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Classical And Instrumental Conditioning Explain Learning

Decent Essays

This essay will describe how the psychological processes of Classical and Instrumental conditioning explain learning. Classical does so through the use of involuntary reflexes while Instrumental through the use voluntary behaviour and reinforcement. Their effectiveness will be explained through the supporting studies.

Classical conditioning is the repeated association of events (neutral and unconditioned stimulus) until the neutral stimulus starts to produce a conditioned response that it otherwise would not produce. This association is reflexive and requires no thinking while allowing the prediction of future events due to the presentation of a conditioned stimulus (formally neutral) creating the expectation of the other event following. There are two types of classical conditioning; excitatory conditioning and inhibitory conditioning. Excitatory conditioning is positive and allows prediction and expectation of the unconditioned stimulus. While Inhibitory is negative as it results in behaviours that normally happen, such as salivating (conditioned response) being actively suppressed (Schwartz, 1995).

Pavlov’s study on dogs supports Classical conditioning. It does this by showing how a neutral stimulus can be conditioned to produce a conditioned response. In the study, Pavlov realised that food (an unconditional stimulus) caused the dog to salivate (unconditional response). He then decided to make a neutral stimulus such as light produce the unconditional response. This

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