Konekcionizam

Općenito

Konekcionizam se danas definira kao pristup u područjima umjetne inteligencije, kognitivne psihologije, kognitivne znanosti i filozofije uma kao dio modela mentalnih ili ponašajnih fenomena sa mrežama jednostavnih jedinica , nije dio teorije u okvirima biheviorizma, ali je na njega utjecala i prethodila mu bihevioristička škola učenja. Konekcionizam predstavlja prvu teoriju učenja u psihologiji.1) Mayer, Richard E. E. L. Thorndike’s Enduring Contributions to Educational Psychology. In Educational psychology: a century of contributions. Routledge, 2003. . Ovo je bio uvod od Herbert Spencer, William Jamesi njegovog studenta Edward Thorndike na samom početku 20. stoljeća iako njegovi korijeni sežu i dalje u prošlost.

What is connectionism?

Connectionism was based on principles of associationism, mostly claiming that elements or ideas become associated with one another through experience and that complex ideas can be explained through a set of simple rules. But connectionism further expanded these assumptions and introduced ideas like distributed representations and supervised learning2) Medler, David A. A Brief History of Connectionism. Neural Computing Surveys, 1(2), p18-72. 1998. and should not be confused with associationism.

Thorndike, the most commonly cited connectionist, summed his ideas on learning into three laws of learning, which should have accounted for both human and animal learning:3) Foreman, Kim. Learning Laws of Thorndike - brief overview. Retrieved June 24, 2011. Link obsolete.

Laws of learning
1. Law of exercise	(Also: as law of use or law of frequency) The stimulus-response (S-R) associations are strengthened through repetition or weakened through lack of repetition.
2. Law of effect	The consequence or outcome of a situation-response event can strengthen or weaken the connection between situation and response. If an event is followed by a positive reinforcing stimulus, the connection will be strengthened and vice versa.
3. Law of readiness	Learning is facilitated by learner's readiness (emotional and motivational) to learn. This potential to learn leads to frustration if not satisfied.

This laws have set the basic principles of behaviorist stimulus-response learning, which was according to Thorndike the key form of learning.

Thorndike also performed a number of experiments on animals concluding that learning is incremental and not insightful. Established S-R connections or knowledge, according to Thorndike also cause and determine intelligence.

Thorndike later changed some of his views admitting that he was wrong and that negative reinforcement (punishment) does not facilitate nor lead to learning. This had great influence on educational process helping to end the practice of punishing the students for incorrect answers.1)

Another point of Thorndike's interest in the first two decades of 20th century was the transfer of practice, later often referred to as transfer of learning. Idea of transfer of practice is to generalize the knowledge or skills and apply them for another problem. Thorndike performed experimental studies showing that transfer of learning will not occur unless learned problem and given problem have many common characteristics.4) Thorndike, E. L., and R. S. Woodworth. The influence of improvement in one mental function upon the efficiency of other functions (I). Psychological Review, no. 8: 247-261, 1901. 5) Thorndike, Edward L., and R. S. Woodworth. The influence of improvement in one mental function upon the efficiency of other functions (II). Psychological Review, no. 8: 384-395, 1901. This was the opposite of what school systems mostly suggested at the time: that some school subjects like Latin language and mathematics improve student's mind in general (doctrine of formal discipline).

Guided by the principle that “whatever exists at all exists in some amount”6) Thorndike, Edward L. Individual differences. Psychological bulletin. 1918. Thorndike has introduced a number of tests of knowledge and intelligence. His CAVD (Completion, Arithmetic, Vocabulary and Directions) test set the major principles and standards of modern intelligence tests.

What is the practical meaning of connectivism?

Practical implications of Thorndike's ideas are suggested through his laws of learning:

rewards promote learning, but punishments do not lead to learning,

repetition enhances learning, and

potential to learn needs to be satisfied.

In his book on learning of mathematics7) Thorndike, E. The Psychology of Arithmetic. New York: Macmillan. 1922. , Thorndike suggested problems children are expected to solve and learn from should be realistic. For example learning to multiply by three should be learned in context of converting feet to yards. He also emphasizes importance of repetition and insists on repetitive practice of basic arithmetic operations. Some of the principles in this book even seem inconsistent with his views on learning: here he refers to learning as meaningful and insightful. Well-learned basic skills enable learning of higher-order skills.

Thorndike tried to apply this to learning mathematics7), spelling and reading 8) Thorndike, E. The Teacher's Word Book. New York: Teachers College. 1921. , measurement of intelligence 9) Thorndike, E. at al. The Measurement of Intelligence. New York: Teachers College Press. 1927. and adult learning 10) Thorndike, E. et al. Adult Learning. New York: Macmillan. 1928. mostly through his laws of learning. He was one of the pioneers of active learning, proposing children should learn by themselves rather than being thought.

Criticisms

Thorndike tried to prove that all forms of thoughts and behaviors can be explained through S-R relations with use of repetition and reward, without need for introducing any unobservable internal states, yet this is today generally considered incorrect. This learning through response was later in 20th century replaced by learning as knowledge construction. Connectionism was in the first decades of 20th century succeeded by behaviorism, but Thorndike's experiments also inspired gestalt psychology.

Keywords and most important names

Connectionism, stimulus-response, S-R, networks of simple units, associationism, supervised learning, law of exercise or use or frequency, law of effect, incremental learning, trial and error

Herbert Spencer, William James, Edward Thorndike

Bibliography

Medler, David A. A Brief History of Connectionism. Neural Computing Surveys, 1(2), p18-72. 1998.

Kearsley, Greg. Connectionism (E. Thorndike). The Theory Into Practice Database. Retrieved February 2, 2011.

Reinemeyer, E. Edward Lee Thorndike. Muskingum University. May 1999.

Zimmerman, Barry J. and Schunk, Dale H. Educational psychology: a century of contributions. Routledge, 2003.

Read more

Thorndike, E. The Contribution of Psychology to Education. The Journal of Educational Psychology, 1, 5-12. 1910.

E. L. Thorndike and R. S. Woodworth. The influence of improvement in one mental function upon the efficiency of other functions. Psychological Review, no. 8: 247-261. 1901.

Thorndike, E. Animal Intelligence. 1911.

Donahoe, J. Edward L. Thorndike: The Selectionist Connectionist. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior 72, no. 3: 451-454, November 1999.

Thorndike, E. Educational Psychology: The Psychology of Learning. New York: Teachers College Press. 1913.

Thorndike, E. The Psychology of Arithmetic. New York: Macmillan. 1922.

Thorndike, E. The Fundamentals of Learning. New York: Teachers College Press. 1932.

Thorndike, E. et al. Adult Learning. New York: Macmillan . 1928.