waldentwo

EVOLUTION Throughout my childhood I was taught about the theory of evolution by Charles Darwin. When I saw the name Charles Darwin in the text I thought oh no here is this guy again. I can't read about him again and read the same old thing. To my surprise this book taught me something new about Darwin' theory and got me interested. In the video above it gives a simple summary on what his theory was. This idea is spoken about with the thought of natural selection which is the theory that the things that can adapt to the environment the best are most likely to survive. This is basically saying that people need certain resources to survive and one might have a better trait that allows them to survive. An example of this is giraffe’s long neck. Originally some might have had shorter necks, but these animals couldn't reach the leaves so the ones with the longer necks survived more causing there to be giraffes with longer necks. I thought this all made sense ever s...

In Chapter 3 we discussed Elicit Behaviors, Simple Mechanisms of Learning, and Classical Conditioning. An elicit behavior is one that is automatically drawn out by a certain stimuli. A reflex is the most basic form of these. Several noteworthy reflexes are the Startle Response, a defensive reaction to a sudden unexpected stimulus, and the orienting response, when we automatically position ourselves to facilitate attending to a stimulus (turning around when something taps your shoulder). A good example of these reflexes is demonstrated in the video at this link . Simple Mechanisms of learning that I found most interesting were Habituation and Sensitization. Habituation is a decrease in strength of an elicited behavior following repeated presentations of the eliciting stimulus. The best example I can think of in my everyday life is when I drive by the gas pumps. The price at the pumps would be the stimulus and the behavior was a knee jerk reaction, then you get used to it. Eventually, di...