Introduction

A study on organizational behavior will remain incomplete without studying learning. It is for this obvious reason that almost all complex behavior is learned. If a manager wants to explain and predict human behavior, he/she needs to understand how learning occurs or how people learn.

Meaning And Definition

What is learning? In simple words, learning is a change in behavior as a result of experience. Different psychologists and behavioral scientists have defined learning differently. Given below are a few important definitions of learning. 

According to Stephen P. Robbins, "Learning is any relatively permanent change in behavior that occurs as a result of experience."

Munn et. al have defined learning as “The process of having one's behavior modified, more or less permanently, by what he does and the consequences of his action, or by what he observes".

In the opinion of Steers and Porter, "Learning can be defined as relatively permanent change in behavior potentiality that results from reinforced practice or experience."

Now, on an overall basis, learning can be defined as a change in behavior acquired through experience.

The above definitions of learning reveal several components that deserve clarification.

• First, Learning involves change, be it good or bad.

• Second, the change in behavior must be relatively permanent. For that matter, a temporary change in behavior as a result of fatigue or temporary adaptations are not considered learning.

• Third, only change in behavior acquired through experience is considered learning. Therefore, a change in individual's thought process or attitudes, if accompanied by no change in behavior, would not be learning. For example, the ability to work that is based on maturation, disease, or physical damages would not be considered learning.

• Fourth, some form of experience is necessary for learning. Experience may be acquired directly through practice or observation or indirectly, as through reading. Finally, learning is not confined to our schooling only. As a matter of fact, learning is a life-long process. 

Principles Of Learning

Principles of learning are highly useful for trainer in order to impart maximum knowledge and skills to the trainees. However, blind adherence to these principles can cause more harm than good. Each principle should, therefore, be interpreted and applied carefully in full consideration of the particular task being learned and the context in which the learning takes place. Principles of learning are many but the most important of them are: motivation, reinforcement, whole versus part learning, learning curves, meaningfulness of material and learning styles.

1. Motivation

The concept of motivation is basic because, without motivation learning does not take place or, at last, is not discernible. Motivation may be seen at different levels of complexity of a situation. A thirsty rat will learn the path through a maze to a dish of water, it is not likely to do so well, or even more purposefully at all, if it is satiated. On a broader level, a college student must have the need and drive to accomplish a task and reach a specific goal.

2. Reinforcement, Punishment And Extinction

Reinforcement, punishment and extinction play a key role in learning process. Reinforcement is used to enhance desirable behavior, punishment and extinction are employed to minimize undesirable behavior.

A. Reinforcement

Reinforcement is the attempt to develop or strengthen desirable behavior. There are two types of reinforcement: positive reinforcement and negative reinforcement.

a) Positive reinforcement 

Positive reinforcement strengthens and enhances behavior by the presentation of positive reinforcers. There are primary reinforcers and secondary reinforcers. Primary reinforcers satisfy basic biological needs and include food, water, and sexual pleasure. However, primary reinforcers do not always reinforce. For example, food may not be a reinforcer to someone who has just completed a five course meal. Most behaviors in organizations are influenced by secondary reinforcers. These include such benefits as money, status, grades, trophies, and praise from others. These become positive reinforcers because of their association with the primary reinforcers and hence are often called conditioned reinforcers.

It should be noted that an event that functions as a positive reinforcer at one time or in one context may have a different effect at another time or in another place. For example, food may serve as a positive reinforcer for a person who is hungry, but not when the person, as stated above, has already a large meal. Clearly, a stimulus that functions as a positive reinforcer for one person may fail to operate in a similar manner for another person.

Within itself, positive reinforcement has several principles.

• The principle of contingent reinforcement states that the reinforcer must be administered only if the desired behavior has occurred. A reinforcer administered when the desired behavior has not been performed becomes ineffective.

• The principle of immediate reinforcement states that the reinforcer will be most effective if administered immediately after the desired behavior has occurred. The more time that elapses after the behavior occurs, the less effective the reinforcer will be.

• The principle of reinforcement size states that the larger the amount of reinforcement delivered after the desired behavior, the more effect the reinforcer will have on the frequency of the desired behavior. The amount, or size, of reinforcer is relative. A reinforcer that may be insignificant to one person may be significant to another person. Thus, the size of the reinforcer must be determined in relation both to the behavior and the individual.

• The principles of reinforcement deprivation states that the more a person is deprived of the reinforcer, the greater effect it will have on the future occurrence of the desired behavior. However, if an individual recently has had enough of a reinforcer and is satisfied the reinforcer will have less effect.

b) Negative Reinforcement 

In negative reinforcement an unpleasant event that precedes a behavior is removed when the desired behavior occurs. This procedure increases the likelihood that the desired behavior will occur.

Just as there are positive reinforcers, there are negative reinforcers as well. Negative reinforcers are the stimuli that strengthen responses that permit an organism to avoid or escape from their presence. Thus, when we perform an action that allows us to escape from a negative reinforcer that is already present or to avoid the threatened application of one, our tendency to perform this action in the future increases. Some negative reinforcers such as intense heat, extreme cold, or electric shock, exert their effects the first time they are encountered, whereas others acquire their impact through repeated association. 

We see negative reinforcement in organizations and in personal life. Supervisors apply negative reinforcement when they stop criticizing employees whose poor performance has improved. By withholding the criticism, employees are more likely to repeat behaviors that enhance their performance. Negative reinforcement also occurs when parents give in to their children's tantrums especially in public places, such as restaurants and shopping malls. Over time, the parent's tendency to give in may increase, because doing so stops screaming.

Thus, both positive and negative reinforcement are procedures that strengthen or increase behavior. Positive reinforcement strengthens and increases behavior by the presentation of desirable consequences. Negative reinforcement strengthens and increases behavior by the threat of and the use of an undesirable consequence or the termination or withdrawal of an undesirable consequence.

Negative reinforcement is sometimes confused with punishment, because both use unpleasant stimuli to influence behavior. However, negative reinforcement is used to increase the frequency of a desired behavior, where as punishment is used to decrease the frequency of an undesired behavior.

Schedules of Reinforcement: 

Reinforcement, positive or negative, needs to be properly scheduled. Schedules of reinforcement determine when reinforcers are applied. Psychologists have identified several different schedules of reinforcement. For example, where reinforcement is administered uninterruptedly, it is called continuous reinforcement. Unlike animals performing tricks in a circus, people on the job are rarely reinforced continuously. Instead, in organizations, reinforces are administered following partial (or intermittent) reinforcement schedules, This means that rewards are administered intermittently. Four varieties of partial reinforcement schedules have great relevance to organizations: fixed interval schedule, variable interval schedule, fixed ratio schedule, variable ratio schedule.

1. Fixed interval schedule

Fixed interval schedule means providing reinforcement on a predetermined, constant schedule. The first desired behavior to occur after the interval has elapsed is reinforced. For example, in a fixed interval, 1 - hour schedule, the first desired behavior that occurs after an hour has elapsed is reinforced. Monthly pay cheque is one example of fixed interval reinforcement.

A fixed interval schedule tends to lead to average and irregular performance. It may result in fast extinction of behavior too. For example, employees who know that their boss will pass by their desks everyday at 1 p.m. will make sure they are working hard at that time. However, without the boss around to praise them, they may take an early break for lunch, or otherwise work less hard because they know that they will not be positively reinforced for their efforts or punished for not working

2. Variable Interval Schedule

Variable interval schedule also uses time as the basis for applying reinforcement, but it varies the intervals between reinforcements. Reverting to the example of the boss passing by employees desks. Suppose that instead of coming by at exactly 1 p.m. every day, the boss visits at a different time each day: 9:30 a.m.on Monday, 2 p.m. on Tuesday, 11 a.m. on Wednesday, and so on. The following week, the times change. Because the employees do not know just when to expect the boss, they tend to work fairly hard until his or her visit. After the visit, the employees may drop back to lower levels because they know the boss will not visit till the next day. As in the fixed interval schedule, there is extinction of behavior but the process is slow.

3. Fixed Ratio Schedule

In fixed ratio schedule, reinforcement is administered after the desired behaviors occur a specified number of times. Piece rating of wages is an example to be stated in this context.

A worker gets paid wages equal to the number of units produced multiplied by rate per unit. Similarly, a salesgirl knows she will earn a bonus for each Rs. 25,000 worth of goods she sells. Immediately after receiving the first reward, performance may slack off. But as her sales begin to approach Rs.50,000, the next level at which reward is expected, performance will once again improve. There is moderately fast extinction of behavior too.

4. Variable Ratio Schedule 

In this, a certain number of desired behaviors must occur before the reinforcer is delivered, but the number of behaviors varies around some average, as for example, reinforcement after 19, then 15, then 12, then 24, and then 17. This type of reinforcement schedule provokes most interest and is preferred by employees for some tasks. It tends to be the most powerful of all the reinforcement schedules.

An interesting fact is that slot machines and a number of other gambling devices operate on a variable ratio schedule. Most of the time when people put a coin into a slot they lose. But, after some unknown number of plays, the machine will payoff. Because gamblers can never tell which pull of the handle will win the jackpot, they are likely to keep on playing for a long time. Obviously, this reinforcement leads to a very high performance. Extinction of behavior is also very slow.

Comparison of Schedules 

Following figure summaries the four types of intermittent reinforcement schedules. Which is superior? The answer is ratio schedules - fixed or variable. The reason is that ratio schedules are more closely related to the occurrences of desired behaviors than are internal schedules, which are based on the passage of time.

B. Punishment

Punishment is the attempt to eliminate or weaken an undesirable behavior. It is used in two ways. One way to punish a person is to apply a negative consequences called punishers - following an undesirable behavior. For example, a professional athlete who is excessively offensive to an official (undesirable behavior) may be ejected from a game (punished). The other way to punish a person is to withhold a positive consequence following an undesirable behavior. For example, a sales representative who makes few visits to companies (undesirable behavior) is likely to receive less commission (positive reinforcer) at the end of the month.

Reverting to the principles of punishment, it may be stated that punishment may end up in unintended results - mainly negative outcomes. Even though punishment may stop an undesirable behavior of an employee, the potential negative outcomes may be greater than the cost of undesirable behavior. Following diagram illustrates some potential negative effects of punishment. As shown in the diagram, punishment tends to minimize undesirable behavior. But if repeated, punishment may result in undesirable emotions, hostility towards boss, low performance, and even high turnover and absenteeism.

C. Extinction

An alternate to punishing undesirable behavior is extinction. Extinction is the weakening of a behavior by ignoring it or making sure it is not reinforced. The rationale for using extinction is that a behavior not followed by any reinforcer is weakened. In other words, if rewards are withdrawn for behavior that were previously reinforced, the behaviors probably will become less frequent and die out. But extinction needs time and patience to be effective. 

D. Whole versus part learning

A great deal of work has been done in psychology of learning to decide whether learning a whole job is superior to breaking the job into parts and learning the parts. In parts learning, the individual is not only required to learn each individual part but must be able to combine the separate parts so that the whole performance can be accomplished. No overall conclusion, however, has been reached in this field.

E. Learning Curves

A highly useful learning concept, which is valid for a wide range of situations, is the learning curve, a diagrammatic presentation of the amount learned in relation to time. A typical learning curve will show on the Y-axis the amount learnt and on the X-axis the passage of time. Fig. 9.7 represents a generalised learning curve, which shows the extent to which the rate of learning increases or decreases with practice.

Certain characteristics are common to all learning curves. One such feature is the initial spuri. At the beginning, it is natural that the rate of learning exhibits a spurt. Usually, the graph levels off at some stage, indicating that maximum performance has been achieved. Apparently at the beginning of the learning process, the subject is highly motivated and seems to exhibit a significant surge of effort. Many experienced trainers exploit this initial spurt by selecting the most important items to be communicated and presenting them as a package to the students at the beginning of the training unit. In many ways, it is possible to exemplify the initial spurt with the aphorism “the first step is the best step”

Another feature of the curve is the learning plateau. At some point in the learning process there is a flattening off in terms of the improvement, a plateau. Frequently, the process of learning is marked by discontinuities and involves escalating from one plateau to another. Most learners are only too aware of the experience of finding themselves on a plateau, which manifests itself in the feeling that they are never going to get anywhere.

Jumping from one plateau to another is called organisation of learning. Organisation of learning is achieved when the learner discovers a new and more effective method of performing particular tasks. For example, when he learns to apply the calculus to solve problems of business.

Disorganisation of learning is an actual fall off in performance. This arises when the subject has to choose between alternative methods of tackling a task.

The last characteristic of the learning curve is the end spurt. The end spurt is preceded by fatigue which is likely to set in with the passage of time. When the training session draws nearer to an end, and the subject realises this, there occurs resurgence of interest and effort to learn more. This revival is called the end spurt.

F. Meaningfulness of materials 

A definite relationship has been established between learning and meaningfulness of the subject learnt. The more meaningful the material, the better does learning proceed. Learning of nonsense syllables proceeds more slowly than that of prose or poetry. On a broader scale, a programme of learning, where, each task makes for meaningfulness, trainers do have certain techniques that increase meaning for the trainees. Organising meaningfulness units, creating association with already familiar terms, and providing a conceptual basis of logical reason for the material are some of the practical possibilities.

G. Learning styles

The final principle of learning is the learning styles. Learning style refers to the ability of an individual to learn. A manager's long-term success depends more on the ability to learn than on the mastery of the specific skills or technical knowledge. There are four styles people use when learning: accommodation, divergence, assimilation, and convergence. Following diagram depicts the four styles. The four styles are based on two dimensions: feeling versus thinking and doing versus observing.

1. Accommodator

An accommodator learns by doing and feeling. He/she tends to learn primarily from hands-on experience. He or she tends to act on gut feeling rather than on logical analysis. An accommodator tends to rely more heavily on people for information while making decisions. He or she seeks action-oriented careers such as marketing, politics, public relations and management

2. Diverger

A diverger learns by observing and feeling. The diverger has the ability to view concreto situations from different angles. When solving problems, diverger enjoys brainstorming. He or she takes time and analyses many alternatives. Diverger is imaginative and sensitive to the needs of the other people. He or she seeks careers in entertainment, arts and services sector.

3. Converger

A converger learns by doing and thinking. The converger seeks practical use for information. When presented with problems and making decisions, the converger tends to focus on solutions. Converger tends to prefer dealing with technical tasks and problems rather than social and interpersonal issues. Converger seeks technical careers in various scientific fields and work at engineering, production supervision, IT and managerial jobs.

4. Assimilator

An assimilator learns by observing and thinking. The assimilator is effective at understanding a wide range of information and putting in to concise and logical form. It is more important for the assimilator that an idea or theory is logical than practical. Assimilator tends to be more concerned with abstract ideas and concept than with people. He or she tends to seek careers in education, information, and science.