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PubMedDate not supplied

Development of alterations in learning: situational learning disabilities.

Until now the nursing diagnosis knowledge deficit has served as a label for all teaching/learning situations. This is inadequate and does not effectively give direction to correct intervention(s). The purpose of this article is to present the diagnostic concept, situational learning disability (SLD), a component of Alterations in Learning, which has been identified as an area to be developed in the Knowing pattern of the NANDA taxonomy. A thorough review of the literature and empirical support involving 20 cardiology patients on a 27-bed telemetry step-down unit is provided. The data support the development of two nursing diagnoses: (1) situational learning disability: impaired ability to learn; and (2) situational learning disability: lack of motivation to learn. The proper identification of these diagnoses can assist nurses in discriminating between patients who can learn, those who cannot learn, and those who need adjustments made in order to facilitate their learning. With this information nurses will be able to make decisions concerning the timing and type of intervention that is most appropriate.

Adult↗
PubMed1995

Implicit learning and concept learning.

In Experiments 1 and 2, subjects were exposed to letter strings that followed a pattern--the second letter was always the same. This exposure was disguised as a test of immediate memory. Following this training, subjects could discriminate new letter strings following the pattern from letter strings not following the pattern more often than would be expected by chance, which is the traditional evidence for concept learning. Discrimination was also better than would be predicted from subjects' explicit report of the pattern, demonstrating the co-occurrence of concept learning and implicit learning. In Experiment 3, rules were learned explicitly. Discrimination was worse than would be predicted from subjects' explicit report, validating the implicit learning paradigm. In Experiment 4, deviations from a prototypical pattern were presented during training. In the test of discrimination, prototypes were as familiar as old deviations and more familiar than new deviations, even when considering only implicit knowledge. Experiment 5 found implicit knowledge of a familiar concept. These results are consistent with the hypothesis that the distinguishing features of a concept can be learned implicitly, and that one type of implicit learning is concept learning.

Adult↗
PubMed1995

The assessment of student nurse learning styles using the Kolb Learning Styles Inventory.

The learning styles of 192 Registered General Nursing/DipHE students was determined using the Kolb Learning Styles Inventory prior to the students having any formal contact with lecturing staff. The percentage of students having a predominantly concrete learning style was 53.7%, while 46.3% were predominantly reflective. This finding is in keeping with those of Laschinger & Boss (1984), who suggest that they are supportive of Kolb's theoretical tenet that concrete learners tend to choose people-oriented professions. Chi-squared tests were used to determine if the respondent's learning styles varied with either age, sex or having been in employment prior to becoming a nursing student; no statistically significant associations were found. A further chi-squared analysis was performed to see if there was a relationship between learning style and those students who possessed: 1) only the DC test, 2) O-levels as highest qualifications, and 3) A-levels as highest qualifications--no statistically significant associations were found. There remain measurement problems with the Kolb inventory, and a discussion of some of these issues are presented. The findings have reinforced the need for using a variety of delivery styles with students, with an emphasis on participation and experiential learning. This need for variety is essential given the distribution of learning styles found with the students. Nurse educators are urged to re-examine perceptions and assumptions about student learning needs.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1985

Thalamocortical relations in taste aversion learning: II. Involvement of the medial ventrobasal thalamic complex in taste aversion learning.

Previous neurobehavioral studies have implicated the gustatory thalamocortical relay as a functional substrate of conditioned taste aversion (CTA) learning. These experiments were conducted to examine the involvement of the gustatory thalamic nuclei in fundamental taste reactivity, gastrointestinal reactivity, and CTA learning. In Experiment 1, bilateral electrolytic lesions were produced in the medial ventrobasal thalamic complex (VBm), including the thalamic gustatory nuclei, in one group of rats. A separate group of rats received control lesion placements in the mediodorsal-periventricular (MD-PV) thalamic nuclei. Animals then received preference-aversion taste tests followed by CTA conditioning. At the conclusion of conditioning, lesions were produced in the anterior insular gustatory neocortex (AIGN) to evaluate whether or not the AIGN contributed to CTA learning in animals lacking VBm thalamus. Results of Experiment 1 indicated that control lesions did not disrupt taste reactivity, gastrointestinal reactivity, or CTA learning. Destruction of VBm thalamus attenuated taste reactivity to sucrose, citric acid, and quinine hydrochloride; however, such lesions did not impair normal taste reactivity to sodium chloride. Lesion placements in VBm thalamus also did not reliably impair gastrointestinal reactivity to ingested LiCl. Elimination of VBm thalamus markedly attenuated CTA learning. Results of neocortical lesion manipulations showed that the AIGN contributed to initial CTA learning in animals lacking MD-PV thalamus but that the AIGN did not mediate initial CTA learning in animals lacking VBm thalamus. Whether animals lacking VBm thalamus used olfactory cues associated with drinking solutions to acquire CTAs was evaluated in Experiment 2. Results of Experiment 2 demonstrated that animals lacking VBm thalamus and the olfactory bulbs could not acquire aversions to ingested LiCl following eight conditioning trials. These experiments demonstrate that destruction of VBm thalamus, including the gustatory thalamic nuclei, is sufficient to prevent CTA learning.

Afferent Pathways↗
PubMed1990

Adverse learning strategy: the Adelaide Diagnostic Learning Inventory and its subscale replicability in a medical student population.

The Adelaide Diagnostic Learning Inventory (ADLIMS) is a measure of learning styles and learning pathologies that was designed to investigate the impact of traditional approaches to learning versus problem-based learning and to identify students whose approach to learning tasks predicted poor academic performance. In this study, some important psychometric properties of the ADLIMS were examined, including its factor structure. In this study, factor replicability across samples was argued to provide a more robust and psychologically meaningful factor solution than that which can be obtained using traditional mathematical criteria. The results of the factor analysis did not confirm the presence of the four factor solution earlier reported for the ADLIMS, but did identify three clear factors that had very high replicability. An inspection of the items comprising these three factors showed that factor 1 tapped subjective distress related to poor study habits, lack of motivation to study, and distraction from social activities. Factor 2 tapped distress arising from high achievement expectations that were hampered by superficial or disorganized study habits that did not enable the student to grasp the relationships between concepts and ideas. Factor 3 tapped positive feelings and a sense of satisfaction associated with a problem-based approach to the learning of new study material. Although the internal reliability of the ADLIMS subscales met the requirements of a measure to be used in general research such as in the investigation of correlates among groups of medical students, they did not meet the higher requirements of a measure to be used to identify or predict individuals with pathological learning styles.

Humans↗
PubMed1981

[The effects of acute administration of thyrotropin-releasing hormone on conditioned active avoidance learning and passive avoidance learning in rats (author's transl)].

The effects of acute administration of thyrotropin-releasing hormone (TRH) on the fear motivated learning of male Wistar rats were studied using a shuttle box. Two kinds of experiments - active avoidance learning (shuttle avoidance learning) and passive avoidance learning were performed. TRH (500 microgram/kg) was injected subcutaneously 40 to 50 minutes before the test trials. 1. In shuttle avoidance learning, TRH facilitated the acquisition after 8 sessions-pretraining and retarded the extinction after 8 approximately 12 sessions-pretrainings compared with saline. In passive avoidance learning, however, the reverse results were obtained: TRH retarded the acquisition and facilitated the extinction. 2. In shuttle avoidance learning, the acquisition facilitating effect of TRH was seen only in poor performer rats (poor performer was defined as less than 37 median score of conditioned avoidance responses in 8 sessions-pretraining), but not in good performer rats (more than 37 conditioned avoidance responses). 3. In shuttle avoidance learning, the acquisition facilitating effect of TRH was not seen in poor performer rats after 15 sessions-pretrainings, and the extinction retarding effect of TRH was not seen in the rats after 28 sessions-pretrainings. 4. From the above results it can be concluded that TRH possesses a fear reducing effect, and the behavioral changes brought about by TRH are seen most obviously in the rats which are in highly fearful conditions.

Animals↗
PubMed1992

Preserved configural learning and spatial learning impairment in rats with hippocampal damage.

This study was undertaken to compare the effect of hippocampal neurotoxic lesions in rats on two behavioral tasks, one a test of spatial learning, and the other an operant discrimination task that is acquired by forming nonspatial configural associations. Lesions of the hippocampus were made with microinjections of ibotenic acid. After postoperative recovery, rats were trained initially to locate a camouflaged escape platform in a water maze using distal spatial cues. Rats also were trained in the maze apparatus with a visible escape platform under conditions in which spatial information was made irrelevant to performance, i.e., cue learning. In an operant task, the same rats were then trained on a discrimination that included simultaneous feature positive and feature negative components (trial types XA+, A-, XB-, B+). After completion of this nonspatial configural learning task, rats received additional training in the water maze using a new platform location for spatial learning. To the extent that proficient performance in both the maze and operant tasks depends on a common function of the hippocampus, i.e., configural learning, the expectation was that hippocampal lesions would prove equally detrimental to performance in both tasks. Contrary to this expectation, lesioned rats were severely impaired in spatial learning but readily acquired the operant discrimination, even exhibiting some evidence of enhanced performance on this nonspatial configural learning task. Performance of the lesioned rats during cue training in the water maze was also enhanced relative to the control group.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Analysis of Variance↗
PubMed1995

Enhancement of hippocampally-mediated learning and protein kinase C activity by oxiracetam in learning-impaired DBA/2 mice.

The effects of oxiracetam on hippocampally-mediated learning performance and hippocampal protein kinase C (PKC) were examined in C57BL/6Ibg (C57) and DBA/2Ibg (DBA) mice. C57 and DBA mice were subjected to daily injections of oxiracetam (50 mg/kg i.p.) or vehicle (0.9% saline) for a total of 9 days. C57 and DBA mice were examined on a modified version of the Morris water maze task and the contextual fear conditioning task on the last 5 or 2 days, respectively, of the 9-day treatment schedule. When compared with controls, C57 and DBA oxiracetam-treated mice showed no difference in motor skill capability to perform these complex learning tasks (swim speed or ability to freeze). Hippocampal PKC activity was measured in cytosolic, loosely-bound, and membrane-bound homogenate fractions. Oxiracetam-treated DBA mice demonstrated a significant increase in spatial learning performance as determined by the Morris task. DBA performance was also improved in contextual learning as determined by the fear conditioning task. The increase in spatial learning performance was correlated to an increase in membrane-bound PKC. No substantial improvements in C57 mice were observed on either learning task nor did hippocampal PKC activity change in response to oxiracetam treatment. These data demonstrate that the learning impairment of DBA mice can be reversed by treatment with a nootropic agent and support previous studies suggesting that PKC may be one mechanism of action for oxiracetam.

Animals↗
PubMed1982

The relationship between learning disability, intelligence, and paired-associate learning.

Learning disabled (N = 45) and non-learning disabled (N = 39) third and fourth grade boys and girls were compared in four paired-associate situations. The situations respectively measured learning, memory, exemplar learning, and transfer. Intelligence was measured with the WISC-R. The data were nonnormal in distribution, and the results were thus analyzed parametrically for intelligence and group. What appears to be an interaction occurred. Intelligence facilitated performance for normals on the memory task but had a deleterious effect for the learning disabled Ss. The learning disabled high intelligence group, however, performed significantly better than the other groups on the exemplar and transfer tasks. These findings are discussed in terms of conceptualizations of learning disability and the nature of intervention strategies. In addition, concern is raised for the validity for research with these children where the IQ factor is ignored or covaried and not directly investigated.

Child↗
PubMed1995

What we have learned from the study of learning in the leech.

The use of invertebrate preparations has contributed greatly to our understanding of the neural basis of learning. The leech is especially useful for studying behavioral changes and their underlying neuronal mechanisms. Learning in the leech is essentially identical to that found in other animals, both vertebrate and invertebrate. Using anatomical and physiological techniques on leeches as they learn, we have begun to characterize the properties of individual neurons and neuronal networks that play a role in learning. We have been able to show two neuronal mechanisms that have not been previously associated with associative conditioning. The first has to do with the importance of contingency: one stimulus [the conditional stimulus (CS)] becomes associated with a second stimulus [the unconditional stimulus, (US)] in proportion to the ability of the CS to predict the US. We have found that important properties for encoding predictability, such as circuit reconfiguration, may lie in the US pathway. The firing of the serotonergic Retzius cells is taken as the US; consistent CS prediction of a US prevents "dropout" of a critical component of one US pathway. Throughout training, predicted USs continue to elicit a barrage of action potentials in these cells. Recurring unpredicted USs degrade both the learning and the response of the Retzius cell to the US. A second insight is that at least two US pathways contribute to learning, the Retzius cell pathway and the nociceptive (N) cell pathway. This second pathway persists after the elimination of the Retzius cell pathway. The observation of multiple US pathways raises a host of issues concerning CS-US convergence and the functional significance of distinct US pathways, and our results are discussed in terms of implications to current models of learning.

Animals↗
PubMed1992

Learning from experience: nurse tutors' and student nurses' perceptions of experiential learning in nurse education: some initial findings.

Experiential learning and experiential learning methods have been widely described in the literature as aids to learning about nursing. This paper describes a descriptive study of nurse tutors' and student nurses' perceptions of experiential learning. Two research methods were used: in-depth semi-structured interviews of 12 nurse tutors and 12 student nurses, followed by a questionnaire survey of a total population of nurse tutors in Wales, U.K. (n = 184) and a 100% stratified sample of student nurses in Wales (n = 325). The questionnaire items were devised out of the interview data. This report offers a description of how the study was conducted and some of the findings. Notably, student nurses tended to perceive experiential learning in terms of learning in the clinical setting whilst tutors referred more to experiential learning as a classroom activity. Other findings are described and discussed.

Attitude↗
PubMed1991

Unaware learning versus preserved learning in pharmacologic amnesia: similarities and differences.

The differences between learning in lorazepam (LOR)--or scopolamine (SCOP)--induced amnesia and learning in unaware drug-free normal subjects were examined. The drugs produced impairment in free recall, but did not affect digit span or word retrieval. In a verbal version, but not a motor version, of the serial reaction time task, the subjects who received SCOP or higher dose LOR showed impairment of sequence-specific learning. Subjects who received placebo had no such impairment. In the stem completion paradigm, higher dose LOR, but not SCOP, impaired performance. In a tachistoscopic word identification task, neither drug interfered with repetition priming. Unaware learning and drug-induced amnesic learning were thus dissociable. These findings disconfirm the hypothesis that unaware learning and drug-induced amnesic learning are analogous.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1983

Developing medical student competence in lifelong learning: the contract learning approach.

How contract learning may be used in the introduction to clinical medicine is described, with the goal to develop and enhance self-directed learning skills and attitudes of first- and second-year medical students. Essential tasks associated with successful self-directed learning are cited, and the contract method is described as a means for providing medical students with the opportunity to practice these tasks in the study of gerontology. The procedures followed in the implementation of the contract learning method are described, and its impact on both need and to continue learning about ageing and skills in directing independent learning projects are analysed and discussed. In addition, the implications of early preparation for doctor's lifelong learning are discussed.

Attitude of Health Personnel↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Learning disabilities as functions of familial learning problems and developmental problems.

A family history of learning problems as provided on a specially designed questionnaire by maternal report was examined in families of 101 children with learning disabilities and 171 children without disabilities. Diagnoses of learning disabilities followed the U.S. Office of Education definition. Students were selected from the Special School District of St. Louis County and the Pattonville School District. A life history of developmental risk factors in the child subject was also examined in the same two groups. Learning disabilities were found to be strongly familial. In principle, the definition of learning disabilities excluded from the study children with problems attributable to child rearing, emotional, or motivational factors. The report of a family history of learning problems is therefore interpreted as consistent with, although not unequivocally supportive of, genetic factors as determinants. Among developmental factors, only male gender proved to have a significant association with learning disabilities.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1992

A comparative study of the learning style preferences of students with learning disabilities and students who are gifted.

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether significant group, gender, and grade differences existed in the learning style preferences of students with learning disabilities and students who are gifted, using the Learning Style Inventory (LSI) (Dunn, Dunn, & Price, 1987). Subjects consisted of 53 students with learning disabilities and 64 gifted students randomly selected from two large public high schools. They were 10th-, 11th-, and 12th-grade students, aged 15 to 17. A three-way analysis of variance on the LSI raw scores revealed significant group differences in preferences for light, design, and kinesthetic modality, and in motivation, persistence, responsibility, parent motivation, and teacher motivation. Significant gender and grade differences were found in preferences for mobility and learning in the afternoon, respectively. A stepwise discriminant analysis revealed six variables that significantly discriminated between the two groups. Findings imply that incorporating the learning styles of students with learning disabilities and students who are gifted is important for individualizing educational programming.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1988

Intermodal learning in infancy: learning on the basis of two kinds of invariant relations in audible and visible events.

In this research, the development of intermodal perception in infancy was examined by using a new method, the intermodal learning method. 3-month-old infants were given the opportunity to learn a relation between 2 single film and soundtrack pairs through a 2-min familiarization period under 1 of 4 conditions. Films of naturalistic events were accompanied by a soundtrack that was (1) appropriate to the composition of the object and synchronous with its motions, (2) appropriate and nonsynchronous, (3) inappropriate and synchronous, or (4) inappropriate and nonsynchronous. A group of control subjects was familiarized with irrelevant films and soundtracks. Then all subjects were tested in a 2-choice intermodal preference test to determine under which familiarization conditions intermodal learning had occurred. Results indicated that only subjects who had been familiarized with appropriate and synchronous film and soundtrack pairs showed evidence of intermodal learning as compared with the performance of control subjects. Intermodal learning occurred on the basis of 2 kinds of invariant audio-visual relations, temporal synchrony, and temporal microstructure specifying the composition of the object. Intermodal learning did not occur through association on the basis of co-occurrence, nor did it occur when any incongruent audio-visual structure was present. These findings support an invariant-detection view of the development of intermodal perception.

Association Learning↗
PubMed1990

Validity of the Estimated Learning Potential and other measures of learning potential.

The validity of the Estimated Learning Potential from the System of Multicultural Pluralistic Assessment was estimated using other measures of learning potential as criteria. In addition, correlations of traditional IQs with the learning potential measures were examined. The correlations between the Estimated Learning Potential and the criterion measures were low to moderate. Further, the traditional IQ was more strongly related to the learning potential measures than to the Estimated Learning Potential. Implications of these results, including the finding that learning potential should not be considered a unitary construct, were discussed.

Aptitude↗
PubMed1995

Hippocampal long-term potentiation does not affect either discrimination learning or reversal learning of the rabbit nictitating membrane response.

The theoretical premise that the acquisition and storage of information occurs through the strengthening of synaptic connections has contributed to the popularity of long-term potentiation (LTP) as a candidate neural mechanism for associative learning. However, whether experimentally induced LTP facilitates, disrupts, or has no effect on subsequent learning is a controversial issue. The present study examined the reported facilitative effect of LTP within hippocampal perforant path-dentate gyrus synapses on subsequent discriminative conditioning of the rabbit nictitating membrane response. In addition, the effect of LTP on subsequent reversal learning of the initial discrimination was examined. LTP did not significantly affect acquisition of the initial discriminative response or subsequent reversal learning. Furthermore, the magnitude of LTP could not be used to predict the rate of acquisition of either task. The failure to find an effect of LTP on classical conditioning of the rabbit nictitating membrane response mirrors the recent failures to replicate the disruptive effect of LTP on spatial learning in the rat. Thus, the potential contribution of an LTP-like mechanism to associative learning remains equivocal.

Animals↗