PSYB45H3 Chapter : Study Guide For Chapter 8
Chapter 8: Doing the Right Thing at the Right Time and Place: Stimulus Discrimination and
Stimulus Generalization
Stimulus Discrimination Learning and Stimulus Control
- Behaviour is strongly affected by its consequences
- Behaviour that is reinforced increases
- Behaviour not reinforced decreases
- Any behaviour is valuable if it occurs at the right time
- Any situation in which behaviour occurs can be analyzed in terms of three sets of events,
o The stimuli that exist just prior to the occurrence of the behaviour, called
antecedent stimuli
! Someone’s presence
o The behaviour itself
o The consequence of behaviour
! ABC (Antecedent, behaviour, and consequence)
- The term stimulus control refers to the degree of correlation between a stimulus and
subsequent response
o Good or effective stimulus control refers to the degree of correlation between a
stimulus and a subsequent response
o When the stimulus occurs, the response follows
- Some stimuli may predict behaviour to occur, whereas others may not
o For example, an out of order sign of a vending machine is a cue that will not
reinforce the person to insert a coin
- Stimulus discrimination learning
o Is the process by which we learn to emit a specific behaviour in the presence of
some stimuli not the other
- Stimulus discrimination training
o Is reinforcement of a behaviour in the presence of a specific stimulus and
extinction of that behaviour in the presence of a different stimulus
o This is the procedure to teach stimulus discrimination
- Controlling stimuli
o There are two types of control stimuli
! SD
• It is a discriminative stimulus
• If a response has been reinforced only in the presence of a
particular stimulus
• SD is a cue that a particular response will pay off
! S^
• If a response has been extinguished only in the presence of a
particular stimulus
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