the reappraisal of physiological arousal?

7C. Message, Source and Target Characteristics

  1. How it worksHow do source credibility, message structure and target involvement each move the odds of persuasion?
  2. Worked exampleShow me a one-sided and a two-sided message tested on an audience that already disagrees.
  3. Worked exampleShow me the sleeper effect where a discounted message gains force weeks after the source is forgotten.
  4. Common mistakeWhy isn't a fear appeal more persuasive the more frightening it gets?
  5. Ties togetherHow do these factors connect to cognitive dissonance doing the persuading from the inside instead?
Your turneasy1 of 3
Immediately after hearing a message from a source with poor credibility, 29 percent of an audience agreed with its conclusion. Four weeks later, with no further exposure, 54 percent agreed. By how many percentage points did agreement rise?

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