Church Barbara A, Jackson Brooke N, Smith J David
Language Research Center, Georgia State University.
Department of Psychology, Georgia State University.
New Ideas Psychol. 2021 Jan;60. doi: 10.1016/j.newideapsych.2020.100817. Epub 2020 Aug 8.
To explain learning, comparative researchers invoke an associative construct by which immediate reinforcement strengthens animal's adaptive responses. In contrast, cognitive researchers freely acknowledge humans' explicit-learning capability to test and confirm hypotheses even lacking direct reinforcement. We describe a new dissociative framework that may stretch animals' learning toward the explicit pole of cognition. We discuss the neuroscience of reinforcement-based learning and suggest the possibility of disabling a dominant form of reinforcement-based discrimination learning. In that vacuum, researchers may have an opportunity to observe animals' explicit learning strategies (i.e., hypotheses, rules, task self-construals). We review initial research using this framework showing explicit learning by humans and perhaps by monkeys. Finally, we consider why complementary explicit and reinforcement-based learning systems might promote evolutionary and ecological fitness. Illuminating the evolution of parallel learning systems may also tell part of the story of the emergence of humans' extraordinary capacity for explicit-declarative cognition.
为了解释学习过程，比较研究人员引入了一种联想结构，通过这种结构，即时强化会增强动物的适应性反应。相比之下，认知研究人员欣然承认人类具有明确学习的能力，即使缺乏直接强化，也能检验和证实假设。我们描述了一个新的分离框架，该框架可能会将动物的学习向认知的明确极点延伸。我们讨论了基于强化学习的神经科学，并提出了禁用一种主要形式的基于强化的辨别学习的可能性。在这种空白状态下，研究人员可能有机会观察动物的明确学习策略（即假设、规则、任务自我建构）。我们回顾了使用该框架的初步研究，这些研究表明人类乃至猴子都有明确学习的能力。最后，我们思考为什么互补的明确学习和基于强化的学习系统可能会促进进化和生态适应性。阐明并行学习系统的进化过程，或许也能揭示人类非凡的明确陈述性认知能力出现的部分原因。
