Classical Conditioning

Classical conditioning is a type of associative learning which occurs when two stimuli are paired together repetitively and therefore become associated with each other eventually producing the same response. Classical conditioning was developed from the findings of Ivan Pavlov to account for associations between neutral stimuli and reflexive behavior such as salivation. Pavlov (1927) accidently discovered that dogs began to salivate before they had tasted their food. To support his theory, he carried out experiments using dogs which involved measuring the amount of saliva they produced. In his experiments, food started off as an unconditioned stimulus (UCS) which produced salivation, an unconditioned response (UCR). They are both unconditioned as they occur naturally without being learned. The dogs were presented with a bell (NS), this provided no salivation. The bell and food were presented together and after many trails an

Dog: Once the test began with the dog approaching the child he did not react violently as he did with the rabbit. He did not start crying until the dog walked away. When the dog approached the child the second time he leaned to one side and started crying (Watson J. B., & Rayner, R.,

Is it possible to rouse fear from a stimulus that at first caused no such response? Classical conditioning is a type of learning where a response is produced from combining a conditioned stimulus with an unconditioned stimulus to produce an unconditioned response. Ivan Pavlov did a famous study, pairing the sound of a bell with food to produce salivation. After a while, just the sound alone would produce salivation. “Little Albert”, an infant that belonged to a wet nurse at the Harriet Lane Home was experimented on by John B. Watson and Rosalie Rayner. Watson and Rayner claim that “Little Albert” was a healthy, unemotional, and stable child. The experiment began with the introduction of a white rat, which alone, produced no fear response. At 11 months and 3 days, the rat was paired with a loud noise. The loud noise frightened “Little Albert”. He began to associate the fear he experienced with the white rat since it was paired with the loud noise.

It occurs when two stimuli are repeatedly paired together, one being an unlearned stimulus and the other a neutral stimulus. The neutral stimuli eventually will produce the same reaction as the unlearned stimuli. Ivan Pavlov had been investigating the saliva reactions in dogs. He conducted a study where he noticed that dogs salivated not only when food was placed in their mouths but also when stimuli associated with the food (a bell) was presented. Pavlov identified that the dogs had formed an association between the two stimuli, that it was an example of classical conditioning. A problem with this study was the fact that we can not generalize it to humans. Watson and Rayner rectified this in a later study using a young boy named Little Albert. At the age of nine months old, Little Albert was showed a variety of stimuli including a white rat, a monkey, a rabbit and burning newspapers. Watson and Rayner observed the boys’ reaction to the stimuli and found he showed no fear in relation to them. The next time Albert was exposed to the rat the researched made a loud, unpleasant noise which made Albert cry. Eventually, Albert would cry just in the presence of the rat. After this observation ‘Watson and Rayner wrote "The instant the rat was shown, the baby began to cry. Almost instantly he turned sharply to the left, fell over on [his] left side, raised himself on all fours and began to crawl away so rapidly that he was

This lab is focused on the ideas of classical and operant conditioning. Classical conditioning is when a neutral stimulus is paired with an unconditioned stimulus to elicit an unconditioned response. In time this turns the neutral stimulus into a conditioned stimulus that causes a conditioned response. Operant conditioning is a method of learning that occurs through reinforcements and punishments for behavior and encourages associating desirable or undesirable outcomes with certain behaviors.

A virtual rat, Sniffy, was used for this experiment. Sniffy the Virtual Rat, Pro Version 3.0 allows for the demonstration of Pavlovian and operant conditioning of a virtual rat. Tom Alloway, Greg Wilson, and Jeff Graham, authors of Sniffy the Virtual Rat designed this program to be an affordable alternative for students to gain “access to the main phenomena of classical and operant conditioning that courses on the psychology of learning typically discuss” (Jakubow, 2007). The program allows for simulations for Pavlovian conditioning such as acquisition, extinction, spontaneous recovery, stimulus-intensity effects, compound conditioning, blocking, overshadowing, overexpectation, inhibition, sensory preconditioning,

Behaviourists use two types of processes to explain how people learn: classical conditioning (Ivan Pavlov) and operant conditioning (Frederic Skinner).In classic conditioning, individuals learn to associate stimuli when they occur together to a response. Therefore individuals learn to produce an existing response to a stimulus that is presented. Take for instance little Albert. The little boy that was classically conditioned to respond with anxiety to the stimulus of a white ray by Watson and Rayner.

You may have heard of a very famous experiment by Ivan Pavlov on the emotional conditioning of dogs. If you have not heard of it, I would suggest that you type it into Google and read about the experiment. This experiment demonstrated that it was possible to create a predetermined emotional response with a trigger or anchor (in this case a ringing bell) provided that the subject (the dog) was pre-conditioned

The dogs would start to salivate just by hearing the bell ringing, which normally would not produce this response. The first part of the process involves an unconditioned response, like blinking or salivating. The next part needed for classical conditioning is an unconditioned stimulus. The unconditioned stimulus is one that automatically produces the unconditioned response, such as the smell of food triggering salivation. During conditioning, the neutral stimulus, like the bell in Pavlov’s case, is repeatedly paired with the unconditioned stimulus, or the meat powder. After a while, the neutral stimulus becomes the conditioned stimulus. The conditioned stimulus then produces a conditioned response, since the subject of the experiment has associated the conditioned stimulus with the unconditioned response. Many interesting experiments have been conducted using classical conditioning. Another scientist that preformed an experiment with classical conditioning is John B. Watson. Watson used classical conditioned to make a young boy fear white fluffy objects. He scared the child by making loud noises every time the child was presented a white rat.

This is known as the unconditioned stimulus (UCS). Meat is the unconditioned stimulus because at the sight of the meat the dogs begin to salivate (Feldman, 2010).   The dog’s response to the meat educes salivation and is known as the unconditioned response (UCR). An unconditioned response is defined as a reflexive and natural response that is not connected to prior learning. Unconditioned responses always occur in the presence of the unconditioned stimulus (Feldman, 2010).   While conditioning the dogs, Pavlov would ring a bell right before the presentation of meat. Eventually, the dogs would associate the ringing of the bell with the meat. Therefore, the dogs would begin to salivate at the sound of the bell. At this point, Pavlov could state that he had classically conditioned his dogs. The bell which was a prior neutral stimulus had now become the conditioned stimulus (CS) that brought forth the conditioned response (CR) of salivation (Feldman, 2010). Moreover, we have to ask what would happen if these poor dogs were never again received food upon the ringing of the bell. This would lead to extinction. Extinction occurs when a prior conditioned response decreases in frequency and eventually disappears (Feldman, 2010).   In order for Pavlov to unconditioned his dogs he would have to break their association with the sound of the ringing bell and the presentation of food. To do so he

In everyday life certain behaviors that individuals engage in, seem to happen without any effort. This is due to the brain conditioning itself to react in a certain way when in the presence of a specific stimulus. One of the biggest contributors to the study of Classical conditioning was Dr. Ivan Pavlov. Pavlov took a group of dogs and began introducing them to a stimulus, in the form of a bell, before he fed them. With the repetition of the bell each time food was given, the dogs linked the bell to the delivery of food. He then, after a length of time, rang the bell and saw that even without food present the dogs began to salivate thus showing they had associated the bell with food. The everyday example of the smell of freshly baked cookies

Classical conditioning says that we learn behaviours by associating the response to the stimulus. An example of this can be found from the work of Ivan Pavlov. In the 1890s Pavlov, a Russian physiologist, carried out some experiments with a dogs. He noticed that when a dog eats food, they salivate: this is an unconditional response to an

Pavlovian conditioning, also known as classical conditioning, was a theory developed by John Watson (1913). The theory included learning a new behavior through association. In other words, two stimuli are connected together to create a new response within an animal or a person. Pavlovian conditioning consisted of conditioned stimulus (US), unconditioned stimulus (UCS), condition response (CR) and unconditioned response (UCR). In Pavlov’s (1902) case, food was UCS and salivation was UCR. Then later on when he associated food with a bell, the dog began to salivate. In the end, every time the bell was rung, the dog began to salivate without seeing any kind of food. As long as the two stimuli are presented in a short amount of time, in this

Ivan Pavlov, a physician, preformed many experiments concerning the physiology of digestion, by accident he discovered what is now known as classical conditioning or Pavlovian conditioning (Wood, Wood, and Boyd 137). Classical conditioning is “a type of learning through which an organism learns to associate one stimulus with another” (Wood, Wood, and Boyd 137). Learning implies that there is at least a semi-permanent change, this change could be demonstrated through behavior for example. In classical conditioning two stimuli are paired together multiple times. A stimulus is “any event or object in the environment to which an organism responds” (Wood, Wood, and Boyd 137). Pavlov, the father of classical conditioning, found that dogs’ natural response to food is salivation. Therefore, whenever the dogs were presented with food they salivated. Salivation is an unlearned behavior, this is referred to as the unconditioned response. He observed that a large portion of the dogs would begin salivating before the food was even presented. For example, the dogs would begin to salivate when they saw the attendant, whom was responsible for feeding them or when they heard the sound of their feeding dishes rattling (Wood, Wood, and Boyd 137). The dogs associated the cues of the attendant and the rattling of the bowls with the unconditioned stimulus, food. An unconditioned stimulus is “a stimulus that elicits a specific unconditioned response without prior learning” (Wood, Wood, and Boyd

Briefly, Pavlov`s classical conditioning theory explain learning new behavior. He used dogs in his experiment. He explained three stages of classical conditioning. The unconditioned stimulus means that a stimulus in the environment has created a behavior (meat salivate the dog), Neutral stimulus that itself will not create a reaction (bell is ruining no salivate dog), conditioned stimulus means that neutral stimulus and the unconditioned stimulus together (meat and bell together salivate dog) and after conditioning means that neutral stimulus creates a conditioned response and becomes a conditioned stimulus(rang bell salivate