影响学习迁移的几个因素的实验研究

针对前人较多地从学习材料本身的特点或学习者的心理特点出发去孤立地考察对学习迁移的影响这一现象 ,本研究试采用代数运算材料 ,系统地探讨了学习材料的相同要素和学习者概括化认知过程两者之间的内在关系 ,并将相同要素进一步区分为表述形式相似和内在原理相似。旨在对较为复杂的认知学习中迁移的影响因素做更深入的考察。结果表明 :①概括化和相同要素对学习迁移的影响依然存在 ,但需作具体分析。其中 ,前者应成为影响学习迁移的更重要因素。②在学习材料的相同要素中 ,实质上对迁移起作用的是内在原理相似性 ;而表述形式相似性不起主要作用。③概括化因素和内在原理相似性因素之间的交互作用对学习迁移影响极大。     

Effects of differential reinforcement on the behavior and self-esteem of children with emotional and behavioral disorders

Students in a residential special school for children with emotional and behavioral disorders participated in a study designed to reduce their levels of inappropriate behavior. The residential care staff rated the students' behavioral problems and their class teachers rated their overt self-esteem pre and post intervention. In addition, the students completed self-ratings of their self-esteem. The students were divided into two groups, experimental and control. A multiple baseline across behaviors design was used to assess behavioral changes in the experimental group. Both groups received tangible rewards to the same level but only the experimental group received them contingent upon behaving appropriately. Results showed that the experimental group students made substantial reductions in their levels of inappropriate behavior, which were maintained at a three-month followup. Also, ratings of their behavioral problems by residential child care staff suggested that this improvement in behavior had generalized beyond the classroom to the residential setting. However, no significant differences were found between the pre- and post-intervention ratings of their self-esteem or teacher ratings of their overt self-esteem.     

Improving the spelling performance of students with disabilities

The present study examined the effects of an error correction strategy on the spelling accuracy of students with emotional and/or learning disabilities. The strategy, which asked students to spell a word, view a correct model, and then correct their errors, was compared to a traditional strategy that asked students to write words three times each while viewing a correct model. Results showed that students learned more words in the error correction condition than in the traditional condition. The error correction treatment was shown to be an effective strategy that reduced the number of repetitive spelling practice trials, and was preferred by students.     

Stability criteria

Three approaches to the determination of behavioral stability were examined. In the first, a learning curve was fit to acquisition data (from Cumming and Schoenfeld, 1960), and the “experiment” stopped when the data approached sufficiently close to the theoretical asymptote. In the second, the data were analyzed for variability and linear and quadratic trend. In the third, the experiment was stopped when the magnitude of the daily changes in the data fell below a criterion. Accuracy was measured as deviation between the average value of the dependent variable when the experiment was stopped, and the average value over the last 100 sessions. The first approach was most accurate, but at the cost of requiring the most sessions and being the most difficult to apply. Both the second and third approaches provided acceptable criteria with a reasonable cost-accuracy tradeoff. The second approach permits a continuous adjustment of the criteria to accommodate the variability intrinsic in the experimental paradigm. The third, nomothetic, approach also takes into account the decreasing marginal utility of extended training sessions.     

Behavioral coaching in the development of skills in football, gymnastics, and tennis

A review of the literature indicates that methods of skill acquisition based on the operant paradigm have been scientifically validated with many motor behaviors. However, these procedures have been limited to the use of positive reinforcement for correct performance when applied to the acquisition of complex sports skills in natural settings. To find complementary procedures to enhance skill acquisition, a coaching method involving several behavioral techniques was developed that focused on remediation of errors. This coaching method combined the following components: (1) systematic use of verbal instructions and feedback, (2) positive and negative reinforcement, (3) positive practice, and (4) time out. Three sports, football, gymnastics, and tennis, were selected to determine the effectiveness and generality of this behavioral coaching method. A total of 23 male and female subjects, ranging in age from 11 to 35, was included in this study. Baseline data were first collected for each sport under standard coaching conditions. Next, the behavioral coaching method was evaluated depending on the sport in either a multiple baseline or a reversal design. The behavioral dimensions selected were blocking in football; backward walkovers, front hand springs, and reverse kips in gymnastics; and the forehand, backhand, and serve in tennis. Behavioral coaching was immediately effective in increasing the correct execution of complex skills in all three sports. Gains of up to 10 times the baseline performance were achieved in each sport. In football, behavioral coaching resulted in an increase in correct blocking performance from a baseline average of 5% to 51.3%. Gymnasts' performances increased from baseline averages of 2.7% to 52.6% across the three skills. In tennis, standard coaching produced an average of 6% correct performance which increased dramatically under behavioral coaching to 57% across the three strokes. The success of the behavioral coaching package used here suggests that a technology of behavior may offer additional and complementary strategies to the acquisition of motor skills in the natural environment.     

Effects of signaled and unsignaled shock on schedule-controlled lever pressing and schedule-induced licking: Shock intensity and body weight

Schedule-controlled lever pressing and schedule-induced licking were studied in rats under a multiple fixed-interval fixed-interval schedule of food reinforcement. Following acquisition of stable rates of pressing and licking, a multiple variable-time variable-time schedule of electric-shock delivery was superimposed upon the baseline schedule. In only one component of the multiple schedule, a 5-sec stimulus preceded each shock (signaled shock). In the other component shock was unsignaled. Several shock intensities (Experiment 1) and body weights (Experiment 2) were studied. Lever pressing and licking were affected similarly by experimental manipulations, although with parametric differences. Depending upon shock intensity and body weight, rates of lever pressing and licking were hardly suppressed, suppressed primarily in the unsignaled shock component (differential suppression), or markedly suppressed in both components. Differential suppression during components with signaled and unsignaled shock and conditioned suppression of responding during the preshock stimulus appeared not to be functionally related. Differential suppression depended more on the discriminability of shock-free time, and on shock intensity, body weight, and the type of response than on the “preparatory” behavior preceding shock.     

Choice as a function of local versus molar reinforcement contingencies.

Rats were trained on a discrete-trial probability learning task. In Experiment 1, the molar reinforcement probabilities for the two response alternatives were equal, and the local contingencies of reinforcement differentially reinforced a win-stay, lose-shift response pattern. The win-stay portion was learned substantially more easily and appeared from the outset of training, suggesting that its occurrence did not depend upon discrimination of the local contingencies but rather only upon simple strengthening effects of individual reinforcements. Control by both types of local contingencies decreased with increases in the intertrial interval, although some control remained with intertrial intervals as long as 30 s. In Experiment 2, the local contingencies always favored win-shift and lose-shift response patterns but were asymmetrical for the two responses, causing the molar reinforcement rates for the two responses to differ. Some learning of the alternation pattern occurred with short intertrial intervals, although win-stay behavior occurred for some subjects. The local reinforcement contingencies were discriminated poorly with longer intertrial intervals. In the absence of control by the local contingencies, choice proportion was determined by the molar contingencies, as indicated by high exponent values for the generalized matching law with long intertrial intervals, and lower values with short intertrial intervals. The results show that when molar contingencies of reinforcement and local contingencies are in opposition, both may have independent roles. Control by molar contingencies cannot generally be explained by local contingencies.     

THE “WHERE IS IT?” REFLEX: AUTOSHAPING THE ORIENTING RESPONSE

The goal of this review is to compare two divergent lines of research on signal-centered behavior: the orienting reflex (OR) and autoshaping. A review of conditioning experiments in animals and humans suggests that the novelty hypothesis of the OR is no longer tenable. Only stimuli that represent biological “relevance” elicit ORs. A stimulus may be relevant a priori (i.e., unconditioned) or as a result of conditioning. Exposure to a conditioned stimulus (CS) that predicts a positive reinforcer causes the animal to orient to it throughout conditioning. Within the CS-US interval, the initial CS-directed orienting response is followed by US-directed tendencies. Experimental evidence is shown that the development and maintenance of the conditioned OR occur in a similar fashion both in response-independent (classical) and response-dependent (instrumental) paradigms. It is proposed that the conditioned OR and the signal-directed autoshaped response are identical. Signals predicting aversive events repel the subject from the source of the CS. It is suggested that the function of the CS is not only to signal the probability of US occurrence, but also to serve as a spatial cue to guide the animal in the environment.     

The second offspring of General Process Learning Theory: Overt behavior as the ambassador of the mind

Wasserman suggested in a recent book review that the study of intervening cognitive processes represents a current focus of interest in animal learning and that this has led to a revitalization of comparative psychology. An examination of the volume reviewed suggests that he may have overstated the case. Most of the authors to whom he refers expressed dissatisfaction with traditional stimulus-response associationism but few argued for the extreme (information processing) sort of cognitive approach described by Wasserman.