Learning Principles

Module 4

Definition of Learning

• Learning, to the behaviorist, is defined as a change in the likelihood or probability of a response. Since likelihood cannot be measured, behaviorists choose to measure frequency or rate. And while this frequency is not the same as future performance, it is a step in the right direction. (The old saying: "The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior" is certainly a behavioral idea.)

  

  Key elements to remember include:

  I.   Learning is behavioral change
  II.  Learning is related to changes in environmental conditions
  III. Lawful relationships between behavior and the environment can only be
        determined if behavioral properties and experimental conditions are
        defined in terms of physical, and observed under controlled conditions.
  IV. Data from the experimental study of behavior are the only acceptable
        sources of information about the causes of behavior
  V.  Behavior of the individual is the appropriate data source.
  VI. Dynamics of an organisms interaction with the environment is the same
       for all species.

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