Foreign Perspectives

Chapter 3, on Three approaches to learning, runs to 46 pages is back to proper psychology. This is the first of the part 2 exam chapters so isn’t tested in any TMA which means that my notes will initially be less fleshed out on this but will improve as the exam approaches.

I’ve highlighted the key exam topics.

This chapter looks at three basic approaches to learning starting with conditioning which is essentially the basis for rote learning, moving on to category learning and finally looking at social and cultural aspects to learning. Quite a fundamental thing and a topic that is covered in some depth in the Child Development module as you would expect.

The comparative approach looks at how different species and generally does this through the methods of behaviourism which look at actual behaviours and ignore the possibility of any internal mental states that may exist.

Classical conditioning introduces a whole raft of terminology, taking up around 1/3rd of the chapter along the way i.e. it’s a pretty important topic. It all started with the physiologist Pavlov who was interested in reflexes. He began by creating a contingency by pairing a neutral stimulus (e.g. a bell) with a natural one (e.g. salivating when food is in the mouth) and found that after a number of repetitions, the neutral stimulus was sufficient to create the salivation (the conditional response) i.e. it had become a conditioned stimulus (or conditioned stimulus), this process being called classical conditioning with the reflex linking the bell to the salivation being the conditional reflex; the food itself is the unconditional stimulus and its salivation is the unconditional response. Watson went on to screw up little Albert by banging a lump of metal behind him whenever he saw a rat which he initially wasn’t scared of.

Instrumental conditioning is where the subject taking a particular action is either rewarded for doing this (positive reinforcement) or something undesirable for them is stopped by their action (negative reinforcement). If the subject is required to so something specific to obtain their reward this is operant conditioning e.g. rats pressing a lever to gain food pellets. Punishment is the initiation of something as a consequence of their actions that would cause negative reinforcement. These techniques have been used in behaviour modification. Experiments based on instrumental conditioning include Tolman with the fan of maze routes showing that there they develop a mental model rather than just having their behaviour modified and variations on this based on room layout.

Category learning arises when we realise that things are generally not unique but rather fall into specific categories which can aid application of knowledge acquired in one context in an entirely different one e.g. we can identify a creature with scales as a “fish” which in turn means that we know it can swim even if we don’t know the specific species. However, that begs the question: how do we build these categories in the first place and a plethora of experiments have looked at that e.g. Bruner and his stimulus cards revealed a number of different strategies used to identify categories (eliminating categories by focusing on one property rather than just randomly scanning works best). Criticisms include that these are artificial categories and that natural categories are quite different e.g. birds need wings to fly and aren’t just things with wings. There’s the issue of whether we can learn new categories and how we do so: is it by hypothesis testing as Bruner would argue, or are the categories innate as Chomsky and Fodor would say? Quite a complex area and these notes don’t really cover it properly yet (see p196-200 of the book).

The sociocultural perspective considers the use of tools and how it depends on interpersonal relationships and is embedded in the society and culture in which it takes place. For example, you could learn to do calculations on paper, on a calculator or perhaps with an abacus. This moves on to the issue of the use of language in problem solving and the differences between cumulative talk (that merely sums up what has gone before) and exploratory talk (that moves the conversation onwards). Finally there is the business of enculturation or indoctrination into the school system: making sense of how school works or learning how to learn in a school context.

For the exam, the key topics for this chapter are highlighted above and are:

Behaviourism
Sociocultural perspective
Operant conditioning
Classical conditioning
Category learning

The problem with customer service jobs in difficult economic times is that the customers demand a whole lot more when the economy is in a bad way.

Even the bargain basement shops are forced into upgrading how they deal with customers these days although, so far, the local LIDL hasn’t risen to the customer service levels of the LIDL shops in France. That’s pretty odd really as France isn’t exactly known for high customer service levels so it’s puzzling as to why the bargain basement shops have much higher customer service levels than the very same shops have in the UK.

However, there is the small problem that in difficult times, there isn’t the scope to improve customer service through adding to staff numbers nor even through extra training for the staff. What’s needed is a cultural shift in the organisation so that people automatically do the small things that can often make the biggest difference to how service is perceived.

Greece is one of those places where you get a mix of the ancient and modern, often side by side and that applies equally to the accommodation as it does to the tourist sights and sites that you will see during your holiday in the country.

The Corissia hotels in Crete are very much at the modern end of that scale as even the briefest glance at their website will show you. That modernity is reflected in the hotel rooms too with all the facilities that you’d expect in the most modern of hotels from the big things such as air conditioning and satellite TV through to the smaller items like the hair dryer that you wish you’d brought but couldn’t face packing it.

Of course, all these means nothing if the hotel isn’t in the right location. That’s particularly difficult on Crete which is quite a long island with attactions all over the place so ideally you want somewhere near the centre and, of course, on the coast (the northern coast is best). However, you can get quite close to this ideal with, for example, the Corissia hotels of Corissia Beach and Corissia Princess both currently offering free airport transfers for early bookers (worthwhile as the airport is towards the eastern end of the island).

I went along to the seminar run by the Dementia Services Development Centre last week to try and get more of a handle on the condition. As you’d expect, the majority of those attending were there to pick up some information in respect of an elderly relative though there were also a handful of care organisations represented as well.

Quite a lot of the morning sessions were on the various strategies that the organisation are involved in and the things that are starting to come to fruition of those. Not really of immediate benefit to most of those there but it’s nice to see that there is work going on behind the scenes.

The rest of the sessions were much better targeted at the audience starting with a good session on the behaviours that one could expect and some strategies to overcome some of the more troublesome ones. I’d not realised that having a diagnosis of vascular dementia is quite a different thing from altzheimer’s and that the development pathway is substantially different so that’s useful to know. De-cluttering is often suggested but the explanation that it’s down to the person being unable to cope with the complexity is rarely given. Having said that, some people can’t cope with the de-cluttering and prefer a bit of chaos so it’s important to take account of the person with the dementia.

Depression is a problem on two fronts. For one, dementia can be mistaken for depression but equally if you’ve got dementia you’re more likely to have depression too. Not really an easy thing to address but things like reminiscence and memory books can help.

They went into aggression quite a bit as it can be a particular problem. Ways of coping with it are to try and avoid it in the first place by noting triggers, having a calm environment  and keeping to a routine. Related to that is the issue of communication which can be a trigger and it’s worth noting the little things like hearing aid batteries and eye sight tests which can kill communication.

From this side of the world, there is just “Hawaii” but what we know of Hawaii is just one of the islands in the chain (Oahu) and the others are very different from that one.

Kauai is very different. Here you’ll find a much quieter type of holiday with resorts giving you the chance to have a beach holiday but in a beautiful island setting. Although the whole Hawaii chain of islands looks pretty small on the map, some of the islands are quite large and all of them have so much to do that we’ll only be looking at a small area of Kauai which should give you a good feel of what the island is like.

As with all the islands in the group, Kauai has all the beaches that you’d expect with water sports, snorkeling (in beautifully clear waters) and, of course, the scenery. National parks abound and near Poipu you’ll find the National Tropical Botanical Garden. Along with the other islands you’ll find lava formations and Spouting Horn is worth a visit to see the lava tube formations: quite spectacular as you can see.

Vacation homes are one option that will help make your holiday a little bit more relaxing or for something a little smaller condos (apartments) give you a choice midway between a self-catering house and a hotel room (usually somewhat closer to the action than the vacation homes are, of course).

For the area, vacation rentals seem the best way to go. Hotels are the choice for Oahu but for Kauai, you need a more laid back option to make the most of what the island has to offer.