Learning+Branch+History

**History of the Learning Branch of Psychology** Interest in the study of learning first arose during the early twentieth century when theorists began to question how behavioral adaptation could be measured in a scientific way and many sought to measure the concepts of learning in a more systematic manner (Medin, Ross, & Markman, 2005). It was during this time that behaviorism became a major school of thought. Later between 1950 and 1970, behaviorism began to focus more on the topics of attention, memory, learning, problem solving, etc ( Cherry, 2011).

Our understanding of Learning processes can trace its’ roots back to early behaviorist thought. These early theories stated that any response could be conditioned by basically any stimuli. This has been proven to be an overly simplistic view. (Medin et al., 2005) We now know that some stimulus-response pairings are much easier to learn than others. It seems that evolution has found a way to help us weed out the most important information from our environment. In fact, there are some survival skills that are innate in several species! However, this form of adaptation is very inflexible, meaning that it depends heavily on the stability of the environment. If the habitat of the organism were to change abruptly, their innate skills would no longer be appropriate, and thus would no longer be helpful for survival.



Ivan Pavlov was an early behaviorist who made a significant impact on learning in the psychological world. In Pavlov's final phase of his career he focused on conditioned reflexes and their effect on the brain. His work with laboratory dogs and their secretion to the given stimulus helped Pavlov term this learned behavior as "a conditioned reflex," which was found different that the coined term "unconditioned reflex." He concluded that unlike an unconditioned reflex which simply occurs automatically, a conditioned reflex will occur only after a stimulus has been presented (Cherry, 2011).

Understanding of the learning process, as we shall see, paved the way for breakthroughs in several different areas of psychology and continues to remain an important concept in today's world of psychology. This is because fundamentals of learning are the foundation for several psychological theories. Ivan Pavlov is just one important example of a psychologist whose theories can attribute their success to the understanding of learning processes. (Medin, Ross, & Markman, 2005).

For centuries scientists have tried to interpret the innerworkings of the human brain. They’ve mapped the circulation, noted the electrical activity, exposed glucosemetabolism, measured and probed its parts, and even traced neuronalgrowth. Still, the vast complexity of our thinking organ has left scholars short of an efficient explanation of how it works. When we consider the amazing complexity of the human brain, it is extraordinary to think that today we know how our brain naturally learns best. Brain-based learning considers what is natural to our brain and how the brain is impacted by circumstances and experiences (Jensen,2000).

Brain-based learning appeared inthe 1980s as an entire new kind of science was silently growing. By the 1990s, it had exploded into dozens of unbelievable sub-disciplines. From this broad multi-disciplinary body of research about the brain came a new way ofthinking about learning. In the earny 1990s, Renate and Geoffrey Caine developed a set of twelve principles they used to describe the various funtions of learning. From this research the Caines determined that there were three fundamental elements of learning: Relaxed alertness - a low threat, high challenge state of mind; Orchestrated immersion- a multiple,complex, authentic experience; and Active processing- making meaning through experience processing (Jensen, 2000).