Behavioral Learning Theory

Schedules of Reinforcement
A determination of how often reinforcement will be available during operant conditioning
Continuous schedule
Is possible if it is available for every occurrence of a behavior;
Useful for establishing new behaviors
Intermittent schedule
The ratio schedule – the number of responses that must occur for reinforcement to be earned

The interval schedule – focus in elapsed time. If the desired behavior occurs after certain amount of time has elapsed, then the student is reinforced

Benefit of intermittent reinforcement is that the behaviors become more permanent when they are reinforced interminettently.

Reinforcement be administered according to the principle: reinforce frequently at first, and less frequently later on.

This combination helps build a behavior quickly, while also helping make the behavior more resistant to extinction

Extinction
It is an important concept for both classical and operant conditioning – if the environmental support for learning is removed, the learned behavior tends to be eliminated
Generalization and Discrimination
They occur both in classical and operant conditioning

In conditioning they refer to learners’ ability to determine when to produce a particular response and when not to produce that particular response

Generalization occurs when students respond to similar stimuli with the same behavior

Discrimination occurs when learners identify two similar stimuli as being different and they respond to them differently

Stimulus control – learners’ behavious are under the control of certain antecedents in their environment


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