Overview

Learning is central to the adaptation of all organisms to their environments. By providing students with a comprehensive and reader-friendly approach that stresses relevance and the similarities between animal and human learning, this book fills the current void in this area. Unlike several of the currently available texts that feature an historical or person approach, this text will feature a concepts or ideas approach. Although the historical/person approach may have a certain amount of appeal, students will learn more when concepts and ideas are stressed and the persons behind the concepts are not the focal point. For example, the authors stress types and schedules of reinforcement rather than delving into Skinner's background and childhood in Pennsylvania. I. Special Features A. Emphasis on Evolutionary Thinking Because all areas of psychology are moving toward biology and there are biological correlates for all behaviors, the authors infuse biological/evolutionary thought throughout the text. B. Adaptation of Learning Section In keeping with the evolutionary emphasis, each chapter will conclude with an Adaptation of Learning section that highlights the biological impact or biological constraints in the area covered by that chapter. In this regard, it is noteworthy that Timberlake's (2001) behavior systems approach proposes that (a) learning modifies preexisting instinctive systems, rather than creating a newly organized behavior, and (b) variations in learning occur between and within species. Such considerations lead directly to numerous examples of adaptation. C. Emphasis on Relevance As already noted, there is a need for students to see the relevance of the material they are studying in the psychology of learning course. To meet this need the authors * Infuse real-life examples throughout each chapter * Have a Where Would You Find This Behavior in Your Own Lives? in each chapter. These recurring sections will help students see the relevance and applicability of the learning principles they have studied. D. Scope As the title suggests, the authors present a comprehensive text that really does go from rats and pigeons (e.g., basic learning processes) to the classroom (e. g., educational psychology) and beyond (e.g., human choice behavior). E. Emphasis on Core Concepts, Not Details; Concept Charts The book emphasizes core concepts, rather than details, throughout the text. For example, it is more important for students to understand the general concept of extinction than memorize details of numerous experiments that manipulated the number of extinction trials. Moreover, each chapter will include a 1-2 page Concept Chart that will summarize the core concepts covered in that chapter. F. Margin Definitions The authors provide definitions of key terms in the margin of the page where the terms are introduced for easy access. G. Review Summaries Because students master material better in small chunks, the book includes one or more Review Summaries in each chapter. PowerPoint Materials The inclusion of PowerPoint materials has become virtually a necessity for any text to be competitive in the current market. Such materials will accompany this text. WebCT/BlackBoard Shell Another growing trend in the development of textbooks is the availability of a WebCT or BlackBoard shell so that adopters of a book can implement these resources quickly and easily. The WebCT/BlackBoard Shell (or the Instructor's Manual) should include a set of assignments for the students to complete.

Full Product Details

9781405183901

Table of Contents

Reviews

Author Information

Stephen F. Davis is Emeritus Professor at Emporia State University. In 2002-2003 he served as the Knapp Distinguished Professor of Arts and Sciences at the University of San Diego. In 2007 he was awarded the honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree by Morningside College (Sioux City, IA). Currently he is the Visiting Distinguished Professor of Psychology at Texas Wesleyan University. Since 1966 he has published over 295 articles on various learning and learning-related topics and 24 textbooks and presented over 900 professional papers; the vast majority of these publications and presentations include student coauthors. He has taught the learning course since 1969. He is the author of a leading Introductory Psychology Text with Prentice Hall, now in it's fifth edition. He is also co-author with Randolph Smith on a very successful research methods text now in its fourth edition also with PH. Davis has completed two previous book projects with Blackwell Publishers-Handbook of Research Methods in Experimental Psychology (2003) and Handbook of the Teaching of Psychology (2006; William Buskist coeditor). He has served as President of APA Division 2 (Society for the Teaching of Psychology), Southern Society for Philosophy and Psychology, Southwestern Psychological Association, and Psi Chi. He is a Fellow of APA Divisions 1 (General), 2 (Society for the Teaching of Psychology), 3 (Experimental), and 6 (Behavioral Neuroscience and Comparative Psychology). Randolph Smith completed his undergraduate degree at the University of Houston and PhD at Texas Tech University in experimental psychology (specialties in human learning/memory and statistics). Randy taught at Ouachita Baptist University in Arkansas for 26 years before becoming Chair of Kennesaw State University's Psychology Department in 2003. He currently serves as Chair of the Department of Psychology at Lamar University in Beaumont, Texas. He has taught the learning course for over 25 years. In addition to topics related to the psychology of learning, his professional work centers on the scholarship of teaching. Randy serves as Editor of the Society for the Teaching of Psychology's journal Teaching of Psychology. He is author of Challenging Your Preconceptions: Thinking Critically About Psychology (2002), co-author (with Steve Davis) of The Psychologist as Detective: An Introduction to Conducting Research in Psychology (2004), and co-author (with Steve Davis) of An Introduction to Statistics and Research Methods: Becoming a Psychological Detective (2005). He has worked with high school teachers grading AP exams since the test's inception and recently served as Faculty Advisor for TOPSS (Teachers of Psychology in Secondary Schools. He is a member of the American Psychological Association and the Association for Psychological Science. In 2006, Randy received the American Psychological Foundation's Charles L. Brewer Distinguished Teaching of Psychology Award and the University System of Georgia Regents' Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Award. Jay Brown was born and raised in Wisconsin and received his BS ('93) and MS ('95) from the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh. His Masters thesis explored the role of observational learning in enrichment studies with rats. He obtained his PhD in 2000 from the State University of New York at Stony Brook and his dissertation research (using pigeons and humans) explored the effects of multiple outcomes on the discount function. He also conducted research with humans establishing the relation between self-control and social-cooperation. Since the time of his post-doctoral training at Carnegie Mellon University his research has exclusively involved humans, studying factors involved in self-controlled decision-making. Currently, Dr. Brown in an Assistant Professor in the Psychology department at Texas Wesleyan University where he not only continues with his research, but applies all he has learned from this research to teaching a variety of classes, including The Psychology of Learning. Christopher Randall received his undergraduate degree in psychology from Wabash College (Crawfordsville, IN), where he worked in the psychology department's animal behavior laboratory. At the University of Kentucky (Lexington, KY), Chris joined Tom Zentall's research laboratory where he collaborated on numerous studies that focused on animal cognition, including his master's thesis: The Use of Search Strategies by Pigeons: Win-Stay versus Win-Shift Learning. Chris subsequently collaborated on research with an ontogenetic focus in Phil Kraemer's laboratory at the University of Kentucky, where he also completed his dissertation: Conditioned and Unconditioned Effects of Morphine: A Comparison of Place Preference and Locomotor Activity in Preweanling and Adult Rats. After completing his graduate studies, Chris joined Skip Spear's laboratory as a postdoctoral research scientist at Binghamton University (Binghamton, NY), where he continued research on the ontogeny of learning and memory in rats. Chris has delivered numerous presentations at professional conferences and he has published articles on topics ranging from animal cognition to developmental psychobiology in several scholarly journals. Chris has held faculty positions at Mount Holyoke College (South Hadley, MA) and Troy University (Montgomery, AL), and currently teaches at Kennesaw State University (Kennesaw, GA). For the past 13 years, Chris has regularly taught the psychology of learning, comparative psychology, and general psychology, both in the traditional classroom and online.

Tab Content 6

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

Countries Available