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| The acquisition, maintenance, and change of an organism's behavior as a result of life-time events(the ontongeny of behavior). In every day language the word "learning" is often used to refer to the transitional changes in behavior, but conditions that maintain behavior in a steady state are also part of what we mean by learning. |
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| Everything that an organism does, including covert actions such as thinking. |
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| Experimental Analysis of Behavior |
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| The method of investigation most commonly used in behavior analysis. The method involves breaking down complex environment-behavior relations into component principles of behavior. The analysis is verified by arranging experimental procedures that reveal the underlying basic principles and controlling variables. This involves intensive experimentation with a single organism over an extended period rather than statistical assessment of groups exposed to experimental treatments. |
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| An increase in the rat of operant behavior as a function of its consequences. Reinforcement also refers to the procedure of presenting a reinforcing event when a response occurs. |
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| A comprehensive experimental approach to the study of the behavior of organisms. Primary objectives are the discovery of principles and laws that govern behavior, the extension of these principles over species, and the development of an applied technology. |
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| Applied Behavior Analysis |
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| A branch of behavior analysis that uses behavior principles to solve practical problems such as the treatment of autism or improvement of teaching methods. Applied behavior analysis is also referred to as behavioral engineering. |
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| When an unconditioned stimulus elicits an unconditioned response. US > UR |
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| This refers to behavior that increases or decreases by the presentation of a conditioned stimulus (CS) that precedes the conditioned response (CR). WE say that the presentation of the CS regulates or controls the respondent (CR). Respondent behavior is elicited, in the sense that it reliably occurs when the CS is presented. The notion system used with elicited behavior is CS> CR. |
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| This occurs when an organism responds to a new event based on a history of pairing with a biologically important stimulus. Ivan Pavlov discovered this form of conditioning at the turn of the century. He showed that dogs salivated when food was placed in their mouths. This relationship between the food stimulus and the salivation is called a reflex, and it occurs because of the animal's biological history. When Pavlov rang a bell just before feeding the dog, it began to salivate at the sound of the bell. In this way, new features (sound of bell) controlled the dog's respondent behavior (salivation). Thus, presenting stimuli together in time (typically conditioned stimulus then unconditioned stimulus) is the procedure for respondent conditioning. If a conditioned stimulus comes to regulate the occurance of a conditioned response, respondent conditioning has occured. |
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| An increase or decrease in operant response as a function of the consequences that have followed the response. |
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| An operant is behavior that operates on the environment to produce a change, effect, or consequence. These environmental changes select the operant appropriate to a given setting or circumstance. That is, particular response increase or decrease in a situation as a function of the consequences that they produced in the past. Operant behavior is said to be emitted in the sense that the behavior may occur at some frequency before any known conditioning. |
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| Selection by Consequences |
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| From a behavioral view point the principle of causation for biology, behavior, and culture selection by consequences. - Phylogenetic, ontogenetic, and cultural selection. |
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| Refers to the kind of mechanism studied by physic and chemistry, the "billiard ball" sort of process where we try to isolate a chain of events that directly result in some effect. In the study of behavior, an immediate causal explanation might refer to the physiology and biochemistry of the organism. |
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| Involves explaining a phenomenon by pointing to remote events that made it likely. Thus, the causal explanation of a species characteristic involves the working of natural selection on the gene pool of the parent population. An evolutionary account of species coloration, for example, would involve showing how this characteristic improved the reproductive success of organisms in a given ecological environment. That is, natural selection for coloration explains the current frequency of the characteristic in the population. |
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| In respondent conditioning, contingency refers to a correlation between the conditioned stimulus (CS) and the unconditioned stimulus (US). Rescorla suggested that a positive correlation between the CS and the US, rather than the mere pairing of these stimuli, is necessary for conditioning. |
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| Alterations of neurons and neural inter connections during a lifetime by changes in environmental contingencies. |
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| A scientific area that integrates the science of behavior with the science of the brain. Areas of interest include the effects of drugs on behavior, neural imaging, and complex stimulus relations, choice and neural activity, and the brain circuitry of learning and addiction. |
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| Culture is usually defined in terms of the ideas and values of a society. However, behavior analysts define culture as all the conditions, events, and stimuli, arranged by other people that regulate human action. |
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| An arbitrary stimulus such as tone, is associated with an unconditioned stimulus that elicits reflexive behavior. After several pairings, the stimulus is presented alone. If the stimulus now elicits a respondent it is called a conditioned stimulus. |
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| The scientific philosophy of behavior analysis |
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| Thorndike (1898) Used to describe the results of his puzzle-box and maze learning experiments. Animals were said to make fewer and fewer errors over repeated trials, learning by trial and error. |
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| Refers to stamping in (or out) some response. The principle of reinforcement -operants may be followed by consequences that increase (or decrease) the probability of rate of response. |
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| As used in respondent conditioning, the percentage of conditioning trials in which the conditioned stimulus(CS) is followed by the US |
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| Researchers and practitioners of behavior analysis. |
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| Behavior that is only accessible to the person who emits it. |
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