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Example Of Classical Conditioning

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One example of classical conditioning that I have experienced in my everyday life is my cat’s response to hitting a spoon on a can of cat food. Classical conditioning involves learning a new behavior through the process of association. A new behavior can easily be learned by conditioning a person or pet to respond to a certain stimulus. My cat is a perfect example of classical conditioning that I see every day. Every morning when it is time to feed my cat I walk outside and hit a spoon on the side of her cat food can. As soon as the spoon strikes the can my cat comes running. The unconditioned stimulus is the sound of hitting the spoon on the can, and the unconditioned response is my cat receives food. Now, whenever I hit a can of food with a spoon my cat will come running because she assumes that I am about to feed her. Now that I know what my cat’s response is to the sound I often use it to my advantage. If I want my cat’s attention all I have to do is make the sound and she will come running. My cat now has a condition response of running to the house as soon as she hears the sound of the conditioned stimulus. The conditioned stimulus in this scenario is the sound of the spoon hitting the can. She hears the spoon hit the can and she automatically thinks that she is about to get food. I do not feed her every time I hit the can, but I do feed her sometimes in order to prevent the response from becoming extinct. If I did not do exercise this response every day and only did

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