The Types of learning Psychology interests because we usually assume that all behavior (or, at least, most) is learned or acquired. Therefore, it can also be unlearned if it has a pathological or maladaptive nature.
Perhaps it is in the pedagogical literature and since the Psychology of education where more emphasis has been made on the forms of educational learning.
Although it is something that we do not usually stop to think about, unless we learn new things continuously and because we retain that information we would not have survived as a species.
And not only we as humans, but all beings that inhabit the face of the earth would have totally lost the ability to adapt and, therefore, to overcome the vicissitudes of evolution. Therefore, all living things have different types of learning that allow them to survive.
To begin we must introduce ourselves to the world of learning psychology by defining what this word means. Technically, learning is all behavior that an organism incorporates into its behavioral repertoire.
In other words, everything we do is the result of learning: from walking, to tying our shoes, to talking. It can also be defined as any change that an organism produces in its behavior.
By this we mean that from the most derisory or elemental to the most intricate has gone through a learning process that is the product of a network of networks and connections both neuronal and environmental.
These networks constitute sequences of actions and serve the ultimate phylogenetic end: to maintain and perpetuate the species through survival or adaptation to a medium.
There are many different disciplines that address the issue of learning and both animal and human behavior experts have been interested from one perspective or another by how organisms learn certain behaviors and how useful they are.
It is above all in the psychopedagogical approach in which we are going to focus this article.
What are the types of human learning?
Non-associative learning: habituation and sensitization
Non-associative learning is the simplest and most elementary of all, since only one element is necessary for the subject to learn something: a stimulus.
The change in behavior occurs here thanks to repeated experience of a single stimulus in which it is not associated with anything (unlike what happens in associative learning, which we will talk about below)
1- Habituation
Habituation is the decrease in the response that an organism gives to a stimulus to which it is exposed in numerous trials or occasions. This decrease in the response rate is presumably due to the poor biological relevance of the stimulus in question.
An everyday and very clear example of this phenomenon is one that we will all have experienced when we are in a room with a wall clock for a long time: at first, the ticking of the hands will bother us, but after a while we will simply stop lending Attention to the clock and we will be so accustomed that practically we will not notice in that noise.
2- Sensitization
Sensitization can be understood as the phenomenon opposed to habituation; That is, because of repeated exposure of a subject to a stimulus, it will increase its response rate.
As examples, there are some types of drugs Which, instead of creating tolerance, sensitize the individual who ingests them: this is the case of cocaine .
The sensitization processes are especially necessary to stimuli of great biological relevance, especially in situations where there is danger or are aversive.
Associative learning
Associative learning forms the second great block of learning types and is so called because the learner has to associate two or more elements.
The clearest examples of which we have heard many are, in their most basic form, Pavlovian learning or classical conditioning and, in its most complex form, instrumental conditioning operating From Thorndike, Watson Skinner .
However, associative learning can not be reduced to just the classical theories of the authors just mentioned.
New trends in disciplines such as Pedagogy or Psychopedagogy open up the spectrum much more and introduce new terms that are extremely useful when applied, above all, to educational contexts, such as a classroom, or therapeutic.
3- Meaningful learning
Surely we have heard of this type of learning, so fashionable (and not in vain) within the classroom.
Meaningful learning is, according to the American theorist David Ausubel , The type of learning in which a student relates the new information to the one he already has, adjusting and reconstructing both information in this process.
Significant learning occurs when new information is connected to a preexisting relevant concept in the cognitive structure.
This implies that new ideas, concepts, and propositions can be learned significantly to the extent that other relevant ideas, concepts, or propositions are sufficiently clear, and function as a point of anchoring the former.
For example, it will be much easier to understand how to solve an unknown in an equation if we already know how to handle basic mathematical operations, just as we will be able to build a web page if we already have solid knowledge of computational language.
The information that is being learned is constantly subjected to a recycling process. That is to say, meaningful learning is not excluded preconceived ideas, but just the opposite: it is, to a certain extent, to also dismantle these from the new information that we are collecting and to which we are seeing the meaning and the logic.
In other words, this learning emphasizes the importance of knowing how to relate concepts, rather than memorize .
4- Cooperative Learning
It is an interactive learning that organizes the activities within the classroom to become a social and academic experience.
The students Work together To carry out the tasks in a collective way, so that the different synergies come together and each member makes its particular contribution.
Special emphasis is placed here on exchanges of information as a way of enriching work and the confluence of ideas.
One of the precursors of this new educational model was the American pedagogue John Dewey, who promoted the importance of building knowledge within the classroom based on interaction and so-called peer support.
Cooperative learning is shaped by three crucial elements:
─ The formation of heterogeneous groups, where the creation of a group identity derived from mutual aid should be promoted.
─ Positive interdependence, fostering effective communication and feedback among group members.
─ Individual responsibility, understood as the value of each member of the group separately.
5- Emotional learning
As it is possible to detach from its own denomination, the emotional learning uses stimuli with great affective load to produce some change in the behavior of the subject. More than in didactic means or in the classroom, this particular type of learning becomes especially useful in the clinic.
A clear example of emotional learning is therapy against phobias, more specifically systematic desensitization.
In it, the subject, through the directed imagination, is presented situations that for him have special affective connotation and great emotional load, all with the aim of enhancing learning in the most effective way possible.
Of course, it is not the only example of this type of learning and this is implicit in many occasions. Without going any further, it is likely that the songs that we associate emotionally with a given context will be burned in our head.
6- Vicarious or observational learning
This learning Was first promulgated by the well-known Albert Bandura and, in short, comes to tell us that another way of learning a behavior is by watching another subject doing it.
If the observer realizes that the task that the observed is performing is beneficial or has positive consequences, it will be more likely to issue it.
We all learn observationally on a daily basis and almost without realizing it, and this type of learning is also called social because it is necessary the relationship between two people so that it is unleashed.
Very clear examples of observational learning would be cases of abuse or domestic violence in families with young children and adolescents.
Most likely, the child will learn the patterns of relational violence that follow their parents, and that in future life imitate such behaviors, more so if they are repeated and reinforced.
That is why it is very important to preach by example in the case that we have just put, since the tendency to imitate behavior and to follow models by the children is imminent, inevitable and certain that we have been able to verify it in numerous occasions in our life Daily.
7- Learning by discovery
He was the psychologist and pedagogue Jerome Bruner Who, throughout the decade of the 60, took as its mark of identity the promulgation of the so-called learning by discovery.
This is a new way of learning in which the student, as his name indicates, was not given any instructions on how to perform a task that dictated his own curiosity.
In other words, the subject learned for himself, progressively and without mediation as far as possible of directions to undertake the activity. In this way, learning became much more meaningful.
From here we can give an important message that Bruner wanted to direct education professionals, especially teachers: the role of the teacher should be no other than to encourage students to be interested in the subject, to make it interesting and useful for his life.
For this pedagogue, the fundamental motivation to learn must necessarily be born of Intrinsic form And it must be driven by curiosity, interest in exploring and discovering novel and surprising issues (do not forget that what surprises us marks more)
This trend is part of the new methodologies of alternative teaching that are increasingly treading stronger for the results it offers and for having proven benefits such as:
─ The promotion of creative problem solving.
─ Learning by successive approximations as opposed to implosive learning
─ The empowerment of metacognitions or, in other words, learning to learn.
8- Learning rote
Memory learning is one that we perform based on storing information by repetitions usually or known as mnemonic rules.
Almost all of us can think of examples such as the subject of the periodic table or multiplication tables, which we practically learned at school without understanding the underlying logic.
Although many are those who reject rote learning, sometimes it is necessary and, in fact, we have also been able to see that there are issues that it is impossible to learn if it is not this way.
Tell us, if not, how we learn the capitals of Europe or the different drugs that belong to the same family of medicines.
Memory learning goes through the different phases of the process of storing information and to understand it, rather than a constructivist approach as in theories of pedagogical cut, we have to contemplate them from a cognitive view.
The information, until it reaches the memory store, goes through several phases according to the model of Atkinson and Shiffrin (1968), which are the following:
─ First we perceive the stimulus to be stored. If we do not pay attention, there will be no learning.
─ That information passes to the store in the short term.
─ If it is useful or valuable, we will retain it.
─ If we retain it, it will be transferred to the warehouse in the long term and will be available to be retrieved according to the relevance it has and the daily use that we give to this information.
CONCLUSIONS
The fact that each subject will require a different approach and the promotion of a different learning, especially if we speak of learning in educational contexts, falls by its own weight.
Each framework has to adapt to the general and curricular objectives that we want to pursue, and it is precisely from this that the importance of creating awareness among the teachers themselves of the alternatives that exist today to traditional methods of teaching.