Thorndike is a famous American psychologist. He adopted the research orientation of positivism, which led to the scientific research of educational psychology. He is a pioneer of scientific educational psychology and the first psychologist to systematically discuss educational psychology. Father of modern educational psychology? .

Thorndike defined human and animal learning as the connection between stimulus and response, which was formed by blindly trying to gradually reduce mistakes? Try this reciprocating process again. His opinion is based on kittens? Mystery box? Based on animal experiments.

Thorndike's classic experiment.

Thorndike was the first psychologist to study the learning law with animal experiments. He put a hungry kitten into a puzzle box. There is food outside the box, and there is a device in the box that can open the door. Then record the kitten's reaction in detail in the box. At first, the cat scratched, bit and ran in the box, trying to escape from the box to eat food, and accidentally bumped into the device that opened the door of the box to eat food. Then put it in the box and try the next round. After repeating this for many times, it was found that the kitten escaped from the box faster and faster, and the invalid action was gradually eliminated until the door opener was directly triggered to escape from the box.

On this basis, Thorndike believes that when entering the puzzle box for the first time, the activities of animals are not based on the understanding of the nature of the box, but on some general impulse. With the gradual reduction of false response, the correct response is gradually consolidated, and finally a stable stimulus-response relationship is formed.

2. try it? Basic law of error

According to his experiments, Thorndike put forward three main rules of associative learning: the effect rule, the practice rule and the preparation rule.

(1) effect rule

The so-called effect law means that in the process of trial and error, if learners can get satisfactory results after responding to a specific stimulus, then the relationship between the response and this specific stimulus will be enhanced; If you get troublesome results, this connection will be weakened. In other words, a satisfactory result will make individuals tend to maintain certain behaviors, while a troublesome result will make individuals escape and give up certain behaviors.

(2) practicing lawyers

In the process of trial and error, any connection between stimulus and response, once practiced, will gradually enhance its strength; And if you don't use it, the power of connection will gradually weaken. In other words, correct repetition will strengthen the connection between a certain situation and a certain reaction that has been formed.

(3) the law of preparation

In the process of trial and error, when the connection between stimulus and response is formed, there is a state of preparation in advance, which is satisfied, otherwise it will be in trouble; On the contrary, when this connection is not ready to be implemented, it is very troublesome to implement. In other words, what do learners have when they enter a certain situation?

Some preparatory reaction tendencies will affect the learning of a certain reaction.

3. Try the educational significance of false statements.

Although Thorndike's theory of trial and error comes from animal experiments, it still has great reference significance for human learning and students' learning. According to the learning characteristics of middle school students, this theory especially emphasizes? Doing middle school? That is, learning related concepts, principles, skills and strategies in the actual operation process. Specifically, it has the following guiding significance for education:

(1) In this process, teachers should allow students to make mistakes, encourage students to try more and learn from their mistakes, so that the knowledge gained will be more solid.

(2) In the process of memory education, teachers should strive to make students' learning self-satisfied with positive results and prevent negative consequences from getting anything. (law of effect)

(3) In the process of learning, we should strengthen reasonable practice and pay attention to practice from time to time after learning. (internship method) (4) any study should be carried out in a state where students are prepared and cannot be done often? A surprise attack? .

(2) Classical conditioned reflex

Pavlov is a famous Russian physiologist. He put forward the famous classical conditioned reflex theory by studying the changes of digestive gland secretion in dogs.

1. Pavlov's classic experiment

In Pavlov's classic experiment, the researchers put the dog in a strictly controlled soundproof laboratory, and the food can be delivered to the dog through a remote control device. The saliva secretion of dogs was measured and recorded by instruments. At the beginning of the experiment, the dog was stimulated by bell, then fed for half a minute, and the saliva secretion was observed and recorded. When the bell and food are presented so many times, only the bell and no food are presented, the dog will also make a salivation reaction.

At the beginning of the experiment, only food can induce dogs to secrete saliva, and the natural connection between food and saliva can be established without any conditions or prior training. At this time, food is called unconditional stimulus, and the salivation reaction caused by food occurs automatically, which is called unconditional response. The bell at this time can not induce the saliva secretion of dogs, and the bell at this time is called neutral stimulation.

During the experiment, when the bell is combined with food for many times, the bell alone can also cause the dog's saliva secretion reaction. At this time, the neutral stimulation of the clock induces the salivation reaction that was originally restricted by food, and the clock at this time is called conditioned stimulation. The salivation reaction caused by ringing the bell alone is called conditioned response. This is the formation process of classical conditioning.

2. The basic law of classical conditioned reflex

(1) gain and attenuation

Conditional action is established through the process of repeated matching of conditional stimulus and unconditional stimulus, so that individuals can learn to respond to conditional stimulus. In the process of obtaining conditioned action, the interval between conditioned stimulus and unconditional stimulus is very important. On the one hand, conditioned stimulus and unconditional stimulus must be presented at the same time or almost at the same time, and it is difficult to establish contact when the interval is too long; On the other hand, conditioned stimulus, as a signal of unconditional stimulus, must be presented before unconditional stimulus, otherwise it is difficult to establish contact.

If the conditioned stimulus appears repeatedly without unconditional stimulus, the conditioned response will weaken and eventually disappear, that is, the conditioned reflex will fade.

(2) Generalization and differentiation

Generalization means making the same response to similar stimuli. Once people and animals learn to respond to specific conditioned stimuli, other stimuli similar to conditioned stimuli can also induce their conditioned responses. For example, after dogs learn to salivate at a certain sound, they will salivate at high or low tones. With the help of stimulus generalization, we can extend our existing learning experience to new learning situations, thus expanding the scope of learning.

Stimulation differentiation refers to making organisms learn to respond differently to conditioned stimuli and stimuli similar to conditioned stimuli through selective strengthening and fading. That is, to distinguish different responses to similar but different stimuli. For example, a certain tone appears and presents food, and other tones appear and do not present food, so dogs begin to learn to distinguish? A person has a salivation response to one tone, but no response to other tones.