How Does Experience Change Behavior?

A foundation in learning, from becoming familiar with a sound to acquiring a skill and changing an established response.

Level: Introductory
Reading load: 10 core readings in 5 units
Prerequisites: No specialist learning course is required. How to Read Psychological Science is useful preparation for comparing arguments and experiments. Some readings use technical terms and statistical tables. The guides introduce the vocabulary; begin by identifying the comparison and the behavior measured.
Last reviewed: September 2026

Introduction

Experience leaves its traces in conduct. A sound loses its power to distract, a signal acquires meaning, an action is repeated, and a practiced skill becomes easier. The changes resemble one another in having a history, but they may arise through different processes. Even improved performance on one occasion leaves open the question of what has been learned and will endure.

This syllabus asks what evidence would justify saying that learning has occurred and what would distinguish explanations of it. Conceptual arguments introduce the questions; experiments make the consequences of those questions visible. Animal research and human studies each contribute, with attention to what can travel between species, tasks, and settings.

Imagine a new volunteer learning to work in a community workshop. They encounter unfamiliar sounds and signals, discover the consequences of their actions, watch experienced volunteers, and practice new procedures. The reading-focus questions return to this example. By the end, you should be able to specify the relevant experience, choose an informative comparison, and explain what a later test in a different setting would add.

Unit 1 of 5

What counts as learning?

Begin with the inference from changed behavior to learning. The first paper proposes a definition and asks what it should leave open. The second makes the problem concrete: declining responsiveness can reflect habituation, but it can also reflect fatigue or sensory adaptation. Together they establish why naming a change is only the beginning of explaining it.

Reading
1 of 10
What Is Learning? On the Nature and Merits of a Functional Definition of Learning
De Houwer, J., Barnes-Holmes, D., & Moors, A. (2013). What is learning? On the nature and merits of a functional definition of learning. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 20(4), 631–642. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13423-013-0386-3
Foundational argument · Methodological contribution · Moderate · Full work: 12 pages
Evaluate the definition as an argument: ask what it includes, what it excludes, and whether it prejudges the mechanism.
Why you’re reading it. Separate identifying an effect of experience from explaining how that effect occurs.
A question to consider. The volunteer works faster on their second day. What comparison would help establish learning rather than greater motivation or an easier task?
Reading
2 of 10
Habituation Revisited: An Updated and Revised Description of the Behavioral Characteristics of Habituation
Rankin, C. H., Abrams, T., Barry, R. J., Bhatnagar, S., Clayton, D. F., Colombo, J., Coppola, G., Geyer, M. A., Glanzman, D. L., Marsland, S., McSweeney, F. K., Wilson, D. A., Wu, C.-F., & Thompson, R. F. (2009). Habituation revisited: An updated and revised description of the behavioral characteristics of habituation. Neurobiology of Learning and Memory, 92(2), 135–138. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nlm.2008.09.012
Major synthesis · Methodological contribution · Accessible · Full work: 4 pages
Use the behavioral characteristics to turn an everyday observation into a discriminating comparison. Keep habituation and sensitization distinct.
Why you’re reading it. Introduce a form of learning that does not require pairing two different events, while ruling out simpler explanations for reduced responding.
A question to consider. The volunteer stops turning toward a repeated background sound. How could you distinguish habituation from fatigue or reduced hearing?

Unit 2 of 5

What do we learn about events?

A cue’s meaning depends partly on what happens without it. Rescorla’s review introduces learning about relations among events; his earlier experiments then make the comparison precise. Track the difference between the arranged experience, the measured response, and the representation proposed to explain it.

Reading
3 of 10
Pavlovian Conditioning: It’s Not What You Think It Is
Rescorla, R. A. (1988). Pavlovian conditioning: It’s not what you think it is. American Psychologist, 43(3), 151–160. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.43.3.151
Major synthesis · Critical reappraisal · Moderate · Full work: 10 pages
Organize the argument around the circumstances of learning, its content, and its expression.
Why you’re reading it. Develop a framework for predictive learning before evaluating a particular experiment.
A question to consider. A workshop signal often sounds before supplies arrive. What would arrivals without the signal tell the volunteer about its usefulness?
Reading
4 of 10
Probability of Shock in the Presence and Absence of CS in Fear Conditioning
Rescorla, R. A. (1968). Probability of shock in the presence and absence of CS in fear conditioning. Journal of Comparative and Physiological Psychology, 66(1), 1–5. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0025984
Landmark empirical study · Methodological contribution · Moderate · Full work: 5 pages
Compare cue-present and cue-absent outcome probabilities in the experiments, keeping the suppression measure in view.
Why you’re reading it. Apply the framework to a design in which background events change what a cue predicts.
A question to consider. Two workshop signals each precede ten deliveries. What additional record would let you compare their predictive value?

Unit 3 of 5

What do consequences teach us?

Consequences can alter what an organism does, but that observation leaves questions about the form of control. Skinner explains behavior through its history of selection. Dickinson asks how behavior changes when an outcome loses value. Examine the arguments on their own terms and ask where they make different claims. Reinforcement increases behavior and punishment decreases it; removing something unpleasant can reinforce an action rather than punish it.

Reading
5 of 10
Selection by Consequences
Skinner, B. F. (1981). Selection by consequences. Science, 213(4507), 501–504. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.7244649
Foundational argument · Moderate · Full work: 4 pages
Distinguish selection within a lifetime from the essay’s extensions to evolution and culture.
Why you’re reading it. Give the behavior-analytic account a substantive place in explaining learning through consequences.
A question to consider. The volunteer cleans a workbench more often after others thank them. What comparison would justify calling the thanks a reinforcer?
Reading
6 of 10
Actions and Habits: The Development of Behavioural Autonomy
Dickinson, A. (1985). Actions and habits: The development of behavioural autonomy. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. B, Biological Sciences, 308(1135), 67–78. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.1985.0010
Foundational argument · Methodological contribution · Moderate · Full work: 12 pages
Follow outcome revaluation and the comparison of training schedules, then reconsider what an account based on past consequences must explain.
Why you’re reading it. Distinguish evidence for action guided by an outcome’s current value from evidence for habitual control.
A question to consider. The workshop stops needing a previously useful step, but the volunteer keeps doing it. What must you check before concluding that the action has become a habit?

Unit 4 of 5

How do observation and practice expand what we can do?

Watching a demonstration and practicing a skill are different routes to new capabilities. They share a measurement problem: performance now may conceal or exaggerate what has been learned. Bandura changes incentives to reveal that problem in imitation. Soderstrom and Bjork extend it across learning research, and Shea and Morgan provide a concrete comparison of practice schedules and later performance. Allow extra time for this three-paper unit. After each work, state what was observed during learning and what was assessed later; use that distinction to connect the imitation study, the review and the practice experiment.

Reading
7 of 10
Influence of Models’ Reinforcement Contingencies on the Acquisition of Imitative Responses
Bandura, A. (1965). Influence of models’ reinforcement contingencies on the acquisition of imitative responses. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1(6), 589–595. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0022070
Landmark empirical study · Methodological contribution · Accessible · Full work: 7 pages
Separate consequences for the model from incentives offered to the observer, then compare the two assessment phases.
Why you’re reading it. Examine observational learning without equating failure to imitate with failure to learn.
A question to consider. The volunteer watches a demonstration but does not copy it until invited to show what they remember. What does that change establish, and what remains uncertain?
Reading
8 of 10
Learning Versus Performance: An Integrative Review
Soderstrom, N. C., & Bjork, R. A. (2015). Learning versus performance: An integrative review. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 10(2), 176–199. https://doi.org/10.1177/1745691615569000
Major synthesis · Methodological contribution · Challenging · Full work: 24 pages
Compare claims about immediate performance with evidence from later retention and transfer tests, including how learners judge their own progress.
Why you’re reading it. Develop criteria for evaluating a practice method beyond how successful it feels during training.
A question to consider. The volunteer performs well with frequent prompts. What later test would reveal whether the procedure can be carried out independently?
Reading
9 of 10
Contextual Interference Effects on the Acquisition, Retention, and Transfer of a Motor Skill
Shea, J. B., & Morgan, R. L. (1979). Contextual interference effects on the acquisition, retention, and transfer of a motor skill. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Learning and Memory, 5(2), 179–187. https://doi.org/10.1037/0278-7393.5.2.179
Landmark empirical study · Moderate · Full work: 9 pages
Reconstruct the practice and test schedules before interpreting the results, and distinguish retention of practiced patterns from transfer to related ones.
Why you’re reading it. Apply the review’s distinction to a bounded motor-learning experiment.
A question to consider. One group practices each workshop procedure in a block and another alternates among them. How would you assess learning without favoring either group through the test order?

Unit 5 of 5

When does learning carry over—or return?

Improvement during practice is not the only misleading performance change: a response can disappear without all earlier learning being lost. Extinction makes context and retrieval central. Use this final review to connect the distinction between learning and performance with the problem of maintaining change, while keeping laboratory findings separate from claims about treatment or everyday behavior.

Reading
10 of 10
Context and Behavioral Processes in Extinction
Bouton, M. E. (2004). Context and behavioral processes in extinction. Learning & Memory, 11(5), 485–494. https://doi.org/10.1101/lm.78804
Major synthesis · Foundational argument · Moderate · Full work: 10 pages
Draw the learning, extinction, and test contexts for each recovery effect. Compare the explanations instead of treating disappearance as proof of erasure.
Why you’re reading it. Bring acquisition, expression, and the persistence of earlier learning into one account.
A question to consider. The volunteer learns that a familiar signal no longer predicts a delivery in a new room, yet responds to it again in the original room. What comparison would test whether context controls which experience is expressed?

Scope and omissions

This is a foundation across nonassociative, predictive, instrumental, observational, and skill learning. Habituation receives a direct core reading; sensitization is introduced as a distinct process, with the dual-process account available in further reading. Consequences include reinforcement, punishment, goal-directed action, and habits, but the core is not a comprehensive treatment of schedules or punishment.

The syllabus does not attempt a full account of memory systems, neural mechanisms, computational learning models, language, cultural transmission, or expertise. Its examples motivate questions for those subjects. Animal experiments do not automatically establish human mechanisms, and basic extinction findings do not establish the effectiveness of a clinical intervention. The five optional works deepen particular questions; they are outside the core sequence.

Synthesis

Learning must be inferred from conduct, yet conduct also changes with fatigue, motivation, and opportunity. The readings give us ways to distinguish these influences and to ask what experience has altered. Predictive, instrumental, observational, and skill learning invite different explanations. Retention and transfer tests extend the inquiry beyond success in the moment, while the return of an old response raises questions about what remains available.

Return to the workshop example and choose one apparent change: responding to a signal, adopting a routine, reproducing a demonstration, or performing a skill. Write a short explanation that specifies what changed and which experience could have caused it.

Propose two plausible explanations and identify a comparison on which they differ.
Specify the behavior you would measure and what would rule out fatigue, motivation, or a change in opportunity.
Explain what a later retention test and a test under changed conditions would each add.
Describe a result that would make you revise your preferred explanation.

Then distinguish three conclusions: the experience changed performance, something was learned, and a particular mechanism produced the learning. State which conclusions your proposed evidence would support. If an old response returned, explain how you would investigate the return rather than treating it as proof that no new learning occurred.

Continue with How Do We Learn What Predicts What? to develop contingency, prediction error, attention and generalization, and compare associative and inferential explanations. For a deeper look at measurement, choose How Do We Know What a Psychological Test Measures? For broader practice evaluating scientific claims, return to How to Read Psychological Science.