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- Title
HUMAN EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY AND LEARNING THEORY: A CRITICAL REVIEW.
- Authors
Ramos De Jesus Pereira, Mauro
- Abstract
The present paper critically reviews the article “Has the Wheel Turned Full Circle? Fifty Years of Learning Theory" by Mackintosh (1997). In this paper, Professor Mackintosh argued for the importance of associative processes in human learning by providing a critical summary of the current standing of major issues in associative learning theory. He makes a case for the important role played by perceptual learning in everyday life. Mackintosh, takes the position that perceptual learning is primarily responsible for improving stimulus discrimination, and that this factor facilitates learning process and subsequent behavioural changes and adjustments to stimuli. Mackintosh seems to suggest (in a quite compelling fashion) that the study of associative learning is a sufficiently broad research topic to be studied in its own right. He exposed some of the flaws of radical behaviourism, and the simplistic Stimulus-Response (S-R) paradigm adopted by a number of prominent animal psychologists back in the 1960s. It is found in the present paper that associative learning theory adopts a much nuanced and sophisticated stance when it comes to understanding the necessary and sufficient conditions for the occurrence of successful conditioning in humans. Associative concepts as proposed by Mackintosh are prerequisites for bringing coherence to current knowledge relating to the effects of conditioning procedures.
- Publication
Journal of Social & Psychological Sciences, 2016, Vol 9, Issue 2, p26
- ISSN
1756-7483
- Publication type
Academic Journal