Latent Learning

A second form of cognitive learning is latent learning, in which a new behaviour is genuinely learned but is not demonstrated or displayed until reinforcement is provided for displaying it. Edward Tolman made an early and influential contribution to this idea through experiments with rats in mazes. Tolman placed two groups of rats in a maze and let them explore it. One group found food at the end of the maze on each run and, as expected, quickly learned to run through the maze efficiently. The second group was given the same opportunity to explore but was never rewarded, and showed no obvious outward sign of having learned the maze at all. Later, however, when this previously unrewarded group was finally given a reward at the end of the maze, its members immediately began running the maze just as efficiently as the group that had been rewarded from the start. …