Predictive learning is a technique of machine learning

Machine learning

Machine learning, a branch of artificial intelligence, is a scientific discipline concerned with the design and development of algorithms that allow computers to evolve behaviors based on empirical data, such as from sensor data or databases...

 in which an agent tries to build a model of its environment by trying out different actions in various circumstances. It uses knowledge of the effects its actions appear to have, turning them into planning operators. These allow the agent to act purposefully in its world. Predictive learning is one attempt to learn with a minimum of pre-existing mental structure. It may have been inspired by Piaget

Jean Piaget

Jean Piaget was a French-speaking Swiss developmental psychologist and philosopher known for his epistemological studies with children. His theory of cognitive development and epistemological view are together called "genetic epistemology"....

's account of how children construct knowledge of the world by interacting with it. Gary Drescher

Gary Drescher

Gary L. Drescher is a scientist in the field of artificial intelligence , author of the book Made-Up Minds: A Constructivist Approach to Artificial Intelligence....

's book 'Made-up Minds' was seminal for the area.

Another more recent predictive learning theory is Jeff Hawkins

Jeff Hawkins

Jeffrey Hawkins is the founder of Palm Computing and Handspring...

' memory-prediction framework

Memory-prediction framework

The memory-prediction framework is a theory of brain function that was created by Jeff Hawkins and described in his 2004 book On Intelligence...

, which is laid out in his On Intelligence

On Intelligence

On Intelligence: How a New Understanding of the Brain will Lead to the Creation of Truly Intelligent Machines is a book by Palm Pilot-inventor Jeff Hawkins with New York Times science writer Sandra Blakeslee. The book explains Hawkins' memory-prediction framework theory of the brain and describes...

.