Private Events Flashcards
What are ‘Private Events’
- Internal events which occur…
- Can be perceived by the…
- E.g., memory, thinking, feelings, creativity, insight, concept formation, novelty reasoning, self control, etc.
within the skin
individual but not by others
Methodological behaviourism:
Private events are…
Ignored…
Mentalist view:
Private events are the…
Radical behaviourism (B.F Skinner):
The skin is an…
Behaviours within the skin (private events) have…
Private events are controlled by…
They are not causes of observable behaviours but…
subjective therefore cannot be studied
private events
causes of observable behaviours (e.g., “I hit someone because I am angry”)
artificial barrier
no special status
the same mechanisms as observable behaviours
are behaviours themselves to be explained. (e.g., “why were you angry?”)
Where a more common mentalist view conflicts with the radical behavioural view is with regard to the….
Unacceptable explanations from a radical behaviorist view but acceptable from a mentalist view:
e.g. I eat because I am hungry
I eat too much because I am impulsive
I hit someone because I am angry
I cry because I am sad.
ultimate causes of behaviour (whether they are internal or external ones).
Saying ‘because I am hungry’, ‘because I am impulsive’, ‘because I am angry’ and ‘because I am sad’ is not an explanation, these behaviours itself that need to be explained
The radical behavioural perspective is radical in that it... Those past causes may lie at the: phylogenetic (evolutionary) level = OR ontogenetic (individual) level
explicitly identifies the ultimate causes of all behaviour as a product of past events.
Genes
As a result of your individual experience with the environment over time.
A radical behavioural perspective of the question, ‘why are you going to MacDonalds”
Might be to say something like:
- Human physiology requires salt, sugar etc (phylogenetic factors; as human beings evolved to require these things for our existence).
- Behaviours which have successfully enabled us to obtain food and eat it are more likely to occur in the future (ontological factors)
- To what degree is eating under stimulus control (e.g. ‘any time’ vs. just meal times because of Pavlovian contingencies in the past)?
- What is the response cost (e.g. is there little delay / cost / effort required)?
main point is that ‘hunger’ or ‘lack of willpower’ are not the causes they are descriptions.
NOTE
This does not imply that all organisms are the same or will be the same. There is natural variability (mutations) in how genes are expressed and how behaviours occur even at ontogentic level
Example of Private Event: What is Memory?
The ability to make a…
Geoff White looked at…
Behavioural researchers focus on memory as a verb:
correct response after a period of time has elapsed since being exposed to a stimulus.
memory as discrimination after a delay (trying to perceive something in the distance temporally rather than physically)
Encoding and Retrieving (measures behaviours involved in memory)
Studying Remembering (3 term contingency): Delayed Matching to Sample 1. Presentation... 2. Removal of... 3. Original stimulus plus... 4. Subject has to...
of stimulus
stimulus for a period of time
one (or more) other (s) presented
identify original stimulus
(1) Presentation of stimulus -
(2) Removal of stimulus for a period of time (delay) -
(3) Original stimulus plus one (or more) other(s) presented. Subject has to identify original stimulus -
the pigeon learns this rule quickly through trial and error
use a delay of zero during training, then investigate various delays during that delay period.
black key : red key : black key
black key : black key : black key
red key : black key : green key
if pigeon pecks at red key > receives reinforcement
Delayed Matching To Sample Procedure.
Similar to conditional discrimination task…
Multiple trials with…
Can also look at with rats using levers
start of trial –black key : white key : black key
display sample –black key : red key : black key
delay –black key : black key : black key
display comparisons –red key : black key : green key
food if matched, nothing if not –black key : black key : black key
intertrial interval –black key : black key : black key
next trial –black key : white key : black key
but with a delay
different samples
Forgetting Functions…
The longer the delay…
Geoff White: like physical distance, the further away something is in time…
What if we did something that could impact the encoding phase of memory?
How would that change the forgetting function?
the worse (or less accurate) performance is (found in all kinds of species) the harder it is to discriminate.
e.g., how long they got to observe the sample stimulus.
How would that change the forgetting function?
Encoding:
Produces a…
Increase condition: increase encoding time for the animal, presented sample stimulus for a longer period of time, overall accuracy was better at remembering the sample stimulus compared to the control.
Decrease condition: decrease encoding time for the animal, presented sample stimulus for a shorter period of time compared to control, overall accuracy was worse at remembering the sample stimulus compared to the control.
Increase condition and decrease condition remain parallel to the control condition – steepness of the lines are exactly the same
Therefore, manipulations that are effecting encoding, effects overall accuracy (ability to remember) but it does not effect the rate of forgetting as the delay increases
The difference between the conditions are the same at each delay
forgetting function which changes uniformly
When encoding time increases, the graph shifts upwards > higher accuracy in remembering
When encoding time decreases, the graph shifts downwards > lower accuracy in remembering
Even though the graphs will shift with change in encoding time, they still run parallel to the control therefore steepness of the line remains the same > manipulating encoding will affect overall accuracy (ability to remember) but does not affect the rate at which forgetting occurs as delay increases
Effect of Stimulus Exposure:
Increases overall levels of accuracy (increasing attending or encoding)
Grant (1976):
Original stimulus presented for 1, 4, 8 or 14 sec before delay began – change duration of exposure to the to be remembered stimulus.
Results?
the longer the stimulus was presented…
the better performance (% accurate) - overall change in accuracy that could be interpreted as increased attention or ability to encode the original stimulus.
How to change steepness of line effecting rate of forgetting?
Rate of Forgetting:
Produces a change in the forgetting function which isn’t…
Interpreted as a…
Start of with same level of accuracy, as delay increases, the difference…
uniform (similar to begin with and then drops away as delay increases…)
decrement in the retrieval phase of memory
between the two conditions gets larger
Working vs. Reference Memory
Working Memory:
Reflects elements of…
Reference Memory:
Refers to long term, never changing rules –
stimulus control that change across trials
involves stable elements of stimulus control that do not change across trials.
Why is this useful?
Example from Geoff White study:
Drugs commonly prescribed for epilepsy
Side effects = bad memory
Researched the effect of drugs used to treat epilepsy on animals, using delayed to matching sample task (observed memory at various delays)
Results?
Suggests how to…
the drug affected the encoding phase but not retrieval phase of memory
best offset the side-effect of the drug (spend more time improving encoding, rather than retrieval after a delay).
Working vs. Reference Memory
Working Memory:
Reflects elements of…
e.g., forget the sample key colour
Reference Memory:
Refers to long term, never changing rules –
e.g., forget the rule of matching the sample
stimulus control that change across trials
involves stable elements of stimulus control that do not change across trials.
The Radial Arm Maze:
Radial arm mazes consist of a central hub with arms radiating from it. At the start of a trial, the arms of the maze are baited and the rat placed in the middle.
In any 1 trial, the rat is allowed a predetermined number of arm visits. To maximise the number of reinforcers obtained, rats have to remember where they have been and yet to go
Used to examine the duration and capacity of memory function in rats.
e. g., Beatty & Shavalia (1980)
- 8 arm maze
- Rats made 4 choices then taken out
- Put back in after variable delays & allowed to 4 make more choices.
- Results?
Rats are good at remembering where they have been up to four hours, after four hours the percent correct drops (forgetting function)
Reference & Working memory in the Radial Arm Maze:
RAM can also be used to differentiate between working and reference memory
A subset of arms are always baited while the remaining arms are always left empty. The rat is allowed to visit a set number of arms before being removed. Rat has to learn which arms to go to and which to avoid to get the maximum amount of reinforcement possible.
Example of WM error:
Example of RM error:
if the rat could not remember if they’ve visited a arm within a trial already
if the rat could not remember which arms are always baited and which arms are never baited
WM in the RAM
Working memory –
Working memory error –
RM in the RAM
Reference memory –
Reference memory error –
rat has to remember where it has been and where it has yet to go.
repeating arms within a trial.
rat has to remember that some arms have reinforcers while others do not.
visiting unbaited arms
RM and WM in RAM
Kay et al. (2009)
Researched the effects of scopolamine on memory, and compared the effects to MDMA. Gave rats scopolamine or MDMA, put them in the RAM.
Results?
Scopolamine produced more working memory errors (i.e., repeated arm visits within a trial)
MDMA (Ecstasy) produced more reference memory errors (i.e., good at remembering where they had been within a trial, not good at remembering what arms are baited or never baited)
Conclusions:
Evidence that animals are capable of…
This has also been found in humans meaning that there may be similar…
Evidence that environmental events influence this behavior of remembering, therefore remembering can be…
remembering and that there are different types of remembering
underlying memory processes between humans and non-humans
viewed as an operant (like any other observable behavior).
Remembering from the point of view of the 3-term contingency:
1) ?
- state dependent memory/context shift effect
- directed forgetting
2) ?
- effect of overall reinforcer amount
Stimulus control (cues and prompts) Reinforcement control (consequences of remembering)
Example 1A - ‘State Dependent Memory’ /Context Shift
e.g. Godden and Baddeley
LEARNING ENVIRONMENT: Wet or Dry (X-axis)
RECALL ENVIRONMENT: Wet or Dry
MEAN RECALL: (Y-axis)
Results?
People remembered better if the learning environment matched the recall/test environment.
Example 1B - ‘State dependent memory’
Overton (1964): rats learned that a correct response in a T maze meant they avoided a shock =
If rat initially learnt while drugged with 25 mg/kg sodium pentobarbital then poor retention of learning if subsequently tested while not drugged.
Conversely, a response learned by rats while in non-drugged state did not occur if later tested while drugged.
- subsequently shown with many environments, drugs (e.g. alcohol), species and learning tasks
- same as humans; better memory if the stimulus/context that was present during learning is also present during recall.
negative reinforcement paradigm
