Sniffy: The Virtual Rat

The new Pro version of the famous Sniffy software simulates a wide range of learning phenomena that are typically discussed in undergraduate courses on the Psychology of Learning. Sniffy, a digital rat in an operant chamber (Skinner Box), helps users explore the principles of operant and classical conditioning with all the benefits of using a live animal and none of the drawbacks. Users begin by training Sniffy to press a bar to obtain food and progress to studies of complex learning phenomena. The Sniffy Pro program provides a simple user interface that enables students to set up events in Sniffy's operant chamber in much the same way research psychologists set up events for real animals. To visualize the results of experiments, the program produces realistic cumulative records and other appropriate behavioural measures of Sniffy's performance. In addition, a series of Mind Windows enable students to visualize how Sniffy's experiences in the Skinner Box produce the psychological changes that their textbooks discuss in connection with the phenomena simulated.

Table of Contents:
Introduction to Sniffy - how and why the Sniffy program was created; introduction to operant conditioning - background and a description of operant chambers and response measures; elementary operant phenomena - magazine training, shaping, acquisition, extinction, spontaneous recovery, primary and secondary reinforcement; schedules of reinforcement - VI, FI, VR, FR schedule effects; operant discrimination and generalization - simple and complex discrimination learning, stimulus generalization; introduction to classical conditioning - background and procedures for measuring the conditioned emotional response; elementary phenomena of classical conditioning - acquisition, extinction, and spontaneous recovery, stimulus intensity effects; compound conditioning and related phenomena - compound conditioning, overshadowing, blocking; inhibitory conditioning - procedures and measurements; associative structures in classical conditioning - sensory preconditioning and higher-order conditioning; nature of classical-conditioning association - S-S vs. S-R associations; habituation and sensitization of the UR - non-associative effects of US intensity.

About the Author :
Tom Alloway was trained by Winifred Hill at Northwestern University and is an expert in animal behavior, specifically ants, as well as operant and classical conditioning. He's the former chair at UT-Mississauga. Greg Wilson runs his own software company and created the first version of Sniffy over 10 years ago. Jeff Graham was trained in cognitive psychology and neural network models of memory. He teaches the computer component of introductory psychology at University of Toronto at Mississauga with over 1500 students per year.