Classical Conditioning

Ivan Pavlov:
1. What was Pavlov actually studying when he developed his theory of classical conditioning?
It was in 1904 when Pavlov won a noble prize for his work on studying digestive processes in dog. While he was in his study of  digestion he noticed in his dogs that every time one of his assitants entered their room, they salivated.
2. Explain (in detail) how Pavlov's experiment was conducted.
Pavlov noted that his dogs would begin to salivate when food and it smell was brought to them. He noticed that this was not due to a physiological process.Based on his observations, Pavlov suggested that the salivation was a learned response. The dogs were responding when they saw the researchers and assistants white lab coats which they related to food.
3. Identify the conditioned stimulus, the unconditioned stimulus and the conditioned response from Pavlov's experiment.
Pavlov focused on investigating how these conditioning responses are learned or acquiered. He makes an experiment and uses food as the unconditioned stimulus, or the stimulus that brings to a response naturally and automatically. The sound of a metronome was chosen to be the neutral stimulus. The dogs would first be exposed to the sound of the ticking metronome, and then the food was immediately presented. So the unconditioned stimulus was the food, then the metronome which was chosen to be the neutral stimilus had become as the dog associates the metronome with food, to be the conditioned stimulus that provoked the conditioned response which was sthe salivation of the dog.
http://psychology.about.com/od/classicalconditioning/a/pavlovs-dogs.htm

4. Explain what extinction means in relation to classical conditioning.
Extinction occurs when a conditioned response decrease or disappear. This happens when a conditioned stimulus is no longer paired with an unconditioned stimulus
5. Explain what stimulus generalization means in relation to classical conditioning.
Stimilus generalization is when the conditioned stimulus revokes to similar responses from similar ojects to the conditiones stimulus itself.
6. Explain what stimulus discrimination means in relation to classical conditioning.
Discrimination  is being able to differentiate between a conditioned stimulus and other stimuli that are similar to it.
http://psychology.about.com/od/behavioralpsychology/a/classcondbasics.htm

7. Explain at least two limitations of this experiment.
The limitations are that he did the experiment only with dogs and it required a surgical procedure.

8. Explain what Pavlov theorized about how we learn.
He created the first learning theory which precedes the reinforcement learning theory. Classical conditioning does not include rewards and punishments which are key terms in the reinforcement learning theory. Classical conditioning is creating relationships by association.
http://www.psychologicalharassment.com/ivan_pavlov.htm


John B Watson:
1. Explain (in detail) how Watson's "Little Albert" study was conducted.
Little Albert was a 9month old baby that was chosen from a hospital for the study. He was given a battery of baseline emotional tests; the infant was exposed, briefly and for the first time, to a white rat, a rabbit, a dog, a monkey, masks with and without hair, cotton wool, burning newspapers, etc. He didn't show any fear at all.They begin to condition Little Albert until approximately two months later, when he was 11 months. The experiment began with putting Albert in a room with a table.A white rat was placed near him and he was allowed to play with it. He did not show any fear at all at the beggining but then  Watson and Rayner made a loud sound behind Albert's back by striking a suspended steel bar with a hammer when the baby touched the rat. Not surprisingly Albert showed fear and began to cry.

2. Identify the conditioned stimulus, the unconditioned stimulus and the conditioned response from Watson's study.
white rat (original neutral stimulus, now conditioned stimulus)
the loud noise (unconditioned stimulus)
emotional response of crying and fear (originally the unconditioned response to the noise, now the conditioned response to the rat).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Albert_experiment
3. Explain at least two limitations of this study.
The limitations were that the experiment was made just in a child and not in a bigger kid, teenager or adult and that their was also other sound besides the one they made.

4. Explain Watson's law of frequency.
Stated that the more often two things are linked the association will be more powerful.
5. Explain Watson's law of recency.
Refers to the responds that have occured after a stimulus.
6. Explain the basic assumptions of behaviorism according to Watson.
According to him behavior can be reduced to its basic components.
 

Article #1
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/12/081215074351.htm

http://www.google.hn/imgres?imgurl=http://news.discovery.com/human/2010/06/09/sleepy-teen-278x225.jpg&imgrefurl=http://news.discovery.com/human/teens-school-start-times.html&usg=__AkiPEj1SfLXMQAmXHy0HGsW2jYw=&h=225&w=278&sz=27&hl=es&start=0&zoom=1&tbnid=MsQeuHFboSv9DM:&tbnh=123&tbnw=155&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dearly%2Bschool%2Bstart%26um%3D1%26hl%3Des%26rlz%3D1T4ADBF_esHN310HN310%26biw%3D1003%26bih%3D519%26tbs%3Disch:1&um=1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=664&vpy=114&dur=2823&hovh=180&hovw=222&tx=99&ty=202&ei=xR_XTMOYBMWclgfo_7yCCQ&oei=xR_XTMOYBMWclgfo_7yCCQ&esq=1&page=1&ndsp=15&ved=1t:429,r:8,s:0

Study conducted by senior author Barbara Phillips, MD, director of the UK Healthcare Good Samaritan Sleep Center in Lexington, Ky.
A survey concerning the sleep habits of students was made after a change in school start times. In 1998 students filled out the first survey concerning their sleep habits in school nights and non-school nights. In 1999, students filled out the same survey. During year one, school times were during 7:30 to 8:00 and in the second year school times were during 8:30 to 9.
Their results were that because of the change in school start times, enabled students to get more sleep which decreased young teenagers auto accidents.
In my opinion this study is relevant because it demonstrates social pressure as well as school pressure give adolescents an inadequate and little amount of time of sleeping which cause big problems such as car accidents.

Article #2
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090609072813.htm


http://www.google.hn/imgres?imgurl=http://www.spokesmanreview.com/blogs/vox/media/all-nighter-main_Full.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.spokesman.com/blogs/vox/2007/dec/18/duh-of-the-week-study-all-nighters-hurt-students-grades/&usg=__jsQSSicqIQc5KCnWW7mn9MAo5ZQ=&h=400&w=600&sz=33&hl=es&start=15&zoom=1&tbnid=EVmY3tOZ8DurJM:&tbnh=104&tbnw=127&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dnight%2Bstudying%26um%3D1%26hl%3Des%26rlz%3D1T4ADBF_esHN310HN310%26biw%3D1003%26bih%3D519%26tbs%3Disch:10%2C88&um=1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=384&vpy=273&dur=4477&hovh=183&hovw=275&tx=148&ty=137&ei=xyXXTLf8HcL98AbVrPHOCw&oei=WCXXTJ-sD4SClAexk5z5Ag&esq=2&page=2&ndsp=18&ved=1t:429,r:2,s:15&biw=1003&bih=519

Lead author Jennifer Peszka, PhD, psychology department chair at Hendrix College in Conway, Ark.,
The study detected that students experience lack of sleep hygiene during their change from high school to college. It was based on data from 89 students with ages between 17 and 20 which were beginning their freshmen year and 34 of the students who were finishing their freshamn year in an arts college. The study states which were the negative effects in poor sleep which affected educated high school and college students.
They found a decline in the grade point average of students during the transition from high school to college. Results indicate that evening types had significantly lower first year college GPA (2.84) than morning and intermediate types (3.18). The evening type students had a greater lowering of their GPA in their transition from high school to college in concerning of the rest of their peers.
In my opinion, this study can make any teenager realize how sleeping issues really afect our grades and even though we got a lot to do for homework every night, we shouldn´t stay up that late doing our work because its really making it worst.

Article #3
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/03/070308121912.htm

http://www.google.hn/imgres?imgurl=http://portal.sochipe.cl/subidos/noticias/fotos/9344-genes-picture.jpg&imgrefurl=http://portal.sochipe.cl/modulos.php%3Fmod%3Dnoticias%26cat%3D25%26fn%3De21e678148e464378f367f5fd7ee4f54%26pag%3D5&usg=__yu-_EvTDFg-60CXEw2eml5jdEYE=&h=320&w=400&sz=14&hl=es&start=0&zoom=1&tbnid=IH1QkHH7cT5xKM:&tbnh=123&tbnw=154&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dgenes%26um%3D1%26hl%3Des%26rlz%3D1T4ADBF_esHN310HN310%26biw%3D1003%26bih%3D519%26tbs%3Disch:1&um=1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=288&vpy=66&dur=967&hovh=201&hovw=251&tx=167&ty=124&ei=VyrXTMvYLoXGlQeimISBCQ&oei=VyrXTMvYLoXGlQeimISBCQ&esq=1&page=1&ndsp=18&ved=1t:429,r:1,s:0

The study was reported by Antoine Viola, Derk-Jan Dijk, and colleagues at the University of Surrey's Sleep Research Center.
The study was used to compare how individuals that hade only the longer gene variant and those that had only the shorter one struggled on keeping themselves awake for 2 days, including the intervening night. The researchers found that although some individuals struggled to stay awake, others did not have any difficulty doing it.
The results came out very early in the morning, between 4 to 8 in the morning and justified that individuals with the larger variant of the gene had very poor results on tests for attention and working memories.
In my opinion, this study is helpful for someone who has or think that they might have a sleeping disorder
and want to know the cause of it but it also interests people to find out what gene of sleeping do they have according to the amount of sleeping they´ve been getting in their lives.