Various constrained frequencies of skilled model observation, under self-controlled conditions, were examined to determine whether there was an optimal frequency of modeling for learning a dance movement. Forty-eight participants with no previous dance/gymnastics experience first did a pre-test, then learned the skill over 60 interspersed observational and physical practice trials in one of four conditions that consisted of either (1) 25%, (2) 50%, (3) 75% modeling frequencies, or (4) no constraint imposed. This 60-trials acquisition phase was followed by a 24-hour post-test. Physical performance, scored by two external evaluators, revealed a significant main effect of Time from pre- to post-test (F(1, 44) = 120.43, p < .001). Cognitive representation scores revealed a main effect of Time for an image selection test (F(1, 44) = 39.09, p < .001), and a Time by Decision interaction for a forced-choice test (F(1.53, 67.48) = 7.00, p = .004). While learning was demonstrated for all measures, evidenced by higher scores at post-test than at pre-test, no main effect of Group was obtained. Consequently, the frequencies of modeling tested here under self-controlled learning conditions were equally beneficial for the learning of the novel dance skill.

While the number of techniques and procedures that surgical trainees must learn is increasing, opportunities for trainees to practice the necessary skills on patients is decreasing; the COVID-19 pandemic further limited these learning opportunities. There is a need to explore additional ways for trainees to practice and improve their performance on surgical tasks. Observing others perform tasks can improve a learner’s own performance of a task, but it is unclear how well current evidence applies to improving surgical task performance as much of the existing evidence supporting the use of observation is for non-surgical tasks. This thesis explores the influence of observing someone else demonstrate tasks on learner’s own performance of tasks relevant to surgical training. Through three experiments, we explored the influence of the type of demonstrator that a learner observes (e.g., someone who is experienced or inexperienced), and whether or not tasks that encourage the learner to think more about the quality of a demonstrator’s performance further influences the learner’s performance. The findings suggest that for learners who are new to a task, observing an experienced demonstrator is more helpful for improving performance than observing an inexperienced demonstrator. Prompting learners to think more about the quality of the demonstrator’s performance, either by requiring them to judge the demonstrator’s performance or by providing them with an expert’s judgment of the demonstrator’s performance, does not further influence the learner’s performance. The findings from this thesis provide insights into how surgical educators can optimize learner’s performance improvements on surgical tasks using observation. This thesis also provides evidence for an effective way for learners to practice surgical tasks, either in-person or remotely, before performing those tasks on patients. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / People who are training to become surgeons have a lot to learn. It is important to find ways that they can get better at tasks. We explored whether having learners watch someone else can help them get better at tasks relevant to surgery. We explored if it is better for a learner to watch someone who knows the task well or someone who is new at the task. We also explored if it is helpful for learners to think about how well the person they are watching did. We found that for learners to get better at a task, it is generally more helpful to watch someone who knows the task well. It did not help learners to think about how the person they are watching did. This helps us better understand how to help surgical learners get better at tasks from observing others before performing those tasks on patients.

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One experiment was adminstered to address three issues central to identifying the processes that underlie our ability to learn through observation. One objective of the study was to identify the movement features (relative or absolute) extracted by an observer when demonstration acts as the training protocol. A second objective was to investigate how the performance level of the model (trial-to-trial variability in strategy selection) providing the demonstrations influences movement feature extraction. Lastly, a goal was to test whether or not visual perspective of the model by the observer (first-person or third-person) interacts with the aforementioned variables. The goal of the task was to trace two circles templates with a 90 degree relative phase offset between the two hands. Video recordings of two models practicing over three days were used to make three videos for the study; an expert performance, discovery performance, and instruction performance video. The discovery video portrayed a decrease in relative phase error and a transition from high trial-to-trial variability in the strategy selection to use of a single strategy. The instruction video also portrayed a decrease in relative phase error, but with no strategy search throughout practice. The expert video showed no strategy search with trial-to-trial variability within 5% of the goal relative phase of 90 across every trial. Observers watched one of the three video recordings from either a first-person or third-person perspective. In a retention test, the expert observers showed the most consistant capability (learning) in performing the goal phase. The instruction observers also showed learning, but to a lesser degree than the expert observers. The discovery group observers showed the least amount of learning of relative phase. The absolute feature of movement amplitude was not extracted by any observer group, results consistent with postulations by Scully and Newell (1985). Observation from the 1P perspective proved optimal in the expert and instruction observation groups, but the 3P perspective allowed for greater learning of of the goal relative phase (90 degree) in the discovery observation group. Hand lead, a relative feature of motion, was extracted by most obsevers, except those who observed the discovery model from the 3P perspective. It's concluded that the trial-to-trial variabiliy in terms of strategy selection interacted with the process of mental rotation, which prevented the extraction of hand lead in those observers that viewed the discovery model.

One experiment was adminstered to address three issues central to identifying the processes that underlie our ability to learn through observation. One objective of the study was to identify the movement features (relative or absolute) extracted by an observer when demonstration acts as the training protocol. A second objective was to investigate how the performance level of the model (trial-to-trial variability in strategy selection) providing the demonstrations influences movement feature extraction. Lastly, a goal was to test whether or not visual perspective of the model by the observer (first-person or third-person) interacts with the aforementioned variables. The goal of the task was to trace two circles templates with a 90 degree relative phase offset between the two hands. Video recordings of two models practicing over three days were used to make three videos for the study; an expert performance, discovery performance, and instruction performance video. The discovery video portrayed a decrease in relative phase error and a transition from high trial-to-trial variability in the strategy selection to use of a single strategy. The instruction video also portrayed a decrease in relative phase error, but with no strategy search throughout practice. The expert video showed no strategy search with trial-to-trial variability within 5% of the goal relative phase of 90 across every trial. Observers watched one of the three video recordings from either a first-person or third-person perspective. In a retention test, the expert observers showed the most consistant capability (learning) in performing the goal phase. The instruction observers also showed learning, but to a lesser degree than the expert observers. The discovery group observers showed the least amount of learning of relative phase. The absolute feature of movement amplitude was not extracted by any observer group, results consistent with postulations by Scully and Newell (1985). Observation from the 1P perspective proved optimal in the expert and instruction observation groups, but the 3P perspective allowed for greater learning of of the goal relative phase (90 degree) in the discovery observation group. Hand lead, a relative feature of motion, was extracted by most obsevers, except those who observed the discovery model from the 3P perspective. It's concluded that the trial-to-trial variabiliy in terms of strategy selection interacted with the process of mental rotation, which prevented the extraction of hand lead in those observers that viewed the discovery model.

Three experiments compared learning of relative and absolute timing of a sequential key-pressing task by physical and observational practice. Experiment 1 compared a task with a complex internal structure (goal proportions of 22.2, 44.4, 33.4 on the three movement segments) to one with a simpler structure (goal proportions of 33.3, 33.3, 33.4). Observers only learned the relative timing as well as physical practicers when the internal structure was simple, but learned the absolute timing in both conditions. Experiment 2 compared variable (700, 900, and 1100 ms overall time) with constant practice (900 ms overall time). Observers of constant practice models learned the relative timing better than no-practice control participants, but not as well as the models, while observers of variable practice models learned the relative timing no better than the control group. Observers in both practice conditions were able to produce the absolute timing as well as those who physically practiced. In Experiment 3 observers of an expert model were able to produce the relative timing as well as those who physically practiced the skill, while those who observed learning models were not. All observers and the physical practice participants were able to produce the overall duration as well as the expert model. The results of these three experiments support earlier findings that increasing stability during practice promotes better learning of relative timing, but that absolute timing can be learned under less-stable conditions (Lai, Shea, Wulf, & Wright, 2000b). These findings also have important implications on the limitations of Scully and Newells' (1985) prediction that relative timing, but not absolute timing, could be learned by observation. Experiments 1-3 along with earlier findings (Black & Wright, 2000) have consistently found that absolute timing could be learned by observers even as the nature of the task, practice schedule, and model are manipulated. Furthermore, the results suggest a limitation to the effectiveness of learning models (Adams, 1986; McCullagh & Caird, 1990).

Observational learning has been defined as the learning of new responses that occurs as a result of observing the responding of a model and the consequences that this responding produces (Catania, 2007; Taylor & DeQuinzio, 2012). The following study compared the effectiveness of a peer and staff model for teaching four adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities a new response chained task. An alternating treatment design, counterbalanced across subjects was used to evaluate the effects of each modeling condition. Results indicated that all four adults learned the skill with fewer sessions by observing the peer model. Following acquisition of each task, the degree of generalization and maintenance of responding was also evaluated. Implications and directions for future research are further discussed.

It has been shown that the observation of two model types, or mixed-modeling, is more beneficial than watching a single type alone (Andrieux & Proteau, 2013; Robertson, 2015). Furthermore, observing others has been shown to lead to consolidation, however, the distinct behavioural outcomes are different than those following physical practice (Trempe et al., 2011). To date it is unknown, whether the observation of different model types, when interspersed with physical practice, will affect the amount of consolidation that occurs. The purpose of this research was to attempt to replicate the mixed-model benefit and to determine whether a mixed-model observation intervention would affect consolidation processes differentially compared to a single-model type alone. Forty-five university age students were randomly assigned to a mixed-model (MM), unskilled model (UM), or skilled model (SM) observation group. All participants were required to learn a waveform-matching task, in which they used their non-dominant arm to reproduce a waveform as accurately as possible within a goal movement time of 900ms. The experiment comprised three testing sessions. The first session required participants to complete a pretest, where they performed 10 trials of the skill with no knowledge of results (KR) provided. Following this, they did their first acquisition session where they received KR on all trials and performed nine blocks of 10 trials that consisted of six physical practice interspersed with four observation trials. Ten minutes following this session, participants performed an immediate retention test consisting of 10 no KR trials. The next day began with a delayed 24hr retention test of 10 no KR trials and another acquisition session. One week later, participants performed 10 no KR retention trials 10 transfer trials, in which participants reproduced a slightly different waveform under a goal movement-time of 1150ms. Root mean square error (RMSE), temporal accuracy and spatial accuracy were collected as dependent variables. Acquisition results demonstrated that all video conditions acquired the skill similarly in terms of all dependent variables. Retention results indicated a significant group by time interaction over the 24-hour retention interval (F(2, 42) = 3.809, p = .030), which showed that those in the MM group were significantly better at the 24-hour retention compared to the other groups, however, this mixed-model benefit was no longer seen at the weeklong retention. In conclusion, these results suggest that mixed-model observation is beneficial to motor learning at the 24-hour retention, in terms of temporal accuracy and also that mixed-model observation could potentially lead to enhanced consolidation of a motor skill.

This study evaluates the efficacy of using Equivalence Based Instruction (EBI) to teach historical figures to teenagers with autism in a group setting. Stimuli consisted of three eight-member classes of (A) vocal names of inventors, (B) pictures of inventors, and (C) textual names of their inventions. Participants were assigned their own directly trained class members (Participant 1- A₁₂₃₄, B₁₂₃₄ ,C₁₂₃₄) and (Participant 2 - A₅₆₇₈, B₅₆₇₈, C₅₆₇₈). Participants trained on relation A→B, then after mastery, trained on relation B→C. Probes were conducted followed both A→B and B→C training to assess mastery. Participants each received instructions for three trials then alternated as observer for three trials. Results found both participants demonstrated class formation on their trained stimuli, and one participant demonstrated class formation for his train and observed stimuli. This suggest observational learning with EBI was effective for teaching new academic skills to teenagers with autism.

Observational learning (OL) allows an individual to acquire novel responses by observing others' behavior and the corresponding consequences. The complexity of skills involved with OL may vary with the learning context. A learner may observe modeled responses to both trained (known) and untrained (unknown) stimuli or they may observe both reinforced (correct) and nonreinforced (incorrect) responses. The purpose of this study was to develop assessment and training procedures for OL component skills when the learner observes a combination of learning contexts: reinforced and nonreinforced responses to both trained and untrained stimuli. Two children with autism, Tom and David, participated. We assessed the following component skills in the context of tact trials: (1) Discriminating trained and untrained stimuli, (2) attending to the modeled performance, (3) discriminating consequences, and (4) conditionally responding based upon a name call. Next, we trained the component skill(s) for which the learner's performance did not meet criterion and then reassessed for OL. For both participants, immediate increases in OL were observed; however, modifications to the post-assessment (differential observing response for consequences and/or differential reinforcement) were required to produce (Tom) or maintain (David) criterion levels of responding. Interpretations of these outcomes, as well as limitations and directions for future research, are discussed.