Dear thalamus-ga;
Thank you for allowing me to answer your interesting question. The
process known as ?Instrumental Conditioning? was first investigated by
Edward Thorndike (1874-1949). The subject of instrumentalized
responses, from which the term ?instrumental conditioning? originated,
was discussed in his 1898 thesis that won him his PhD in psychology
from Columbia University, where he would continue on as an academic
fellow for 50 more years (E. L. Thorndike 1898 Ph.D., Law of Effect,
The Puzzle Box, S-R Bonding, Rft Needed, and General Process Learning
Theory):
?Edward Thorndike noted that responses are instrumentalized; that is,
a response leads to a sought-after effect. Thorndike asserted that in
a novel situation, an animal has a variety of possible responses.
Depending on the consequences, different kinds of responses have
different strengths and probabilities. The more experienced the animal
is in a given situation, the stronger the response that leads to a
desired consequence.?
UC IRVINE
Learning 1: Pavlov and Thorndike
Behavior theory and classical conditioning
http://hypatia.ss.uci.edu/psych9a/lectures/lec8notes.html
Radical Behaviorist B F Skinner later brought attention to what came
to be known as ?Operant conditioning?. Like Thorndike, he too
completed his thesis on reflex behavior in 1930 and was awarded his
PhD at Harvard. Skinner was once quoted as saying:
?A person does not act upon the world, the world acts upon him."
INSTRUMENTAL LEARNING
http://www.viterbo.edu/personalpages/faculty/DWillman/p335_op_cond.htm
?B.F. Skinner's version of instrumental conditioning, called ?operant
conditioning?, involves environmental control of responses. In his
experiments involving a rat being placed in a Skinner box, the light
is viewed as a discriminative stimulus because it serves as a cue to
indicate the particular conditions under which response will be
reinforced. Reinforcement controls responding by selectively
strengthening behaviors that act on the environment to produce change.
The key is that the outcome of responding determines the future
probability of behavior. The best conditioning occurs when reinforcers
are given immediately.?
INSTRUMENTAL LEARNING
http://academics.tjhsst.edu/psych/oldPsych/ch6/instrum.htm
INSTRUMENTAL CONDITIONING I: AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGY BEGINS
Donald Kendrick, Middle Tennessee State University
http://www.mtsu.edu/~psyskip/ltlec5.htm
Dictionaries define ?instrumental conditioning? this way:
?Instrumental conditioning - Operant conditioning that pairs a
response with a reinforcement in discrete trials; reinforcement occurs
only after the response is given.?
Translation: Instrumental conditioning is a conditioning procedure in
which the environment constrains the opportunity for reward and a
specific behavior can obtain reward. A person learns that once
behavior is positive because of the reward or negative because of the
lack of reward.
Operant conditioning is defined as:
?Conditioning in which an operant response is brought under stimulus
control by virtue of presenting reinforcement contingent upon the
occurrence of the operant response.?
Translation: An ?operant? is an active behavior as a result of
interacting with the environment. Operant conditioning then is a
process by which the results of the person's behavior (?operant? or
?operand? inclusively) determine whether the behavior is more or less
likely to occur in the future.
The two types of conditioning are often used interchangeably and
differ only slightly. In Instrumental conditioning, the reward is
determined by the behavior. In Operant conditioning the behavior
determines the level of reward.
PRINCIPLES AND APPLICATIONS OF APPETITIVE CONDITIONING
http://highered.mcgraw-hill.com/sites/0072490462/student_view0/chapter4/glossary.html
So, suffice it to say that Operant Conditioning and Instrumental
Conditioning are essentially one and the same, each focused on a
different set of results.
I hope you find that my research exceeds your expectations. If you
have any questions about my research please post a clarification
request prior to rating the answer. Otherwise I welcome your rating
and your final comments and I look forward to working with you again
in the near future. Thank you for bringing your question to us.
Best regards;
Tutuzdad-ga ? Google Answers Researcher
INFORMATION SOURCES
PEORIA DEPARTMENT OF SPECIAL EDUCATION
http://specialed.peoriaud.k12.az.us/psygloss.htm
THE FREE DICTIONARY
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/instrumental%20conditioning
HYPERDICTIONARY
http://www.hyperdictionary.com/dictionary/instrumental+conditioning
http://www.hyperdictionary.com/search.aspx?define=operant+conditioning
GOOGLE
://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&safe=off&oi=defmore&q=define:instrumental+conditioning
PRINCIPLES AND APPLICATIONS OF APPETITIVE CONDITIONING
http://highered.mcgraw-hill.com/sites/0072490462/student_view0/chapter4/glossary.html
AN INTRODUCTION TO OPERANT (INSTRUMENTAL) CONDITIONING
Developed by: W. Huitt and J. Hummel
Last Revised: July 3, 1997
http://chiron.valdosta.edu/whuitt/col/behsys/operant.html
EDWARD LEE THORNDIKE
http://evolution.massey.ac.nz/assign2/MM/bio.html
EDWARD LEE THORNDIKE
http://fates.cns.muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/thorndike.htm
SEARCH STRATEGY
SEARCH ENGINE USED:
Google ://www.google.com
SEARCH TERMS USED:
define:instrumental conditioning
define:operant conditioning
Edward Thorndike
B F Skinner |
Request for Answer Clarification by
thalamus-ga
on
30 Jul 2004 06:41 PDT
Dear Tutuzdad,
Thank you for your prompt reply.
I probably could have saved you some time if I had been more
forthcoming about my own level of knowledge regarding the jargon that
Skinner and Thorndike employed. I've read several books written by and
about B. F. Skinner (who doesn't use the term instrumental
conditioning) but my knowledge of Thorndike and his work is limited to
what I've read on the web and in general psychology textbooks.
In discussions of acquired behavior, I, too, have found that the terms
instrumental conditioning and operant conditioning can be used more or
less interchangeably. Although, it seem that instrumental conditioning
is associated with Thorndike's research whereas operant conditioning
is more associated with radical behaviorism- both of which are
distinguished from classical conditioning. Your research confirms what
I initially suspected. I asked the question out of the fear that I was
missing an important distinction between the two terms. Perhaps I
should have included this background information when I submitted the
question.
The links that you provided were good, and I am happy with the summery
that you wrote, although I have an objection to the way that you
worded the following statement:
"In Instrumental conditioning, the reward is determined by the
behavior. In Operant conditioning the behavior determines the level of
reward."
Forgive me for being pedantic. I suppose my objection boils down to a
quibble regarding the use of the word "determine". In both
instrumental and operant conditioning, the subject's behavior doesn't
determine the contingencies or intensity of reward in a functional
sense. When behaviorists talk about how consequences control behavior,
it can almost seems as though an outcome is retroactively controlling
its own precipitation. If we want to be clear about the order of
causality, it is probably more accurate to say that an animal's
history of reward and punishment (relative to its genetically endowed
capacities) determines its future behavior. Research done by James
Olds and Peter Milner points to a physiological explanation for the
mechanisms of reinforcement that involves the release of dopamine in
the mesolimbic pathway of the nucleus accumbens.
Even though behaviorists use the rate of response to measure the
rewarding effects of various reiforcers, it would still be unwise to
assume that a test subject capriciously modulates its rate of
responding so that it may alter the level of subjective pleasure
received by various stimuli. I'm pointing this out because I fear that
way you used the word "determine" could potentially promote further
misconceptions regarding the science of conditioning.
If we were to argue that there is a subtle distinction between the two
forms of conditioning, I propose that the difference lies in the
laboratory environment used to elicit the desired behavior from the
test subject. Thorndike's most famous work demonstrated the
progressively lowered latency of escape behaviors. The learning curve
is a metric that we've found useful ever since. On the other hand,
Skinners work with pigeons and rats emphasized how the consecutive
administration of reinforcers could be used to shape complex behavior
with precision. Perhaps his most significant discoveries revealed how
different schedules of reinforcement altered a subject's rate of
response.
I only have one request for clarification. Are you confident that the
first published work to use the term "instrumental conditioning" was
Thorndike's 1898 thesis?
|
Clarification of Answer by
tutuzdad-ga
on
30 Jul 2004 08:26 PDT
Perhaps my use of the word ?determines? was ill conceived and another
word would better describe the process. I derived this summarized
statement in part from these quotes among others:
?Operant conditioning (instrumental conditioning) A process by which
the results of the person's behavior determine whether the behavior is
more or less likely to occur in the future?
PEORIA DEPARTMENT OF SPECIAL EDUCATION
http://specialed.peoriaud.k12.az.us/psygloss.htm
[Of BF Skinner?s work] ?His approach was straight forward, look for
the occurrence of a change in behavior and determine what consequences
of that behavior were responsible for the change.?
B.F. SKINNER (1938): OPERANT CONDITIONING
http://www.viterbo.edu/personalpages/faculty/DWillman/p335_op_cond.htm#operant
Clearly, it is the ?results of the person?s behavior? and not the
conditioning itself that makes the determination, demonstrating that I
did misspeak in my statement. I intended to show contrast between the
two and as such erred in my description. The contrast however is
indeed present in spite of my inadvertent semantic error.
In Thorndike?s 1898 thesis he speaks of ?instrumentalized? learning
and conditioning. This is the origin of the term. An abundance of
sources confirm that he coined the term and was the first behaviorist
to describe the process in that fashion:
?Thorndike labeled this type of learning instrumental.?
AN INTRODUCTION TO OPERANT (INSTRUMENTAL) CONDITIONING
Developed by: W. Huitt and J. Hummel
Last Revised: July 3, 1997
http://chiron.valdosta.edu/whuitt/col/behsys/operant.html
?Thorndike called this instrumental learning.?
http://64.233.179.104/search?q=cache:rwv6O6e7ZYMJ:library.thinkquest.org/C0110291/basic/animals/conditioning.php+%22instrumental+learning%22+%22thorndike+called%22&hl=en
?What set Thorndike apart from his predecessors was that he was the
first to investigate instrumental learning systematically using sound
experimental methods.?
http://pavlov.psyc.queensu.ca/~flanagan/PSYC100/lecture6/lecture6.html
? ?The Law of Effect?, Thorndike's most important law, maintains that
if a response in the presence of a stimulus leads to satisfying
effects, the association between the stimulus and the response is
strengthened (Weiten, 1992, p.201). It is also referred to as
instrumental learning where the response that is instrumental in
bringing about a satisfying state forms a connection between the
response and the stimulus (not the response and the reward)?
http://evolution.massey.ac.nz/assign2/JR/etmain.html
Upon further investigating your question I must also correct my
earlier statement. In 1898 Thorndike?s penned his thesis (entitled:
"Animal Intelligence: An Experimental Study of the Associative
Processes in Animals"). This was the basis for his ?Law of Effect?
theory as mentioned in my earlier answer. Over the years, Thorndike
amended the title of this thesis and renamed it as well. He wrote an
article detailing his later experiments in 1901 and in 1911 combined
the two into a single volume to form ?Animal Intelligence:
Experimental Studies.? Some time later Thorndike incorporated a
dissertation ?The Mental Life of Monkeys? into his ?Animal
Intelligence: Experimental Studies?, so it is evident that Thorndike?s
thesis became a life long work spanning more than 50 years from it?s
inception to his death.
EDWARD LEE THORNDIKE: ANIMAL INTELLIGENCE (1911)
http://www.thoemmes.com/psych/thorndike1.htm
Thorndike?s work is most definitely the origin of the term
?instrumental learning? or ?instrumental conditioning?, but where the
term was ?first used? is another matter altogether and one that I have
not been able to positively determine.
I did find that BF Skinner was later responsible for coining the term
?operant conditioning:
?In the 1930's, B.F. Skinner expanded on this kind of learning and
named it operant conditioning, being 'a form of learning in which
voluntary responses come to be controlled by their consequences' (or
reinforcers)?
http://evolution.massey.ac.nz/assign2/JR/etmain.html#sec5
?Operant conditioning, so named by psychologist B. F. Skinner??
http://www.wordiq.com/definition/Operant_conditioning
I hope this significantly adds to what I have already discussed.
Regards;
Tutuzdad-ga
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