Publications [#325720] of John E. Staddon

Chapters in Books

1. Staddon, JER "Reinforcement learning: Reverse-engineering the behavior of pigeons."  December, 1992: 8.
   (last updated on 2025/06/16)

   Abstract:
   Understanding how the brain works is in principles just like understanding any other complex mechanism. Human brains and human beings are hard to work with, so the lower animals provide a better starting place. There are two parts to the problem: How do the pieces function individually (neuroscience)? And, How does the system work as a whole (experimental psychology)? We work on the second problem by devising, and testing experimentally, simple dynamic models for the behavior of pigeons in learning tasks. I will give examples from recent work on reinforcement learning.