Extinction : New Learning Versus Unlearning

Reinforcement is the main contributing factor in operant conditioning. There is more than one way to go about establishing reinforcement, if a delay occurs between the response and the reinforcement the response may not become strengthened. It is likely that if the reinforcement occurs immediately after the response that there will be a definite strengthening of the response. Continuous reinforcement is when reinforcement occurs at every instance of the desired response. Intermittent reinforcement occurs when a response is reinforced some of the time. The different schedules of reinforcement influence patterns of response. Intermittent schedules offer greater resistance to extinction than continuous schedules.

After a behavior, an aversive stimulus may be removed entirely, reduced in intensity or its onset delayed. This is either intentional or unintentional reinforcement provided by another. Can be viewed as escape or avoidance.

Shaping is an applied behavioral analysis technique that can be used to teach new behavior or elicit a desired target behavioral response in both human and nonhuman animals. Defined as a systematic process of reinforcing successive approximations to a target behavior, shaping is especially useful for behaviors that are difficult to learn by instruction, imitation, and verbal or physical cues (Alberto and Troutman, 2013, p. 294). The general rules of shaping dictate that behavior must occur prior to being reinforced, and also must be differentially reinforced until a predetermined terminal criterion is reached (Athens, Vollmer, and St. Peter Pipkin, 2007).

Operant conditioning focuses on a system of reinforcement and punishers where actions will have a consequence (Skinner, 2016). In operant conditioning, behaviour that is reinforced will be strengthened while behaviour that is not reinforced will weaken with time (Skinner, 2016). There are three types of operants. The neutral operants that will neither increase nor decrease the chances of repeating a behaviour (Skinner, 2016). The reinforcers will increase the chances of repeating a behaviour (Skinner, 2016). The punishers will decrease the chances of repeating a behaviour (Skinner, 2016). Positive reinforcement strengthens a behaviour as an individual gains rewards through it (Skinner, 2016). Negative reinforcement strengthens the behaviour by removing an unpleasant consequence

I would like to start off by defining the Operant condition is a method of learning that occurs through rewards and punishments for behavior. In the operant conditioning, an association is made between a behavior and a consequence for that behavior (Cherry 1).This theory was made by B.F. Skinner known as Skinnerian. As a behaviorist, Skinner believed that it was not really necessary to look at internal thoughts and motivations in order to explain behavior. Instead, he suggested, we should look only at the external, observable causes of human behavior (Cherry 1). According to the Power Point, there are three process of Operating Conditions Extinction, Generalization, and Discriminative Stimuli. Extinction is weakening and disappearance of a

Operant conditioning, introduced by Skinner, focuses on rewarding or punishing consequences to increase or decrease behaviors. Through classical conditioning, there is a belief that behaviors are responses to environmental stimulation. Operant conditioning challenged this thought. Skinner believed that the consequences should be focused on more so than the stimuli. The idea was that consequences controlled actions; therefore behaviors will increase when consequences are rewarded and decrease the likelihood of the behavior through nonrewarding consequences. The intent of punishment is to decrease the behavior from happening again by presenting an unpleasant condition or by eliminating a positive reinforcer. The focus of positive and negative

Avoidance conditioning is associated with the concept of negative reinforcement. In fact negative reinforcement contributes to an escape behavior initially and secondly to the avoidance behavior. The escape behavior of an organism occurs when the organism performs an action that terminates the aversive stimulus that it is receiving at the current moment in time. More importantly, the avoidance conditioning occurs when a warning stimulus indicates to an organism that a particular aversive event is present and allows the organism time to actively participate in a certain behavior response in order to avoid the aversive stimulus (Powell, Honey, & Symbaluk, 2013). Subsequently, avoidance conditioning can be demonstrated utilizing the shuttle box procedure. According to Domjan (2006), the shuttle box contains an electrically conductive metal grate floor and also contains a partition in the middle with a hole cut out in the center of it that allows an organism (such as a rat) to shuttle from one compartment to another during avoidance conditioning trials. Coincidentally, this particular response is also called shuttle avoidance. Indeed, to better comprehend avoidance conditioning, an understanding of Mowrer’s Two-Factor Theory,

The purpose of our experiment is to detect the feature of relapse when the reinforcement of the alternative behaviour is discontinued. A relapse is a recurrence of a past conditioned behaviour. Podlesnik et al. (2006) found that discontinuing non-drug reinforcement for rats can cause their drug seeking behaviour to recur. Leitenberg et al. (1970) found similar results in their study. However, previous studies were not able to discover the difference of the relapse strength between behaviours that went on longer extinctions and shorter extinctions. In our study, each key will give reinforcement to the pigeons when they peck it during one of the conditions. At the end, all of them will go on extinction. Therefore, our study can observe

The results supported Skinners (1938) theory of operant conditioning where behaviour could be modified and the use of reinforcement or punishment can increase or decrease

Reinforcement of a performed behavior that is discontinued, as a result the behavior is then eradicated or decreased.

The presentation of non-contingent reinforcement after the extinction of a learned response has also been well studied. Evidence indicates that this can lead to a restoration of conditioned responding in appetitive conditioning (Bouton & Peck, 1989). However, there is no widespread agreement as to the theories behind it, although it has been suggested that presentation of the US, after conditioning and extinction, but before the test phase, elevates reinstatement of the response (Delemater, 1997).

A biological constraint in learning theory refers to an inherited tendency to learn and create certain relationships, and it has been said that some species are much more readily than others in learning such behaviour. Therefore it involves the factors which make populations resistant to evolutionary change and the animals biological make up. In this paper I will attempt to explain the bases of the original biological approaches to learning in classical conditioning in humans and animals, make comparison between animals and the association of fears

Operant conditioning developed by Skinner is one of the learning methods according to which the likelihood of behavior is increased or decreased by the use of reinforcement or punishment. In case of positive reinforcement a certain behavior becomes stronger by the effect of experiencing some positive condition. In case of negative reinforcement a certain behavior becomes stronger by the outcome of stopping or staying away from some negative condition. In case of extinction a certain behavior is becomes weaker by the outcome of avoiding to experiencing some positive condition or stopping some negative condition.

These three experiments aim to explore the various aspects associated with extinction procedures. To facilitate these experiments, we used the Sniffy the virtual rat Pro Version 3.0 program by Wadsworth Cengage Learning. This program attempts to accurately simulate some of the psychological processes and behavioral phenomena found in rats. In this program, all of the subjects are always starved for food, regardless of how much it has eaten. This simplifies the process of operant conditioning by reducing the amount of time required to simply wait for the virtual rat to be hungry again.

The study of operant learning has illustrated the nature of the relationship between behaviour and consequence, namely that behaviour is strengthened or weakened by it 's consequences (Skinner, 1963). Furthermore, Skinner (1963) referred to reinforcement as the strengthening of a behaviour due to it 's consequence and that reinforcement increases the probability that a similar behaviour will occur again in the future. Indeed, a single reinforcement is enough to warrant the strengthening of a behaviour (Iverson, 1992). In contrast, extinction is the reduction of the frequency of a behaviour when previously reinforced behaviour is no longer followed by reinforcement (Chance, 2014). Over a course of extinction sessions, the behaviour will decline and be extinguished (Chance, 2014). How resistant behaviour is to extinction is effected by previous reinforcement history, and this will be discussed in the context of the application of extinction to modify maladaptive or undesirable behaviors.