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| Item type: | Book section |
|---|---|
| ISBN: | 978-94-017-8902-8 |
| Title of Book: | International Handbook on Research in Professional and Practice-based Learning |
| Publisher: | Springer |
| Place of Publication: | New York, Berlin |
| Number of Issue or Book Chapter: | 12 |
| Date: | 2014 |
| Institutions: | Human Sciences > Institut für Psychologie > Lehrstuhl für Psychologie I (Allgemeine Psychologie I und Methodenlehre) - Prof. Dr. Mark W. Greenlee |
| Keywords: | Perceptual learning - Procedural learning - Skill acquisition - Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) - Implicit memory - Brain function - Visual system |
| Dewey Decimal Classification: | 100 Philosophy & psychology > 150 Psychology |
| Status: | Published |
| Refereed: | Yes, this version has been refereed |
| Created at the University of Regensburg: | Yes |
| Item ID: | 32531 |
Abstract
Sensory systems represent an essential interface between the organism and its environment. Throughout life the organism continuously interacts with stimuli, objects and environments and this interaction has a long-lasting effect on its cen-tral nervous system. Humans learn to respond optimally to stimuli as they occur in everyday scenarios. The neuroscience of learning and memory attempts to ...
Abstract
Sensory systems represent an essential interface between the organism and its environment. Throughout life the organism continuously interacts with stimuli, objects and environments and this interaction has a long-lasting effect on its cen-tral nervous system. Humans learn to respond optimally to stimuli as they occur in everyday scenarios. The neuroscience of learning and memory attempts to explain how the nervous system adapts to new environments and learns through repeated practice. Two forms of learning have been the focus of neuroscientific investiga-tion: procedural learning and perceptual learning. Procedural learning is defined as a training-induced change in performance for a given task, in which repeating a complex activity leads to an automatic (and often unconscious) production of highly adaptive behaviour or skill. Perceptual learning, on the other hand, is
“the specific and relatively permanent modification of perception and behaviour following sensory experience. It encompasses parts of the learning process that are independent from conscious forms of learning and involve structural and/or functional changes in primary sensory cortices” (Fahle & Poggio, 2002).
These two forms of learning are involved in skill acquisition and they underlie at least partly the formation of professional expertise.
This chapter will introduce concepts in neuroscience required to understand the possible changes that occur in biological nervous systems when an organism is re-peatedly exposed to a particular stimulus configuration. The focus in this chapter will be on low-level processes in perception and motor control and how these low-level processes are improved by learning. More complex cognitive skills that build on these low-level processes will be discussed in the final section of this chapter.
To introduce the reader to concepts used in neuroscience (see glossary below), processes like adaptation, habituation, sensitization, conditioning and extinction will be defined and differentiated from procedural and perceptual learning. Each of these processes exhibits specific time constants that describe the change in neu-ral activity over time, being either short- or long-term. These low-level forms of learning are discriminated from other forms of learning and memory that require conscious encoding, consolidation and recall. Next, a review is given of the most relevant work on the topics of perceptual and procedural learning. Some recent insights into the role of dopaminergic and cholinergic processes will be given. The chapter will conclude by providing a description of the state of the art in the neu-roscientific study of skill acquisition. A discussion of the possible ramifications of this research on the design of learning environments will be given.
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