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MIDTERM PSYCH 311

1) Which of the following is the simplest form of elicited behavior?
a. The habitation response
b. Feedback stimuli
c. Reflexive behavior
d. The sensitization process

2) Which of the following describes the difference between a general search and a focal search?
a. General searches are localized, while focal searches focus on a larger area.
b. General searches occur when an animal does not yet know specifically where to look for food,
while focal searches are spatially localized.
c. General searches are appetitive while focal searches are consummatory.
d. There are no differences; both terms are alternative ways of describing appetitive behavior.

3) Which of the following is one of the characteristics of a modal action pattern?

a. The eliciting stimulus is usually easy to identify.
b. They are species-specific response patterns.
c. The threshold for eliciting the behavior is relatively invariant.
d. The eliciting stimulus will have similar effects over different situations.

4) Which of the following most correctly describes a sign stimulus?

a. First causes sensitization, then habituation
b. First causes habituation, then sensitization
c. sufficient for eliciting a modal action pattern
d. similar to an instinct

5) Which of the following most correctly states Descartes’ position on human and animal behavior?
a. Human behavior is governed by free will; animal behavior is governed by reflexes.
b. A few human and animal behaviors are governed by free will; most are governed by reflexes.
c. Voluntary human behaviors are governed by free will; involuntary human behaviors and all
animal behaviors are governed by reflexes.
d. All human and animal behaviors can be explained by reflex mechanisms.

6) According to Thomas Hobbes,

a. reflexes were predictable; the mind was not.
b. the mind was predictable; responses to environmental cues were not.
c. neither the operations of the mind nor reflexes were predictable.
d. both reflexes and the operations of the mind were predictable.
7) Of the primary rules of association, which has been most prominent in considerations of associations?
a. similarity
b. contingency
c. contrast
d. contiguity

8) After giving your cat fish-shaped treats time and time again, you notice the cat begins to salivate at the
sight of the fish-shaped snack. This is an example of
a. Differential learning
b. Sequential learning
c. Taste aversion learning
d. Object learning

9) A rat is trained to press a lever for a small amount of food. While pressing the lever at a steady rate,
the rat is presented with a tone-light stimulus that had been previously paired with foot-shock. When the
tone-light stimulus is on, the rat decreases its rate of lever pressing. This decrease is an example of
a. sign tracking.
b. Conditioned suppression
c. Conditioned repression
d. unconditioned fear responding.

10 ) From the selection below, select the true statement about stimuli.
a. Identification of CSs and USs is relative.
b. Identification of CSs is relative, but USs do not need reference to other stimuli.
c. Identification of USs is relative, but CSs do not need reference to other stimuli.
d. Identification of CSs and USs does not rely on reference to other stimuli.

11) A rat is given 20 exposures to a red light cue. Then, the red light is presented paired with food
delivery. Compared to a rat that did not receive the initial 20 exposures, this rat took a long time to
develop a CR to the red light. The slower learning is due to
a. the US-preexposure effect.
b. the latent-inhibition effect.
c. the latent-excitation effect.
d. the CS relevance effect.

12) According to studies of belongingness, rats conditioned with

a. illness learn a stronger aversion to audiovisual cues than to taste.
b. shock learn a stronger aversion to taste than to audiovisual cues.
c. illness learn a stronger aversion to taste than to audiovisual cues.
d. either shock or illness learn stronger aversions to audiovisual cues than to taste.
13) Which of the following is true of an operant response?
a. Response speed determines outcome.
b. Pushing a lever with a paw and pushing a lever with the snout are equivalent.
c. Licking a water spout and pushing a response lever are equivalent.
d. Licking a water spout and chewing a food pellet are equivalent.

14) The major advantage of free-operant methods over discrete trial procedures is that
a. the animals learn more quickly.
b. free operant methods provide the opportunity to observe changes in the likelihood of behavior
over time.
c. free operant methods can reveal an animal’s preferences.
d. free-operant methods involve S-S learning, but discrete trial procedures involve S-R learning.

15) Which of the following is an example (positive) punishment?

a. Dora is sent to her room without dessert because of her poor manners.
b. Steve has his mouth washed out with soap for swearing.
c. Bobby is not allowed to buy cigarettes because he is too young.
d. All of the above

SHORT ANSWER
16) The interstimulus interval refers to what time period?
Between the start of ___CS____ and the start of ____US____.

17) The trace interval refers to what time period?

The time between the end of __CS__ and the start of ___US__.

18) What is the function of preexposure to the CS or the US? Preexposure disrupts or retards learning

19) Increasing CS or US intensity has what effect? stimulus salience

20) Short CS-US intervals elicit focal search behavior. Longer CS-US intervals elicit general
search behavior.

21) A negative contingency between a response and an aversive stimulus is also known as ___ negative
reinforcement ___.

22) The difference between (positive) punishment and negative reinforcement is that in negative
reinforcement the instrumental response turns off an aversive stimulus. In positive punishment, the
instrumental response produces an unpleasant, or aversive, stimulus.
LONG ANSWER
23) Compare the nativist and empiricist positions. How has each contributed to the theoretical
underpinnings of the study of learning?
Nativist position assumes that we are born with innate ideas about certain things, Empiricist positions claims
that individuals were born without any presumptions about the world and all of the ideas people had were
learned through experiences after birth. Both have contributed to de study of learning in the sense that
human learning is a combination of both nature and nurture, this being said, the nativist position and the
empiricist position explain how biology and experience contribute to learning process in the human.

24) Compare and contrast appetitive and consummatory behavior, and describe how these are
related to general search, focal search, and food handling.
consummatory behavior is the completion of a species’ typical response sequence, appetitive behavior is to
put organism into contact with the stimuli that will release the consummatory behavior.
General search opens the response sequence by causing the individual to search around for food. Focal
search will be the appetitive behavior where the individual knows where to go. The process finalizes with
consummaroty behavior where the individual is in a food handling and ingestion mode.

25) Describe sign stimuli involved in the control of human behavior.

Sign stimulus is a specific feature of an object or animal that elicits a modal action pattern. It is involved in
the control of human behavior in the sense that once sign stimulus is identified, it can be exaggerated to
produce a strong response, situations like traumatic events elicit strong defensive modal action patterns, also
it creates modal action patterns involved in sexual arousal and copulation elicited by visual, olfactory, tactile,
and other types of sign stimuli specific to each species

26) What is the difference between a modal action pattern and a simple general reflex? Provide an
example of each.
MAP is a response pattern exhibited by most, if not all, members of a species in much the same way. A
general reflex is a close relation between an eliciting stimulus and a resulting response that is mediated by
a neural circuit. MAPs are more complex than reflexes and they MAPs involve an entire organism, instead
of a few muscles or glands.
An example of reflex will be the a newborn sucking everything that is put on the mouth as an involuntary
action; a MAP will be when the baby next to the mother moves the head, sucks the hand and cry to search
for breastmilk.

27) Describe the distinction between habituation, sensory adaptation, and fatigue.
Habituation is a decrease or cessation of a response to repeated stimulus. Sensory adaptation is the A
temporary reduction in the sensitivity of sense organs caused by repeated or excessive stimulation. Fatigue
is the temporary decrease in behavior caused by repeated or excessive use of the muscles involved in the
behavior.
28) What is object learning, and how is it similar or different from conventional classical
conditioning?
Object learning is the association of one feature of an object with another. It is similar to classical
conditioning because in classical conditioning, after the association is learned, the previously neutral stimulus
is sufficient to produce the behavior.

29) Describe a higher-order conditioning situation from common human experience. Make sure you
note the initial CS and US.
The kid who had a fear clowns then later developed a fear to McDonalds. In this scenario one CS
(clowns) had conditioned fear to another US (McDonalds) that previously elicited no fear.

30) How does the comparator hypothesis explain the blocking effect?
It assumes that what is blocked is responding to CSB, not learning about CSB. If the block is removed, then
then the responding to CSB can happen.

31) How can one measure instrumental behaviors? What are the indicators that learning is taking
place?
Instrumental behavior is an activity that usually achieves some goal or satisfies a need. Discrete-trial
techniques are used for studying instrumental behavior. We can measure Instrumental behaviors by its
effectiveness in order to obtain the goal. The law of effect is an indicator that learning is taking place.

32) Describe how you would go about training a dog to open a refrigerator to fetch a can of soda.
Make sure to include the details of the magazine training and shaping.
This kind of training will be divided into two steps, first the dog will learn to open the door and then to
fetch the can of soda.

The first step is to create a preliminary phase of conditioning to achieve this preliminary phase I will pair
a light on with the opening of the fridge, multiple attempts of turning on the light and opening the fridge
will allow the dog to learn the association, after the association is achieved, the dog will be ready to learn
to open the door, to achieve this response, a sequence of training steps will be implemented; each training
step will follow a reinforcer of a dog treat. First the dog will be taught to open the door by leaving it
partially open, when the dog opens the partially opened door, the dog will be trained to open a closed
door.

As soon as this task is learned, I will teach the dog to fetch the can of soda, by this I will pair dog treat
attached to the can of soda, I will fetch the can and then give the treat to the dog, after the association is
made the dog will be trained to fetch the can of soda step by step, at the end the dog will be trained to
fetch the can of soda without the treat.

After the both steps are learned I will proceed to combine the task, first turn on the light, the dog will
open the fridge and then fetch the can of soda based on the associationS made before.