Week 6 Post 2

Learning From Others

Learning is something we all do from a very young age, voluntarily or not. Social learning is the phenomenon of learning by observing others, which is very common in the animal world and human society, Social learning gives the same results with less time and energy than individual learning. A combination of individual and social learning can also be used, and often is.
Local enhancement: occurs when seeing others investigating or performing an activity makes an individual want to investigate; makes them curious.
Stimulus enhancement occurs when the aftermath of an investigation by another individual result in a stimulus for an individual who may have not had interest before.
Social learning is necessary if an individual is not as good as the others, so if they need more help to survive.Social behaviors can also be wrong at times.  Wrong behaviors are called maladaptive behaviors; when the behavior is more harmful than helpful.

You see local enhancement and maladaptive behavior amongst humans all the time. When one group of people try a new food, maybe a Starbucks drink, then everyone wants to try it. And when the people in front of an individual cross the road when the light is red, and the individual follows, it is maladaptive.