PSYC 311 Chapter Notes - Chapter 13.5: Basal Ganglia, Frontal Lobe, Episodic Memory
9 Jun 2016
School
Department
Course
Professor
Document Summary
Instrumental or operant conditioning is the means by which we profit from experience. We tend to repeat actions that have favourable outcomes. Instrumental conditioning entails the strengthening of connections between neural circuits that detect a particular stimulus and those that produce a particular response. These circuits begin in the various regions of the sensory association cortex, where perception takes place, and end in the motor association cortex of the frontal lobe which controls movement. In conjunction with the hippocampal formation, the transcortical connections are involved in the acquisition of episodic memories as well as complex behaviours involving deliberation/instruction. However, with practice, the behaviour becomes much more fluid and eventually we can perform them without thinking and multitask. Evidence suggests that learned behaviours become automatic and routine because they are transferred to the basal ganglia. Eventually they take over most of the details of the process, leaving the transcortical circuits free to do something else.
