What is happening in psychology of learning courses?

Current practices in the undergraduate Psychology of Learning course were assessed through a survey in which a questionnaire probing the teaching of the course was sent to 238 4-year colleges and universities in the United States. Fifty-four percent of the questionnaires were returned. Learning courses were taught at all but 10 of the schools that responded. The course typically is one of several that can be selected to fulfill requirements for the major in psychology. The course orientation and content varied widely from cognitive to eclectic to behavioral, and laboratory requirements existed in less than half of the courses. The effects of these practices on behavior analysis are considered and several suggestions are made for teaching behavior analysis in the Learning course and elsewhere to undergraduates.     

Evaluating preschool children's preferences for motivational systems during instruction

Preschool teachers rely on several strategies for motivating children to participate in learning activities. In the current study, we evaluated the effectiveness of and preference for three teaching contexts in which embedded, sequential, or no programmed reinforcement was arranged. The embedded context included highly preferred teaching materials, the sequential context included highly preferred edible items for correct responding, and a control context included neither. In addition, an exclusively play-oriented activity was included as a fourth option to determine if one of the direct teaching contexts could compete with a relatively unstructured and exclusively child-led activity. All participants preferred the sequential context (use of high-quality consequences) over the embedded context (use of high-quality teaching materials), 2 of the 4 participants preferred some motivational system to none at all, and the play area was selected over all variants of the instructional contexts during the majority of trials. We found either no or small differences in correct responding in the different instructional contexts; however, rates of undesirable behavior were highest in the least preferred interaction area for 3 of the 4 participants. Implications for the design of effective and preferred teaching environments for young children are discussed.     

Partial remediation of speaker and listener behaviors in people with severe dementia

We investigated the effects of contingent reinforcement (Intervention 1) and contingent reinforcement with modeling (Intervention 2) on speaker and listener behaviors in 5 people with severe dementia. Intervention 1 generally increased listener behavior; there was no clear effect on tacting, but echoic behavior increased in the one case investigated. Given the weak baseline repertoires of these clients and the paucity of other effective interventions, even the small increases in verbal behaviors found here are important. Further gains may be achieved, for example, if reinforcement opportunity per trial type were to be increased from one to several per day or if participants were trained to echo the listener stimulus in mand compliance tasks.     

Learning for Life: An Ecological Approach to Pedagogical Research

ABSTRACT— The trend to convert laboratory findings on the conditions associated with optimal memory into recommendations for teaching strategies and learning aids will harm students if findings fail to generalize to students' usual learning environments. Moreover, it is likely that pedagogies function differently for students with different degrees of background knowledge, time, and interest in the subject matter; that some support activities will prevent students from honing their ability learn from narrative material without guided learning; and that an overuse of learning aids will tax students' ability to use them effectively. We contrast two approaches to developing pedagogy—memory first and pedagogical ecology—and explain how the human factors approach of pedagogical ecology could be a more satisfying model for the scholarship of teaching and learning.     

Live training versus e‐learning to teach implementation of listener response programs

Discrete‐trial teaching is an effective teaching procedure that must be implemented with high integrity to produce optimal learning. Behavioral Skills Training (BST) has proven effective for staff training; however, BST is time and labor intensive. Computer‐based instruction (CBI) programs may provide a more efficient and cost‐effective alternative to live training if the CBI program is as effective as BST in producing accurate implementation. The current study compared CBI to BST to train novice undergraduate students to conduct discrete‐trial teaching. Participants were randomly assigned to one of the two conditions and assessed prior to and after the completion of training. Results indicated that although both BST and CBI were effective at training participants to implement discrete‐trial teaching, BST was slightly but significantly more effective whereas CBI quickly created a return on the investment of product development.     

Unstable in more ways than one: reaction time variability and the neuroticism/distress relationship

The authors hypothesized that a greater degree of stimulus-response variability could either serve adaptive or maladaptive control purposes, depending on levels of Neuroticism. Specifically, a more variable relation between stimulus and response may be emotionally beneficial if such flexibility is used to support non-neurotic forms of self-regulation, but costly if it is used to support neurotic forms of self-regulation. To investigate these ideas, the authors asked 232 college undergraduates within three studies to perform several choice reaction time (RT) tasks. On the basis of performance, we could quantify stimulus-response variability in terms of RT variability from trial to trial. Such a measure of stimulus-response variability interacted with Neuroticism in predicting momentary negative affect (Study 1), informant judgments of negative affect (Study 2), and informant judgments of anxious symptoms (Study 3). As hypothesized, greater stimulus-response variability tended to be associated with less distress among individuals low in Neuroticism, but more distress among individuals high in Neuroticism. The results highlight the manner in which Neuroticism may "taint" control functions, in turn reinforcing Neuroticism-linked outcomes.     

Driving attention with the top down: the relative contribution of target templates to the linear separability effect in the size dimension

Bauer, Jolicoeur, and Cowan (1996a, 1996b, 1998) have shown that visual search for a target among distractors is apparently serial if the target is nonlinearly separable from the distractors in a particular feature space (e.g., color or size). In contrast, if the target is linearly separable from the distractors, search is relatively easy and seemingly spatially parallel. We examined the contribution of top-down knowledge of the target to the linear separability effect on search. Two visual search experiments were conducted using small, medium, or large circles as targets. In the first experiment, participants could use knowledge of the target to guide search, whereas, in the second, the target was unknown on each trial. Search for a medium (nonlinearly separable) target among small or large distractors benefited least from knowledge of the target as compared with search for a small or large target. Thus, the linear separability effect can be determined in part by use of top-down knowledge to facilitate the detection of targets at the ends of a continuum defining the stimuli.     

Inefficacy interim monitoring procedures in randomized clinical trials: the need to report

If definitive evidence concerning treatment effectiveness becomes available from an ongoing randomized clinical trial, then the trial could be stopped early, with the public release of results benefiting current and future patients. However, stopping an ongoing trial based on accruing outcome data requires methodological rigor to preserve validity of the trial conclusions. This has led to the use of formal interim monitoring procedures, which include inefficacy monitoring that will stop a trial early when the experimental treatment appears not to be working. For participants, inefficacy monitoring is especially important as it ensures that they are not being treated worse than if they had not enrolled on the trial. We discuss the importance of reporting with trial results the formal interim inefficacy monitoring guidelines that were utilized, and, if none were used, the reasons for their absence. A survey of two leading medical journals suggests that this is not current practice.     

Driving attention with the top down: The relative contribution of target templates to the linear separability effect in the size dimension

Bauer, Jolicoeur, and Cowan (1996a, 1996b, 1998) have shown that visual search for a target among distractors is apparently serial if the target is nonlinearly separable from the distractors in a particular feature space (e.g., color or size). In contrast, if the target is linearly separable from the distractors, search is relatively easy and seemingly spatially parallel. We examined the contribution of top-down knowledge of the target to the linear separability effect on search. Two visual search experiments were conducted using small, medium, or large circles as targets. In the first experiment, participants could use knowledge of the target to guide search, whereas, in the second, the target was unknown on each trial. Search for a medium (nonlinearly separable) target among small or large distractors benefited least from knowledge of the target as compared with search for a small or large target. Thus, the linear separability effect can be determined in part by use of top-down knowledge to facilitate the detection of targets at the ends of a continuum defining the stimuli.     

The Role of Christian Educational Institutions in Improving Economic Self-Reliance

This article argues that Christian educational institutions in Africa can play a major role in improving economic self-reliance within the continent, if those who establish Christian universities there take time to plan the programs and activities in those institutions. Specifically, it argues that with proper planning of quality education–the curriculum, the choice of extra-curricular activities, the teaching methods, and proper assessment–Africa's situation, especially its economy will improve. The paper insists that God gave a mandate to Christians to lead out in the world when He called them the light of the world (Matthew 5:14-16) as well as promised that they would be the head and not the tail (Deuteronomy 28:13). Finally, it ends with several recommendations that will help leaders of Christian universities in Africa to plan education in such a way to improve the economy of the continent. While the paper addresses Christian institutions of higher learning in general, it focuses its attention on Seventh-day Adventist educational institutions of higher learning in Africa and draws its examples from Babcock University in Nigeria, West Africa.     

Evaluating dental faculty performance: perceptions of dental school deans

In this study 57 deans in 67 United States and Canadian Dental Schools ranked, in decreasing order of importance, 12 performance criteria and then ranked the same 12 criteria as they perceived faculty would rank them. Agreement between the deans' two global rankings gave a Spearman's rank-order correlation of .92. Although the general level of agreement between the two perceptual ranks was significant, several important discrepancies in rank order were identified. Deans perceived that faculty would rank number of publications first and classroom, clinical, and laboratory teaching third. Deans personally ranked classroom, clinical, and laboratory teaching as first and number of publications as fourth. Implications of the discrepancy between the perceived importance of research productivity and teaching in faculty evaluation were discussed with respect to the increasing emphasis placed on research for dental faculty within the university.     

A comparison of blocked and mixed‐trial methods for teaching auditory–visual discriminations

Behavior analysts typically teach conditional discriminations in a mixed‐trial format but may switch to a blocked‐trial format for learners displaying limited acquisition. No known research has shown that mixed‐trial methods are more effective or efficient than blocked‐trial methods for teaching discriminations, so it is not clear why this format has been adopted as the “first‐line” intervention. We compared blocked and mixed‐trial formats for teaching novel auditory–visual discriminations to three adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD). Results show blocked‐trial methods resulted in faster skill acquisition in all cases, suggesting this format may be a preferable starting point for instruction.     

Expanding the Intertrial Interval During Extinction: Response Cessation and Recovery

We examined trial spacing during extinction following a human contingency learning task. Specifically, we assessed if an expanding retrieval practice schedule ( [Bjork and Bjork, 1992] and [Bjork and Bjork, 2006]), in which the spacing between extinction trials was progressively increased, would result in faster immediate extinction and less recovery from extinction than uniformly spaced extinction trials. We used an ABB vs. ABA renewal design and observed that, whereas the expanding group extinguished faster during extinction treatment, the expanding and constant groups showed the same level of extinction with an immediate test in the extinction context (ABB) and the two groups showed equivalent ABA renewal at test in the training context. We conclude that the faster extinction observed in the expanding groups could be misleading in clinical treatment, if the therapist used the absence of fear during extinction as the basis for terminating treatment.     

Effects of recent exposure to a conditioned stimulus on extinction of Pavlovian fear conditioning

In six experiments we studied the effects of a single re-exposure to a conditioned stimulus (CS; "retrieval trial") prior to extinction training (extinction-reconsolidation boundary) on the development of and recovery from fear extinction. A single retrieval trial prior to extinction training significantly augmented the renewal and reinstatement of extinguished responding. Augmentation of recovery was not observed if the retrieval and extinction training occurred in different contexts. These results contrast with those reported in earlier papers by Monfils and coworkers in rats and by Schiller and coworkers in humans. We suggest that these contrasting results could depend on the contrasting influences of either: (1) occasion-setting contextual associations vs. direct context-CS associations formed as a consequence of the retrieval trial or (2) discrimination vs. generalization between the circumstances of conditioning and extinction.     

Intolerance of uncertainty and decisions about delayed, probabilistic rewards

Worry is the inflated concern about potential future threats and is a hallmark feature of generalized anxiety disorder. Previous theoretical work has suggested that worry may be a consequence of intolerance of uncertainty (IU). The current study seeks to explore the behavioral consequences of IU. Specifically, we examine how IU might be associated with aspects of reward-based decision making. We utilized a simple laboratory gambling task in which participants chose between small, low-probability rewards available immediately at the beginning of each trial and large, high-probability rewards only available after some variable delay. Results demonstrate that higher levels of intolerance of uncertainty were associated with a tendency to select the immediately available, but less valuable and less probable rewards. IU also predicted decision-makers' sensitivity to outcomes. We discuss the cognitive and affective mechanisms that are likely to underlie the observed decision-making behavior and the implications for anxiety disorders.     

Evaluating conditional arguments with uncertain premises

Treating conditionals as probabilistic statements has been referred to as a defining feature of the “new paradigm” in cognitive psychology. Doing so is attractive for several reasons, but it complicates the problem of assessing the merits of conditional arguments. We consider several variables that relate to judging the persuasiveness of conditional arguments with uncertain (probabilistic) premises. We also explore ways of judging the consistency of people's beliefs as represented by components of conditional arguments. Experimental results provide evidence that inconsistencies in beliefs are more prevalent if the arguments’ components are spatially and temporally dispersed than if they are contiguous in space and time. This supports the idea that assuring the consistency among even a small number of beliefs is difficult to do, especially if the beliefs in question are not brought into consciousness at the same time; but consistency can be enhanced when beliefs are considered simultaneously or nearly so.     

Getting satisfied with “satisfaction of search”: How to measure errors during multiple-target visual search

Visual search studies are common in cognitive psychology, and the results generally focus upon accuracy, response times, or both. Most research has focused upon search scenarios where no more than 1 target will be present for any single trial. However, if multiple targets can be present on a single trial, it introduces an additional source of error because the found target can interfere with subsequent search performance. These errors have been studied thoroughly in radiology for decades, although their emphasis in cognitive psychology studies has been more recent. One particular issue with multiple-target search is that these subsequent search errors (i.e., specific errors which occur following a found target) are measured differently by different studies. There is currently no guidance as to which measurement method is best or what impact different measurement methods could have upon various results and conclusions. The current investigation provides two efforts to address these issues. First, the existing literature is reviewed to clarify the appropriate scenarios where subsequent search errors could be observed. Second, several different measurement methods are used with several existing datasets to contrast and compare how each method would have affected the results and conclusions of those studies. The evidence is then used to provide appropriate guidelines for measuring multiple-target search errors in future studies.     

The effect of brief delays to reinforcement on the acquisition of tacts in children with autism

We used discrete‐trial training to teach 3 children with autism to tact shapes of countries using 3 levels of reinforcement delay for correct responding: 0 s (immediate delivery), 6 s, and 12 s. Two of the 3 participants acquired the targets more quickly in the immediate‐delivery condition, suggesting that delays as brief as 6 s may be detrimental to learning tacts for some children.     

An evaluation of estimation data collection to trial‐by trial data collection during discrete trial teaching

There are many data collection procedures used during discrete trial teaching including first‐trial data collection, probe data, trial‐by‐trial data collection, and estimation data. Continuous, or trial‐by‐trial data collection, consists of the interventionist collecting data on learner behavior on each trial. Estimation data consists of the interventionist estimating learner performance after a teaching session using a rating scale. The purpose of the present study was to compare trial‐by‐trial data collection to estimation data collection during discrete trial teaching to teach children expressive labels. The data collection procedures were examined in terms of accuracy of data collection, efficiency of teaching (i.e., number of trials delivered per session), and rate of child acquisition of targets. Results of the adapted alternating treatment design replicated across three participants and multiple targets found estimation data collection to be as accurate as trial‐by‐trial data collection in determining mastery of targets. Estimation data collected by the interventionist was also found to be accurate when compared to the actual trial‐by‐trial data collected after the study concluded.