Psychology of Learning

Unit 3: Observational Learning & Applications

Key Terms

A-B-C Analysis: Functional assessment method examining Antecedents, Behaviors, & Consequences to identify maintaining variables.

Absolute Differences: Unique features completely absent in other species when comparing human cognition.

Academic Learning Time: The portion of engaged time during which students are working on tasks at an appropriate level of difficulty & experiencing high success rates. Represents the most refined measure of instructional time, combining time-on-task with task appropriateness.

Achievement Gap: Persistent differences in academic performance between demographic groups, particularly between students from different socioeconomic, racial, or ethnic backgrounds. Research examines both the gap itself & factors contributing to differential outcomes.

Achievement Standards: Internalized criteria for when self-reward is appropriate; learned through observing models’ self-reinforcement patterns.

Action Research: A form of descriptive research conducted by practitioners (typically teachers) in their own settings to solve practical problems & improve practice. Involves cycles of planning, acting, observing, & reflecting.

Action Understanding: Automatically comprehending others’ actions by simulating them in one’s own motor system; mirror neurons create internal representations.

Active Participation: A feature of video games distinguishing them from passive television viewing; players perform violent actions themselves.

Adaptive Specialization: Hypothesis that cognitive abilities evolve to match species-specific ecological demands.

Agentic Perspective: Bandura’s view that people actively contribute to their own development through intentional action, forethought, self-regulation, & self-reflection.

Allocated Time: The total amount of time officially scheduled for instruction in a subject area. Represents the maximum possible instructional time before accounting for interruptions, transitions, & off-task behavior.

Analogous Structures: Anatomical features with similar functions but different evolutionary origins (e.g., bird & insect wings).

Analytic Rubrics: Scoring guides that evaluate multiple dimensions of performance separately, providing specific feedback on distinct criteria such as content, organization, evidence, & mechanics. Contrast with holistic rubrics.

Animal Intelligence: Cognitive capacity for reasoning, problem-solving, learning, & adaptation in nonhuman species.

Animated Video Modeling: Video modeling using cartoon or animated characters to demonstrate target behaviors.

Antecedent: Events, conditions, or stimuli that precede & may trigger a behavior. In functional assessment, identifying antecedents helps understand what prompts problem behaviors & informs intervention design.

Anxiety Hierarchy: Ranked list of fear-inducing situations from least to most threatening, used in systematic desensitization.

Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA): The systematic application of behavioral principles to improve socially significant behaviors. Uses functional assessment to identify behavior functions & designs interventions based on reinforcement, extinction, & other operant principles.

Approximate Number System: Cognitive system representing quantities as analog magnitudes following Weber’s law.

Arbitrariness: Language feature where relationship between symbols & meanings is conventional, not inherent.

Assessment: The process of gathering information about student learning through various methods including tests, observations, projects, & performances. Serves formative, summative, placement, & diagnostic purposes.

Attention: In observational learning, the first of Bandura’s four processes; the observer must notice relevant features of the model’s actions.

Autism Service Dogs: Service dogs providing support & safety for individuals with autism spectrum disorder.

Autism Spectrum Disorder: A neurodevelopmental condition characterized by differences in social communication & restricted/repetitive behavior patterns.

Aversion Therapy: Therapeutic approach using conditioning to create unpleasant associations with problematic stimuli or behaviors.

Awareness Training: Component of habit reversal training teaching individuals to recognize when they engage in the habit.

Backup Reinforcers: Tangible rewards, privileges, or activities that tokens can be exchanged for in a token economy.

Behavior: In learning objectives, the observable action that demonstrates learning. Effective behavioral objectives use action verbs (identify, compare, calculate) rather than vague terms (understand, appreciate) that resist measurement.

Behavior-Reading Versus Mind-Reading: Debate over whether animals respond to observable behavioral cues or truly represent mental states.

Behavioral Activation: Treatment for depression based on increasing engagement in positively reinforcing activities.

Big Team Science: Collaborative research involving many laboratories studying diverse species to address replication & generalizability.

Biofeedback: Using electronic monitoring to provide real-time information about physiological processes for self-regulation training.

Bloom’s Taxonomy: A hierarchical framework for classifying educational objectives by cognitive complexity. The revised taxonomy (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001) includes six levels: remembering, understanding, applying, analyzing, evaluating, & creating.

Broken Mirror Hypothesis: The theory that autism involves reduced mirror neuron activity, explaining social learning deficits; recent reviews find insufficient support.

Carbon Disulfide: A component of rat breath that serves as a semiochemical, making food-related odors transmitted from demonstrator to observer rats behaviorally significant.

Classroom Management: The actions teachers take to create an environment that supports academic & social-emotional learning. Includes establishing procedures, organizing physical space, managing time, & responding to behavior. Meta-analyses show effect sizes around d = 0.44.

Cognitive Integration: Combination of multiple cognitive abilities into unified systems enabling emergent capacities.

Cognitive Modeling: A form of modeling in which the model demonstrates behavior while also describing the thought process involved.

Collectivism: A cultural orientation emphasizing group harmony, interdependence, & collective goals over individual achievement. Influences learning preferences, classroom participation patterns, & responses to competition versus cooperation. Contrast with individualism.

Common Descent: Principle that all species share ancestors, forming a branching tree of life.

Comparative Cognition: Scientific study of cognitive processes across species, integrating psychology, ethology, & neuroscience.

Competing Response Training: Component of habit reversal training teaching a physically incompatible behavior to replace the habit.

Concept Formation: Ability to group stimuli into categories based on shared features or relationships.

Conditioned Fear Response: Learned emotional reaction of fear elicited by a previously neutral stimulus after conditioning.

Conditioned Stimulus: Previously neutral stimulus that elicits a response after being paired with an unconditioned stimulus.

Conditions: In learning objectives, the circumstances under which performance occurs, including available resources, constraints, & contexts (e.g., ‘given a calculator,’ ‘without notes,’ ‘working collaboratively’).

Consequences: In classroom management, the outcomes that follow rule compliance or violation. Effective consequences are consistent, immediate, proportionate, & logical. In behavioral analysis, consequences that follow behavior & affect its future probability.

Contagion: Another term for social facilitation; situation in which the observation of another organism’s behavior increases the likelihood that the same behavior, already in the repertoire, will be exhibited.

Contingency Management: Systematic application of reinforcement contingencies to increase desired behaviors or decrease problematic ones.

Convergent Evolution: Independent evolution of similar traits in unrelated species facing similar selection pressures.

Correlation Coefficient: A statistical measure (typically Pearson’s r) indicating the strength & direction of relationship between two variables, ranging from -1.0 to +1.0. Used extensively in correlational research to quantify associations.

Correlational Research: Research examining relationships between variables without manipulating them. Cannot establish causation but identifies associations & enables prediction. Common in educational research where experimental manipulation is impractical.

Counterconditioning: Pairing a conditioned stimulus that elicits an undesirable response with a stimulus that elicits an incompatible, positive response.

Covert Self-Instruction: Final phase of self-instructional training where the individual uses inner speech to guide performance.

Covert Sensitization: Imaginal form of aversion therapy where clients imagine unwanted behavior followed by aversive consequences.

Criterion: In learning objectives, the standard specifying acceptable performance levels (e.g., ‘with 80% accuracy,’ ‘completing four of five steps correctly’). Establishes how well students must perform to demonstrate mastery.

Criterion-Referenced Evaluation: Assessment comparing student performance to established standards rather than to other students. Students either meet criteria or not, regardless of peer performance. Aligns with mastery learning philosophy.

Cultural Capital: The knowledge, behaviors, & skills that confer social advantages, often aligned with dominant cultural norms. Students whose home culture matches school culture may have advantages in navigating educational expectations.

Cultural Spillover Theory: Theory that levels of acceptance of violence in media are reflected by acceptance of violence in society.

Cultural Transmission: The passage of knowledge, skills, & traditions across generations through social learning rather than genetic inheritance.

Culturally Responsive Teaching: Instruction that recognizes the importance of including students’ cultural references in all aspects of learning. Builds bridges between home & school cultures while maintaining high expectations for all students.

Culture: Learned behaviors transmitted socially across generations, creating population-specific traditions.

Cumulative Cultural Evolution: The process by which knowledge accumulates across generations, with each generation building on previous discoveries.

Deferred Imitation: Reproducing observed behavior after a time delay; requires memory & representation, suggesting cognitive processes beyond simple reflexes.

Delay of Gratification: Bypassing immediately available smaller rewards in favor of larger rewards not immediately available.

Demonstrator-Observer Paradigm: Galef’s experimental procedure in which a demonstrator rat eats a novel food & then interacts with an observer rat, who subsequently shows preference for that food.

Dependent Variable (DV): In experimental research, the outcome measure that researchers observe for changes resulting from manipulation of the independent variable. In educational experiments, typically measures of learning, achievement, or behavior.

Descriptive Research: Research methods that describe phenomena without manipulating variables, including observations, surveys, case studies, & ethnographic research. Provides rich detail about educational contexts & practices.

Desensitization: Reduced emotional responsiveness to violence following repeated exposure.

Diagnostic Assessment: Assessment designed to identify specific learning difficulties, misconceptions, or skill deficits requiring targeted intervention. Provides detailed information about what students know & where they struggle.

Differential Reinforcement: Procedures that reinforce desired behaviors while withholding reinforcement for undesired behaviors. Includes DRA (reinforcing alternative behaviors), DRO (reinforcing other behaviors), & DRI (reinforcing incompatible behaviors).

Differential Reinforcement of Alternative Behavior: Reinforcing a specific appropriate behavior that serves the same function as the problem behavior.

Differential Reinforcement of Other Behavior: Reinforcing the absence of the problem behavior during specified time intervals.

Direct Conditioning: Mary Cover Jones’s method of gradually introducing a feared object while the child engages in a pleasurable activity.

Directional Selection: Selection favoring one extreme of a trait distribution, shifting the population mean.

Displacement: Language feature enabling communication about things not present in immediate environment.

Disruptive Selection: Selection favoring both extremes of a trait distribution, potentially leading to speciation.

Distractors: In multiple-choice items, the incorrect response options designed to be plausible to students who lack complete understanding. Effective distractors represent common misconceptions or errors.

Duality of Patterning: Language feature where meaningless sounds combine into meaningful units following grammatical rules.

Ecological Intelligence: Perspective viewing intelligence as adaptive problem-solving shaped by species-specific environmental demands.

Educational Psychology: The scientific study of learning & teaching processes, applying psychological principles to educational practice. Encompasses research on cognition, motivation, development, assessment, & instructional design.

Emotional Contagion: The tendency to automatically mimic others’ emotional expressions & consequently converge emotionally.

Empathy: Understanding others’ emotions by simulating their emotional expressions in one’s own brain.

Emulation: Learning about environmental affordances (what can be done with objects) without necessarily copying the demonstrator’s specific movements.

Engaged Time (Time-on-Task): The portion of instructional time during which students are actively attending to learning tasks. Strongly predicts achievement but represents only a fraction of allocated time after accounting for transitions & off-task behavior.

Environmental Enrichment: Raising animals in stimulating environments with opportunities for social interaction & exploration, which increases brain development & learning ability.

Episodic-Like Memory: Memory for specific events integrating what, where, & when information.

Essay Questions: Assessment items requiring students to organize & express ideas in extended written form. Assess synthesis, evaluation, & argumentation skills but require substantial scoring time & introduce scorer subjectivity.

Ethnographic Research: A form of descriptive research involving extended observation & participation in natural settings to understand cultural patterns & meanings. Provides deep insight into classroom dynamics & student experiences.

Ethology: Biological study of animal behavior emphasizing naturalistic observation & evolutionary function.

Evidence-Based Practice: Interventions supported by rigorous research demonstrating effectiveness; video modeling holds this designation for ASD.

Evolutionary Psychology: Application of evolutionary principles to understand human cognition & behavior.

Exposure & Response Prevention: Treatment for OCD involving exposure to obsession-triggering situations while preventing compulsive rituals.

Extinction Burst: A temporary increase in the frequency or intensity of a behavior when reinforcement is first withheld. Teachers implementing extinction must anticipate & persist through this initial escalation.

Faded Self-Guidance: Phase of self-instructional training where the individual whispers instructions while performing a task.

False Belief Task: Test of theory of mind requiring prediction of behavior based on another’s mistaken belief.

Feedback: Specific information about performance quality provided during social skills training.

Fitness: Reproductive success; the relative contribution of an individual’s genes to the next generation.

Flooding: Immediate, prolonged exposure to intensely feared stimuli without gradual hierarchy progression.

Formative Assessment: Assessment occurring during instruction to provide feedback guiding teaching & learning. Purpose is improvement rather than evaluation. Includes quick checks, questioning, observations, & practice with feedback.

FOXP2 Gene: Gene involved in speech & language development; mutations cause language impairments.

Functional Assessment: Systematic process of gathering information to understand why problem behaviors occur by identifying their antecedents, consequences, & functions (attention, escape, tangible, sensory). Guides development of function-based interventions.

Functional Behavior Assessment: Systematic process for identifying the environmental variables maintaining problem behavior.

Functional Communication Training: Teaching appropriate communicative responses that serve the same function as problem behavior.

Generalized Imitation: Miller & Dollard’s concept that imitation functions as a learned operant response through reinforcement history.

Genotypes: Genetic makeup of an organism; the alleles inherited from parents.

Great Chain of Being: Pre-evolutionary hierarchical view ranking organisms from simple to complex, with humans at the top.

Group Focus: A classroom management skill involving maintaining attention & engagement of all students, not just those currently responding. Techniques include group alerting, accountability, & high participation formats.

Group Therapy: Treatment format providing natural opportunities for observational learning through peer modeling.

Guide Dogs: Service dogs assisting blind individuals with navigation & obstacle avoidance.

Habit Reversal Training: Behavioral treatment for repetitive behavior disorders combining awareness training with competing response training.

Hafting: Attaching stone points to wooden handles, requiring understanding of component integration.

Hearing Dogs: Service dogs alerting deaf individuals to important environmental sounds.

Holistic Rubrics: Scoring guides that assign a single overall score based on general quality rather than scoring multiple dimensions separately. Faster to use than analytic rubrics but provide less specific feedback.

Homologous Structures: Anatomical features sharing common ancestry despite different functions (e.g., bat wings & human arms).

Imaginal Exposure: Exposure therapy technique where clients imagine fear-inducing scenarios rather than confronting them directly.

Imitation: A change in behavior following observation of another organism; copying behavior that may or may not have been previously in the animal’s repertoire.

Imitative Behavior: Therapeutic factor in group therapy describing clients learning by observing other group members.

Implosive Therapy: Imaginal flooding variant using exaggerated, unrealistic worst-case scenarios to maximize anxiety activation.

In Vivo Exposure: Real-life confrontation with feared stimuli, generally more effective than imaginal exposure.

Incidental Encoding: Remembering details that seemed irrelevant at encoding but can be recalled when later queried.

Incredible Years: Evidence-based parent training program using group format with extensive video modeling of parenting strategies.

Independent Variable (IV): In experimental research, the factor manipulated by researchers to observe its effect on the dependent variable. In educational experiments, typically the instructional method, intervention, or treatment being tested.

Individualism: A cultural orientation emphasizing personal autonomy, independence, & individual achievement. Influences preferences for competition, individual recognition, & self-expression. Contrast with collectivism.

Inhibitory Learning Model: Contemporary theory that exposure creates new safety memories competing with original fear memories.

Instruction: Clear explanation of target skill and its components during social skills training.

Instructional Time: The time remaining for teaching after subtracting non-instructional activities (announcements, transitions, interruptions) from allocated time. Represents actual teaching time available.

Kin Selection: Selection favoring behaviors that benefit genetic relatives, explaining altruism toward kin.

Lamarckian Inheritance: Discredited theory that organisms pass acquired characteristics to offspring.

Learning Objective (LO): A statement specifying what students should know or be able to do after instruction. Effective objectives include three components: behavior (observable action), conditions (circumstances), & criterion (performance standard).

Learning Styles: The discredited hypothesis that students learn better when instruction matches their preferred modality (visual, auditory, kinesthetic). Meta-analyses consistently find no evidence supporting matching instruction to supposed learning styles (d = 0.04).

Learning-Performance Distinction: Bandura’s insight that observational learning occurs regardless of model consequences, but performance depends on expected outcomes.

Lexigrams: Arbitrary visual symbols representing words, used in ape language research.

Live Coaching: PCIT technique where therapist provides real-time guidance through wireless earpiece during parent-child interaction.

Live Modeling with Guided Participation: Observing a live model then gradually participating in the interactions oneself.

Local Enhancement: When a demonstrator’s presence near an object increases its salience to an observer, leading to increased interaction without understanding of behavior or goals.

Mastery Learning: An instructional philosophy holding that most students can master most objectives given sufficient time & appropriate instruction. Emphasizes criterion-referenced evaluation & allowing multiple attempts to demonstrate proficiency.

Matching: An objective test format presenting two columns (premises & responses) for students to associate. Effective items include more responses than premises & maintain homogeneous content within sets.

Mate Choice Copying: A form of social learning in which individuals use the observed mate choices of others to inform their own mate preferences.

Mentalizing: Cognitive process of representing & reasoning about others’ mental states.

Metatool Use: Using one tool to obtain another tool, demonstrating hierarchical planning.

Mindreading: Informal term for theory of mind; inferring what others think, know, or intend.

Mirror Neurons: Neurons that fire both when an organism performs a behavior & when observing another performing the same behavior.

Mobility Assistance Dogs: Service dogs helping individuals with physical disabilities perform daily tasks.

Modeling: Term introduced by Bandura used interchangeably with observational learning; the process by which observers pattern their behavior after a model.

Morgan’s Canon: Precept that animal activity should always be explained using the simplest mechanisms possible; also known as the principle of parsimony.

Motivation: In observational learning, the fourth of Bandura’s four processes; determines whether learned behaviors are performed based on expected consequences.

Movement Management: A classroom management skill involving pacing lessons appropriately, maintaining momentum, & managing transitions smoothly. Includes avoiding slowdowns, fragmentation, & overdwelling on minor issues.

Multiple Baseline Design: A single-case experimental design demonstrating experimental control by introducing an intervention sequentially across different behaviors, settings, or participants. Strengthens causal inference without reversal.

Multiple-Choice: The most versatile objective test format, including a stem (question or incomplete statement), one correct answer, & several distractors. Can assess knowledge through application levels when well-constructed.

Natural Selection: Differential survival & reproduction of individuals based on heritable traits, driving evolutionary change.

Neophobia: Fear of new things; rats are highly neophobic about novel foods because they cannot vomit to expel toxins.

Neurofeedback: Biofeedback targeting brain electrical activity (EEG) to train self-regulation of neural patterns.

Norm-Referenced Evaluation: Assessment comparing students’ performance to each other rather than to fixed standards. Yields percentile ranks & relative standings but provides no information about absolute achievement levels. Grading on a curve exemplifies this approach.

Normalization: The gradual process by which repeated media violence exposure shifts perceptions of acceptable behavior.

Numerosity Discrimination: Ability to distinguish quantities or amounts without precise counting.

Object Permanence: Understanding that objects continue to exist when not directly perceived.

Obligatory: Characteristic of human tool use as essential for survival rather than optional.

Observational Conditioning: Learning stimulus-stimulus associations by observing others’ responses; for example, developing fear by watching another’s fearful reaction.

Observational Learning: A change in behavior that occurs as a result of observing a behavior & its consequences; learning from others rather than direct experience.

Overimitation: The tendency (especially in human children) to copy adult behaviors that are unnecessary for achieving goals; an adaptation for cultural learning.

Overlapping: A classroom management skill involving the ability to attend to multiple events simultaneously without losing focus on instruction. Effective teachers handle interruptions while maintaining lesson momentum.

Overt External Guidance: Phase of self-instructional training where child performs task while adult provides verbal instructions.

Overt Self-Guidance: Phase of self-instructional training where child performs task while self-instructing aloud.

Parent-Child Interaction Therapy: Evidence-based treatment for disruptive behavior using live coaching of parent-child interactions.

Participant Modeling: Treatment combining observation of a model with guided participation by the observer.

Pedagogical: Relating to teaching; behaviors involving explicit instruction, demonstration, & feedback.

Peer Assessment: Students evaluating each other’s work, providing feedback & sometimes grades. Meta-analyses show small-medium effects (g = 0.31) on academic performance, particularly effective as formative feedback.

Peer Modeling: Observational learning from individuals similar in age or status to the observer.

Peering: Close-range observation of a conspecific, particularly studied in chimpanzees as a mechanism for acquiring tool-use & other complex skills.

Percentile Ranks: Norm-referenced scores indicating what percentage of a comparison group scored below a particular score. A student at the 75th percentile scored higher than 75% of the norming group.

Performance-Based Assessment: Evaluation through demonstrations, products, or extended projects rather than traditional tests. Assesses authentic, complex skills (laboratory techniques, presentations, artistic performances) in realistic contexts.

Phenotypes: Observable characteristics of an organism resulting from gene-environment interaction.

Placement Assessment: Assessment determining appropriate instructional levels, course placements, or program assignments. Matches students with instruction suited to their current knowledge & skill levels.

Planned Ignoring: A classroom management technique of deliberately withholding attention from minor misbehaviors that are maintained by attention-seeking. Effective when combined with positive attention for appropriate behavior.

Point-of-View Video Modeling: Videos filmed from the learner’s perspective showing what they would see when performing a task.

Portfolios: Collections of student work samples over time demonstrating growth, achievement, & reflection. Effective portfolios include student selection of pieces & reflection on what they demonstrate about learning.

Power Distance: A cultural dimension reflecting acceptance of hierarchical authority & unequal power distribution. High power distance cultures may expect more formal teacher-student relationships & teacher-directed instruction.

Principles of Behavior Modification: Bandura’s (1969) systematic framework for understanding therapeutic applications of observational learning.

Prize-Based Contingency Management: CM variant where clients earn chances to win prizes of varying value contingent on target behaviors.

Procedures: Established routines for accomplishing recurring classroom tasks (distributing materials, transitioning between activities, seeking help). Effective procedures are taught, practiced, & reinforced until automatic.

Productivity: Language feature enabling creation of unlimited novel utterances from finite elements.

Progressive Muscle Relaxation: Technique involving systematic tensing and releasing of muscle groups to achieve deep relaxation.

Proximity Control: A non-verbal classroom management technique involving moving closer to off-task students to redirect behavior without interrupting instruction. Part of a hierarchy of least-intrusive interventions.

PTSD Service Dogs: Service dogs trained to help individuals manage post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms.

Punctuated Equilibrium: Evolutionary pattern of long periods of stasis interrupted by rapid change during speciation events.

Quasi-Experimental Designs: Research designs that compare groups but lack random assignment to conditions. Common in educational research where true randomization is impractical. Require careful attention to potential confounds.

Random Assignment: In true experiments, the process of assigning participants to conditions by chance, ensuring groups are equivalent before treatment. Enables causal inference by controlling for confounding variables.

Ratchet Effect: Mechanism of cumulative culture where improvements are preserved until further innovations occur.

Reciprocal Altruism: Cooperation between unrelated individuals based on expectation of future reciprocation.

Reciprocal Causation: When two variables influence each other bidirectionally; media violence & aggression may have reciprocal effects.

Reciprocal Determinism: Bandura’s concept that behavior, personal factors, & environmental factors all influence one another in continuous triadic interaction.

Reciprocal Inhibition: Principle that two incompatible emotional responses cannot occur simultaneously.

Recursive Tool Manufacture: Using tools to make other tools in extended chains of production.

Reinforcement: Praise and encouragement for skill acquisition during social skills training.

Relative Differences: Shared features differing in degree between humans & other species.

Reliability: The consistency of assessment results across occasions, scorers, or forms. Unreliable measurements cannot support valid inferences. Types include test-retest, inter-rater, & internal consistency reliability.

Replacement Behavior: In functional assessment, a socially appropriate behavior taught to serve the same function as a problem behavior. Functional communication training teaches communication as a replacement for challenging behaviors.

Reproduction: In observational learning, the third of Bandura’s four processes; translating cognitive representations into motor performance.

Response Cost: A punishment procedure involving loss of earned reinforcers (points, tokens, privileges) contingent on undesired behavior. Effective when combined with positive reinforcement for appropriate behavior.

Response-Contingent Positive Reinforcement: Core mechanism of behavioral activation; engaging in activities that produce positive outcomes.

Retention: In observational learning, the second of Bandura’s four processes; forming mental representations through imaginal & verbal encoding.

Reversal Design (ABAB): A single-case experimental design demonstrating experimental control by alternating between baseline (A) & intervention (B) phases. Behavior changes with phase changes support causal inference.

Role-Play: Client practice of skills in simulated scenarios during social skills training.

Routines: Established patterns of behavior for recurring classroom situations. Well-practiced routines reduce cognitive load, minimize transition time, & create predictable learning environments.

Rubrics: Scoring guides specifying evaluation criteria & performance levels. Reduce subjectivity, clarify expectations, & provide frameworks for feedback. Include analytic rubrics (multiple dimensions) & holistic rubrics (single overall score).

Rules: Explicit statements of expected behavior in the classroom, typically 3-6 positively stated guidelines. Effective rules are taught, posted, consistently enforced, & paired with clear consequences. Distinguished from procedures.

Scalar Timing: Temporal discrimination with precision proportional to duration, following Weber’s law.

Selection Effects: The alternative explanation that correlations reflect aggressive individuals preferring violent media rather than media causing aggression.

Self-Assessment: Students evaluating their own work against criteria, developing metacognitive awareness & self-regulation skills. Most effective when combined with explicit training on assessment criteria & standards.

Self-Efficacy: An individual’s belief in their capability to execute behaviors necessary to produce specific outcomes; influences effort & persistence.

Self-Instructional Training: Meichenbaum’s approach teaching individuals to guide their behavior through self-directed speech.

Self-Regulation: The use of internal monitoring to determine appropriate times to demonstrate learned behaviors; controlling impulses for long-term goals.

Self-Reinforcement: Administering rewards to oneself contingent on meeting performance criteria; children observationally learn self-reinforcement patterns.

Service Animal: Animal trained to perform tasks assisting individuals with disabilities.

Setting Event: Background conditions or events that influence the likelihood of behavior by altering motivation or establishing operations. Examples include illness, fatigue, hunger, or earlier conflicts that affect subsequent behavior.

Simple Systems Approach: Strategy of studying simpler organisms to understand basic principles before tackling more complex systems.

Social Brain Hypothesis: Theory that social living demands drove brain & cognitive evolution in primates.

Social Cognition & Interaction Training: Intervention focusing on social cognitive processes; compared to SST in recent meta-analyses.

Social Facilitation: Situation in which the observation of another organism’s behavior increases the likelihood that the same behavior, already in the repertoire, will be exhibited.

Social Learning: A change in behavior following observation of the act & its consequences performed by another organism; the observer expects similar contingencies.

Social Skills Training: Structured approach to teaching interpersonal competencies through modeling, practice, and feedback.

Social Transmission: The spread of behaviors, information, or fear responses through a social group via observational learning.

Social-Cognitive Theory: Bandura’s theory that knowledge about behavioral consequences can be acquired vicariously through observing others.

Sociobiology: Study of social behavior from an evolutionary perspective, examining how natural selection shapes social systems.

Socioeconomic Status (SES): A composite measure typically including family income, parental education, & occupation. SES correlates moderately with academic achievement (r = .22-.28), though school-level SES effects are stronger (r = .58).

Spatial Memory: Memory for locations, spatial relationships, & navigation through environments.

Spontaneous Recovery: Return of an extinguished response after time has passed, demonstrating original learning persists.

Stabilizing Selection: Selection favoring intermediate trait values, reducing variation around the mean.

Standards-Based Grading: A grading approach emphasizing criterion-referenced evaluation against explicit learning standards, reporting proficiency on specific outcomes rather than averaging points. Often includes opportunities for reassessment.

Stem: In multiple-choice items, the question or incomplete statement presenting the problem to be solved. Effective stems present complete, clear problems without requiring students to read all options to understand the question.

Stereotype Threat: The psychological phenomenon where awareness of negative stereotypes about one’s group can impair performance on relevant tasks. Meta-analyses show smaller effects in real testing situations (d = .04) than laboratory studies.

Stimulus Enhancement: A type of observational learning in which there is increased likelihood of behavior focused on a particular object following observation of another organism interacting with that object.

Stimulus Generalization: Extension of conditioned responses to stimuli similar to the original conditioned stimulus.

Summative Assessment: Assessment occurring after instruction to evaluate achievement for grading, certification, or accountability purposes. Looks backward at what was accomplished rather than forward at how to improve.

Symbolic Modeling: Observational learning from filmed or recorded demonstrations rather than live models.

Syntax: Grammatical rules governing word order & sentence structure in language.

Systematic Desensitization: Wolpe’s structured treatment combining relaxation with graduated exposure to feared stimuli.

Theory of Mind: The ability to attribute thoughts & feelings to oneself & others & to understand that others’ thoughts & desires may differ from one’s own.

Therapeutic Factors: Mechanisms of change in group therapy identified by Yalom, including imitative behavior and universality.

Time-Out: A punishment procedure removing access to reinforcement for a brief period (typically 3-10 minutes) contingent on problem behavior. Most effective when the regular environment is reinforcing & time-out is brief & consistent.

Token Economy: Reinforcement system where tokens are earned for target behaviors and exchanged for backup reinforcers.

Tolerance Series: Mary Cover Jones’s hierarchy documenting Peter’s progressive approach to the feared rabbit.

Tool Use: Using an object to modify the environment or another object to achieve a goal.

Traditional Video Modeling: Watching videos of another person performing target behaviors correctly.

Transitions: Movement between activities, locations, or instructional formats. Efficient transitions minimize lost instructional time; effective teachers establish clear procedures & practice smooth transitions.

Triple P: Positive Parenting Program; multi-level system of parenting interventions incorporating video modeling.

True Imitation: Behavior change following observation whereby the observer recognizes the intentional structure of the model’s actions & invokes theory of mind.

True-False: An objective test format requiring students to judge statement accuracy. Efficient but allows 50% guessing success & limits assessment to recognition of factual accuracy.

Two-Action Test: Experimental design presenting observers with demonstrators performing one of two different actions to achieve the same outcome to distinguish imitation from emulation.

Uncertainty Avoidance: A cultural dimension reflecting tolerance for ambiguity & unstructured situations. High uncertainty avoidance cultures may prefer explicit instructions, clear rules, & structured learning environments.

Uniformitarianism: Principle that natural processes operating today also operated in the past, allowing gradual geological & biological change.

Universality: Therapeutic factor involving recognition that others share similar problems, reducing isolation.

Validity: The degree to which evidence & theory support intended interpretations of assessment scores. Contemporary views emphasize that validity concerns the appropriateness of inferences drawn from results rather than properties of the test itself.

Vestigial Structures: Reduced or functionless structures that were functional in ancestors.

Vicarious Extinction: Learning that feared consequences do not occur through observing a model’s safe interaction with feared stimuli.

Vicarious Learning: Another term for observational learning; learning that occurs by observing others’ behaviors & their consequences.

Vicarious Punishment: Observing a model punished decreases the observer’s likelihood of performing that behavior without personal punishment.

Vicarious Reinforcement: Observing a model receive reinforcement creates expectancy that similar reinforcement will follow similar behavior in the observer.

Video Modeling: Using recorded demonstrations of target behaviors to teach new skills.

Video Self-Modeling: Watching edited videos of oneself successfully performing target behaviors.

Virtual Reality: Computer-generated immersive environments used for therapeutic modeling and exposure interventions.

Virtual Reality Exposure Therapy: Using VR environments to simulate feared situations for graduated exposure treatment.

Virtual Role-Play: Practicing social interactions with virtual characters in simulated environments.

Voucher-Based Reinforcement Therapy: CM approach where clients earn vouchers exchangeable for goods or services contingent on verified abstinence.

Withitness: A classroom management concept (Kounin, 1970) referring to teachers’ awareness of what is happening throughout the classroom. Effective teachers demonstrate they ‘have eyes in the back of their head,’ deterring misbehavior through vigilant monitoring.

Working Memory: Limited-capacity system for temporarily holding & manipulating information.