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Module 15 Classical Conditioning
Hot water example • Every time someone flushes a toilet in the apartment building, the shower becomes very hot and causes the person to jump back. Over time, the person begins to jump back automatically after hearing the flush, before the water temperature changes. • The hot water is the US • The jumping back is the UR • The toilet flush is the CS • The jumping back to the flush alone is the CR
Classical Conditioning terms • Learning: A relatively permanent change in behavior due to experience. • Classical conditioning: A type of learning where a stimulus gains the power to cause a response because it predicts another stimulus that already produces the response. • Stimulus: Anything in the environment that one can respond to.
Classical Conditioning terms • Response: Any behavior or action. • Behaviorism: The view that psychology should restrict its efforts to studying observable behaviors, not mental process. • Cognition: Mental processes; all the mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, and remembering.
Components of Classical Conditioning • Unconditioned Stimulus (UCS): Stimulus that triggers a response reflexively or automatically. (Ex): Just as scalding hot water in a shower makes someone jump. Very hot shower water is a UCS for jumping. Classical conditioning cannot happen without a UCS. The only behaviors and emotions that can be classically conditioned are those that are reliably produced by a UCS. • Unconditioned Response (UCR): The UCR is, quite simply, the response to the UCS. (Ex):If hot cheese water is the UCS, jumping out of the way is the UCR. Once again, notice that the stimulus-response relationship between the UCS and the UCR is reflexive, not learned. • Conditioned Stimulus (CS): The CS is originally neutral stimulus that, through conditioning (learning), gains the power to cause the response. (Ex): On someone’s first day in the dorm, the word “Flush!” was a neutral stimulus---he did not associate it with showers, and it did not make him jump. Thousands of other sights and sounds around the dormitory were also neutral stimulus to a CS. (This constitutes learning) All those other neutral stimuli remained neutral. In basic classical conditioning, the neutral stimulus and CS are always the same thing. The term neutral stimulus describes the stimulus before conditioning and the term CS describes the stimulus after conditioning. • Conditioned Response (CR): The CR is the response to the CS. In basic classical conditioning, it is the same behavior that is identified as the UCR. IF I jump because of hot water (a UCS), my jumping is a UCR. However, if I have learned to jump when someone yells “Flush!” (a CS), my jumping is now a CR.
3 Basic Processes in Classical Conditioning • Acquisition: The process of developing a learned response. • Extinction: The diminishing of a learned response; when an unconditioned stimulus does not follow a conditioned stimulus. • Spontaneous Recovery: The reappearance, after a rest period, of an extinguished conditioned response.
Ivan Pavlov’s Experiment • Ivan Pavlov was a Russian physiologist that was interested in studying digestion. He was investigating the effects of salivation. (What causes drooling) He showed the dog the meet powder (UCS) which caused the dog, by instinct, to salivate (UCR). He then started ringing a bell before he would give the dog the food. The dog didn’t catch on at first, but then he started salivating at the sound of a bell. The bell was the CS, and the salivating to the bell is now the CR, because he learned to respond to the bell. Salivation can be the UCR and the CR. It’s the UCR when he salivated because his instinct is to salivate at the sight and smell of food. It’s the CR when he learns that he’s going to get the food when he hears the bell and then salivates.
Generalization and Discrimination • Generalization: A process in which an organism produces the same response to two similar stimuli. • Ex: Let’s say Pavlov lost his bell, so he got a new one with a different tune. The dog hears the similarity and still salivates. • Discrimination: A process in which an organism produces different responses to two similar stimuli. • Ex: Okay so again, we’re going to say that he got a new bell with a different tune. But the dog hears the difference and realizes that is not the sound that leads to the food, so he doesn’t salivate.
The Balloon Experiment Someone pops a balloon with a needle, and we flinch or jump. The balloon popping is the UCS. Our flinch or jump is the UCR. But if we jump before the balloon pops just because we see the needle approaching the balloon, the needle becomes the CS, and our flinch becomes the CR.
Ivan Pavlov: famous for discovering classical conditioning. • Rosalie Rayner: Co-researcher for the famous Little Albert demonstration of classically conditioned emotion.
Commercials or Advertising We use the UCS, UCR, CS, and CR in our everyday lives. In a Nestea commercial they show people that are hanging out by a pool, it makes you feel cool or refreshed. The pool is the UCS and us feeling refreshed is the UCR. When you go to the store and see the Nestea brand iced tea, you feel refreshed because you learned that that’s how it’s advertised to make you feel. So the tea is the CS, and you feeling refreshed is the CR.
John Garcia Identified taste aversion
Taste Aversion • Taste aversion is your avoidance of certain tastes, just because of how they taste, or how they make you feel. • John Garcia and Robert Koelling discovered a way to show how taste aversion could develop. They paired a nausea-producing drug with a certain food or drink. The drug that produces nausea is the UCS and the nausea, or you feeling sick, is the UCR. They would use that same food or drink with the nausea-producing drug repeatedly. Eventually just the thought, taste, or smell of that food could create nausea. So that food becomes the CS, and your nausea is now the CR.
Robert Rescorla: Developed a new theory that emphasized the importance of cognitive process in classical conditioning.
