- habituation
-
/heuh bich'ooh ay"sheuhn/, n.1. the act of habituating.2. the condition of being habituated.3. physiological tolerance to or psychological dependence on a drug, short of addiction.4. reduction of psychological or behavioral response occurring when a specific stimulus occurs repeatedly.[1400-50; late ME. See HABITUATE, -ION]
* * *
Reduction of an animal's behavioral response to a stimulus, as a result of a lack of reinforcement during continual exposure to the stimulus.Habituation is usually considered a form of learning in which behaviours not needed are eliminated. It may be separated from most other forms of decreased response on the basis of permanence; the habituated animal either does not resume its earlier reaction to the stimulus after a period of no stimulus, or, if the normal reaction is resumed on reexposure to the stimulus, it wanes more quickly than before. Vital responses (e.g., flight from a predator) cannot be truly habituated.* * *
the waning of an animal's behavioral response to a stimulus, as a result of a lack of reinforcement during continual exposure to the stimulus. It is usually considered to be a form of learning involving the elimination of behaviours that are not needed by the animal. Habituation may be separated from most other forms of decreased response (not including changes caused by maturation or seasonal cycles) on the basis of permanence; the habituated animal does not resume its earlier reaction to the stimulus after a period of nonstimulation, or, if the normal reaction is resumed, it wanes, on reexposure to the stimulus, more quickly than before. In the latter case, repeated interruptions and resumptions of the stimulus are followed by increasingly rapid decreases in response, and eventually the stimulus elicits no response. Vital responses (e.g., flight from a predator) cannot be truly habituated, although a temporary waning of the response may occur.* * *
Universalium. 2010.
