Learning Sets (Learning to Learn)

Modified: 2020-03-27

A more complex form of learning is learning to learn, or learning sets. Learning sets are found in many places. An example is taking a test. Many things contribute to success in test taking: studying, knowing the type of test items in advance, sleeping well the night before, and so on. The question is, how does one acquire a set of successful test-taking behaviors? By taking lots of tests is the answer. Over time, test takers will, by trial and error, develop an array of successful behaviors to engage in before a test. Conversely, they will also develop another array of behaviors NOT to engage in before a test. So learning sets develop with experience.

Sports are another place where learning sets develop routinely. Sportscasters always talk about teams and players that "...have been there before." Because of their experience, they are less likely to be surprised by new events in a big game. So, game experience and specifically, game experience in particular situations (e.g., the Final Four, the World Series, the Super Bowl) seems to affect performance positively in similar games subsequently.

Harlow studied learning sets experimentally with rhesus monkeys in the WGTA, the Wisconsin General Test Apparatus. In the WGTA, subjects are presented with pairs of stimuli six times. Under one of the stimuli is a reinforcer (Froot Loops are a monkey favorite). Then the monkey is allowed to knock away one of the stimuli. If the correct one is displaced, it gets the reinforcer; if not, the tray is quickly withdrawn. The interesting results in the WGTA occur when one looks at the performance of experienced versus inexperienced subjects. Highly experienced subjects are nearly always correct from the second trial on, while inexperienced subjects hover around a chance level (e.g., 50%). Just like test-takers and athletes, the experienced monkeys had learned the situation. They knew when to stay and when to switch, even with stimuli they had never seen before.

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