Blog post # 3

     In class, we learned about the difference between Imitative Learning and Emulative Learning. Imitative learning focuses on simply copying the actions we observe others doing, such as a teacher or a parent, following an established structure in order to complete a behaviour or achieve a certain goal. However, the main focus is completing the goal, with less focus on understanding the thought behind it. Emulative learning is what happens when you observe someone else perform a certain behaviour, but you do not copy the exact methods used by the teacher. Instead, emulative learning focuses on understanding the reasoning behind the behaviour (eg., seeing a method used to retrieve an object using tool A, but instead using tool B to achieve the same result).

    I can think of a variety of examples throughout the course of my life in which I used both imitative and emulative learning to learn concepts and behaviours. During high school, I worked at McDonald's as my part time job. McDonald's is renowned for their training program, and their restaurant functions similarly to an assembly line at a manufacturing plant, to maximize the speed in which the customer receives their food (the goal). Because of the goal of getting the food to the customer as fast as possible, employees are taught specific methods to cook, prepare and serve the food to maximize efficiency. Because of this pre made method, there is not really much better method to be discovered that would be more efficient. Certainly other methods could be used, but it would slow down production so there would not be much point.

    However, in another cooking example, I use emulative learning all the time at home when I am cooking and preparing dishes for myself to eat. Oftentimes, people use recipes or cookbooks to teach them how to cook certain dishes. Following these recipes exactly may yield the expected positive result (good food). However, when I use a recipe/cookbook, I often tweak the ingredients to my specifications, based on my taste preferences and available ingredients. While I may have achieved a different end goal, that being a different dish, I understood the intent behind the instructions, that is to make the specific dish. While I might have used different tools, ingredients and temperature, I still reached the same end goal (behaviour) with my own method, because I understood the idea and general directions behind the idea.

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