An ETHOLOGICAL Approach to TEACHING and LEARNING

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An ETHOLOGICAL Approach to TEACHING and LEARNING

• Causes and consequences of behavior are both
  proximate and ultimate
• Complementary questions representing relevant
  biological variables (DDEEP ETHOLOGY)
• Epigenetic cascade of interacting biological and
  environmental influences

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An ETHOLOGICAL Approach to Animal Behavior

• Causes and consequences of behavior are both
  proximate and ultimate
• Complementary questions representing relevant
  biological variables (DDEEP ETHOLOGY)
• Epigenetic cascade of interacting biological and
  environmental influences

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CAUSES and CONSEQUENCES

• Behavioral patterns are presumed to have CAUSES
  and a CONSEQUENCES
• It is helpful to distinguish endpoints on a
  continuum from PROXIMATE to ULTIMATE causes
• Scientific investigations are informed by an
  accurate Description of the behavioral pattern we
  are concerned with and by the questions and
  methods of several biological disciplines
• Development
• Ecology
• Evolution and
• Physiology

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DETERMINISM

• Variables determining behavior are rarely
  exclusively
• Biological (genetic or nature) or
  Environmental (nurture)
• They are
• Epigenetic reflecting the cascade of interacting
  genetic and environmental variables (Open and
  Closed Genetic Programs)

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Epigenetic Cascade

• The genetic program both forms and is formed by
  the context in which it unfolds
• The progress of the organism follows in part the
  path created by preceding events.
• se hace camino al andar (the road is made by
  walking.
• Antonio Machado)

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DECIPHERING DETERMINISM

• . . . grant me the serenity to accept the things
  I cannot change,
• courage to change the things I can,
• and the wisdom to know the difference.
• (from Reinhold Neibuhrs adaptation of a 14th c
  English prayer)

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DECIPHERING DETERMINISM

• Although real wisdom is beyond science
• . . . the aim of science is not to open the
  door to everlasting wisdom, but to set a limit on
  everlasting error.
• (from Bertolt Brechts Life of Galileo)

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Domains of Ethology

• Description (morphology)
• Development
• Ecology
• Evolution
• Physiology

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DESCRIPTION

• MORPHOLOGY The structures from cells to
  systems to body form that act in the world
• Anatomy, cytology . . .
• The structural phenotype
• Objective description of behavior emphasizing the
  parts of the body involved

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Development

• The progressive change in the nature of the
  organism often occurs in phases.
• Ontogeny The delicate stages requiring great
  stability occurs in a protected environment (egg,
  womb)
• Experience The flexible stage that must adjust
  to the vagaries of a less protected environment
  (the world with which one must cope)

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Development

• All changes in organisms (including their
  development) can be traced back to the activation
  or suppression of genes.
• Genomics Between the activation of a gene and
  the consequences for the organism, there are
  typically many steps, most of which involve
  protein synthesis.
• Proteomics There are far more proteins than
  genes. Activating a gene initiates a cascade of
  effects some of which are collateral effects,
  side-effects.

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Ecology

• The environment, internal and external
• Ecosystem geology, climate . . .
• Social family, tribe, populatrion . . .
• EPIGENESIS genes and the ENVIRONMENT interact,
  resulting in the manifest form (morphology) and
  behavior of the living organism
• THE ENVIRONMENT is the editor of traits
  (natural selection) selection pressure

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ECOLOGY

• The environment in which the organism is born
  develops, prospers, and dies.
• Context of life internal (the milieu interieur)
  and external (climate and geology)
• Determines Fitness

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ECOLOGY revisited

• The environment in which the organism is born
  develops, prospers, and dies.
• The environment drives adaptive change in
  organisms. Adaptations are traits that
  contribute to fitness (direct and indirect)
• It also epigenetically structures what we can and
  cannot know or understand, in a sense we are
  inseparable from the environment we are in it
  and it is within us, the interstices of our
  brains . . . It is the matrix in which we are
  embedded . . .
• It informs our brains of what is or is not (or
  can or cannot) be real.
• There is manifest reality (what we see) and
  latent reality (what lies beneath the surface and
  cannot be directly known).
• Art enlarges our capacity to understand the
  latent possibilities of our worlds

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Evolution

• Evolution is about being in the right place at
  the right time
• Blind variation, selective retention
• Darwins observations
• 1. Species overproduce young
• 2. Populations in nature remain stable
• 3. Resources are limited
• 4. Individual young are variable
• 5. Variability can be inherited
• Inferences
• Struggle for survival among individuals
• DIFFERENTIAL SURVIVAL and REPRODUCTION (natural
  selection)
• Changes accrue over many generations

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EVOLUTION

• Involves transmission of biologically relevant
  information across generations.
• Genetics Genes are biological units of
  inheritance. The program by which they are
  translated into manifest phenotype can be
  open or closed with respect to the influence
  of the environment. Most traits are polygenic,
  most genes are pleiotropic.
• Memetics Memes are cultural units of
  inheritance such as words, ideas fashions . . .
• Epigenetics interaction of genes and environment

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Physiology

• Neurobiology
• Endocrinology
• The nervous systems work with the endocrine
  system to help the organism cope with its NEEDS
  most of which are created by the changing
  internal and external environments
• INPUT INTEGRATION OUTPUT

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PHYSIOLOGY

• The proximate causation of behavior.
• Requires a stabile milieu interieur maintained
  by homeostasis the dynamic balance of multiple
  systems
• Neurology Central and peripheral nervous
  systems
• Endocrinology The glands and hormones that can
  be stimulated by the nervous system but also feed
  back to affect the nervous system

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Neurobehavioral homeostasis

• MOTIVATION -- involves accommodating fundamental
  needs (realte to Maslow's "needs hierarchy") key
  neural structure in vertebrates is HYPOTHALAMUS
  (which coordinates AUTONOMIC activities of
  nervous system)
• AFFECT -- involves detection and evaluation of
  "salience" of stimuli and situation approach and
  avoidance responses (often perceived as
  "emotional responses" and possessing autonomic
  elements may be more-or-less "stressful") key
  neural structures are LIMBIC SYSTEM (especially
  n. accumbens of basal ganglia and amygdala)
• COGNITION -- involves selection and assessment of
  alternative inputs and outputs of which the
  organism has some level of awareness. May need to
  evoke memory and internal representations
  (models) key neural structures are parts of
  FOREBRAIN (especially prefrontal cortex in
  "higher" vertebrates)

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HIERARCHY OF INDIVIDUAL HUMAN NEEDS FOR EDUCATION

• PHYSIOLOGICAL (we need to maintain homeostasis
  and protect the stability of our milieu
  interiour, we must tolerate, compensate for, or
  overcome environmental change, dysfunctions and
  diseases of cells, tissues and organs)
• SAFETY (we need to meet challenges to the
  integrity and stability of the whole organism)
• SOCIAL (we need to be in the company of others
  for enhanced protection from physical or
  predatory threats, to locate or produce food, for
  resource defense, to facilitate the efficiency of
  division of labor, for a richer learning
  environment, and for reproduction)
• SOCIAL ESTEEM (we need to have our superiority in
  life_enhancing attributes the group values
  recognized, partly because our social group is
  likely to protect us or our access to needed
  resources)
• SELF ACTUALIZATION (we need to attain our maximum
  biological or cultural potential, a state
  characterized in humans by a unique and ineffable
  epiphenomenal harmony with one's self and
  environment)
• after Maslow

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CONSTRAINTS ON LEARNING

• Stimuli. Constraints on stimuli.
• Response. Constraints on the response.
• Species and sex differences in reinforcing
  effects.
• Response/reinforcer interactions.
• Diversity of reinforcing effects.
  Drive-reduction, need met
• Context, the physical or cultural ecology of an
  experience (metaphor, stress, comfort zone))
• Competing behavior elicited by irrelevant aspects
  of the context.
• Developmental. Age changes sensitive periods,
  windows
• Adapted from Hinde 1973

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THINKING ABOUT TEACHING
METAPHOR EDUCATIONAL CONCEPT EDUCATIONAL CONCEPT EDUCATIONAL CONCEPT EDUCATIONAL CONCEPT
TEACHING LEARNING KNOWLEDGE MIND
I Container pouring absorbing material (substance) container (holds)
II Journey guiding making progress horizon (perspective) inner eye (sees)
III Master-Disciple training doing exercises skill (habit) muscles (acts)
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HIERARCHICAL TAXONOMY OF TEACHING

• I. AUTONOMOUS TEACHING AUTO-TEACHING
• II. MODELING SOCIAL TEACHING ALLO-TEACHING
  forms
• 1. Mere presence
• 2. Peer facilitation
• 3. Modeling
• III. INTERACTIVE TEACHING. Teaching in the
  traditional sense the teacher's actions vary
  according to student reactions.
• IV. MEDIATION individuals act to foster
  generalizations beyond the immediate needs of
  observers (transcendence) by selectively
  emphasizing specific aspects of stimuli, their
  relationships, their temporal or spatial
  contexts typically by intervening between
  stimuli and student to transform the student's
  experience (MLE)

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HIERARCHICAL TAXONOMY OF TEACHING

• I. AUTONOMOUS TEACHING AUTO-TEACHING
• Self-teaching, unaffected by the presence of
  observers, but may or may not be inhibited by
  their presence involves curiosity and
  observation, including feedback about one's own
  behavior. The behavior of autonomous teachers
  (or the influence or artifacts of their behavior)
  may be observed by others. May include the
  internalization of forms of social teaching.

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HIERARCHICAL TAXONOMY OF TEACHING

• II. MODELING
• The teacher models the student imitates
• Sometimes it is a reciprocal relationship

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HIERARCHICAL TAXONOMY OF TEACHING

• II. MODELING
  SOCIAL TEACHING
  ALLO-TEACHING forms
• 1. Mere presence of another (even passive or
  imagined?) individual may facilitate the
  probability, rate, or frequency of the
  performance of a behavioral pattern in another
  individual (audience effect). the performer
  (actor, teacher) may or may not prosper as a
  result of practice, and the observer (audience,
  student, respondent) may prosper as a result of
  (a) demonstration of boundary conditions
  (empowerment) for the act, its target, or context
  or (b) demonstration of modal (typical) motor
  acts and their coordination.
• 2. Peer facilitation (reciprocal facilitation)
  comparably inexperienced individuals teach each
  other including facilitating by co-action of
  individuals engaged in the same task.

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HIERARCHICAL TAXONOMY OF TEACHING

• 3. Modeling (teacher's actions fixed in form)
• a. Indifferent modeling individuals (models,
  actors, teachers) may act, unaffected by the
  presence of observers.
• b. Observer-affected (facilitated) modeling
  models have their actions affected (facilitated
  or inhibited) by the presence of observers.
• c. Directed modeling Models act only in the
  presence of observers involves recruiting and
  sustaining their attention and directing their
  actions to them.

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HIERARCHICAL TAXONOMY OF TEACHING

• III. INTERACTIVE TEACHING. Teaching in the
  traditional sense the teacher's actions vary
  according to student reactions.
• a. Responsive teaching individuals direct their
  actions to students to on the basis of feedback
  from students.
• b Adjusted teaching individuals adjust their
  actions to accommodate feedback from performance
  of student includes reciprocity, providing
  guiding feedback to students about their
  performance.

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HIERARCHICAL TAXONOMY OF TEACHING

• IV. MEDIATION individuals act to foster
  generalizations beyond the immediate needs of
  observers (transcendence) by selectively
  emphasizing specific aspects of stimuli, their
  relationships, their temporal or spatial
  contexts typically by intervening between
  stimuli and student to transform the student's
  experience (MLE)
• INTERNAL versus EXTERNAL validity an issue ?