Hockenbury Discovering Psychology 5th txtbk

Operant Conditioning199Associations that are easily learned may reflect the evolutionary history and survivalmechanisms of the particular animal species. For example, rats in the wild eata wide variety of foods. If a rat eats a new food and gets sick several hours later, it’slikely to survive longer if it learns from this experience to avoid that food in the future(Kalat, 1985; Seligman, 1970).That different species form some associations more easily than others also probablyreflects the unique sensory capabilities and feeding habits that have evolved as a matterof environmental adaptation. Bobwhite quail, for instance, rely primarily on vision foridentifying potential meals. In contrast, rats have relatively poor eyesight and rely primarilyon taste and odor cues to identify food. Given these species differences, itshouldn’t surprise you that quail, but not rats, can easily be conditioned to develop anaversion to blue-colored water—a visual stimulus. On the other hand, rats learn morereadily than quail to associate illness with sour water—a taste stimulus (Wilcoxon &others, 1971). In effect, quail are biologically prepared to associate visual cues with illness,while rats are biologically prepared to associate taste cues with illness.Taste aversion research emphasizes that the study of learning must consider theunique behavior patterns and capabilities of different species. As the result of evolution,animals have developed unique forms of behavior to adapt to their naturalenvironments (Bolles, 1985). These natural behavior patterns and uniquecharacteristics ultimately influence what an animal is capable of learning—andhow easily it can be conditioned to learn a new behavior.Conditioning Taste Aversionsin Coyotes The fact thatcoyotes readily form tasteaversions has been used toprevent them from preying onlivestock (Bower, 1997; Garcia& Gustavson, 1997). To stopcoyotes from killing lambs onsheep ranches, sheep carcassesare injected with lithium chloride,a drug that produces extremenausea. In the leftphoto, the coyote has discoveredthe carcass and is eatingit. In the right photo, the nauseouscoyote is writhing on the ground. Inone study, captive coyotes were fedlithium-tainted rabbit and sheep carcasses.When later placed in a pen with live rabbitsand sheep, the coyotes avoided themrather than attack them. In fact, some ofthe coyotes threw up at the sight of a liverabbit (Gustavson & others, 1976).Operant ConditioningAssociating Behaviors and ConsequencesKey Theme• Operant conditioning deals with the learning of active, voluntary behaviorsthat are shaped and maintained by their consequences.Key Questions• How did Edward Thorndike study the acquisition of new behaviors, andwhat conclusions did he reach?• What were B. F. Skinner’s key assumptions?• How are positive and negative reinforcement similar, and how are theydifferent?Classical conditioning can help explain the acquisition of many learned behaviors,including emotional and physiological responses. However, recall that classical conditioninginvolves reflexive behaviors that are automatically elicited by a specificstimulus. Most everyday behaviors don’t fall into this category. Instead, they involvenonreflexive, or voluntary, actions that can’t be explained with classical conditioning.