PSY-B - Psychology PSY-B 320 Lecture Notes - Lecture 31: Basal Ganglia, Limbic System, Amygdala
28 Mar 2017
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Investigating the evolutionary and environmental influences on brain-circuit activity that contribute to behavior. Evolutionary psychology: discipline that seeks to apply principles of natural selection to understand the causes of human behavior, behaviors exist because the neural circuits producing them have been favored through natural selection. Congenitally blind children also spontaneously produce the same expressions that sighted children do. Environmental influences on behavior: b. f. skinner (1904 1990) Suggested a strong role of learning in behavior (believed behavior was selected by environmental factors) Reinforcer - in operant conditioning, any event that strengthens the behavior that it follows. Experience shapes behavior by pairing stimuli and reinforcers. Acquired association between a specific taste or odor and illness can require only a single experience. Leads to an aversion to foods having that taste or odor: example: garcia (1966) Coyotes were killing sheep, so poison was added to a sheep carcass made coyotes ill. Most coyotes learned never to eat sheep again.
