classical conditioning

Question 1

who created classical conditioning?

Answer 1

Ivan Pavlov

Question 2

what does classical conditioning suggest?

Answer 2

that a response that would not naturally occur could be conditioned to occur to a stimulus.

Question 3

what is a stimulus?

Answer 3

something that causes a response (food)

Question 4

what is a response?

Answer 4

a natural automatic reflex (salivation)

Question 5

what was the unconditioned stimulus/neutral stimulus in pavlovs experiment?

Answer 5

food

Question 6

what was the unconditional response?

Answer 6

salivation

Question 7

the bell an unconditioned stimulus was paired with the neutral stimulus and what happened ?

Answer 7

after a few parings the unconditioned stimulus of the bell became a conditioned stimulus which then triggered a conditioned response of salivation.

Question 8

what is forward conditioning?

Answer 8

when the NS is displayed before the UCS

Question 9

what is the spontaneous conditioning?

Answer 9

when the NS and the UCS is presented at the same time

Question 10

what is backwards conditioning

Answer 10

when the UCS is presented before the NS

- this isn’t as effective as forward conditioning.

Question 11

what is meant by extinction?

Answer 11

refers to when there is no longer association between the UCS and the CS so the behaviour stops.

Question 12

what is meant by spontaneous recovery?

Answer 12

when the behaviour suddenly reappears for no apparent reason

Question 13

what is meant by generalisation?

Answer 13

when the behaviour occurs to other stimulus that is similar to the orginal.

Question 14

what is meant by discrimination?

Answer 14

when the behaviour only occurs to the original stimulus.

Question 15

what can’t CC explain which may be a weakness of the theory?

Answer 15

• it can’t explain how new behaviours are learned it can only explain how we display existing behaviours but through different situations.
• therefore it might be considered an incomplete explanation.

Question 16

what did Kippin find? (2000)

Answer 16

• classically conditioned rats to ejaculate to the
  smell of almond or lemon.
• During conditioning male rats were allowed to mate with female rats who either smelled of lemon
  or almond.
  -At first male rats showed no preference but after
  conditioning they preferred to mate with those who had the smell that they associated to ejaculation .

Question 17

what problems with generalisability might arise?

Answer 17

• often studies are carried out using animals, such as Kippin and Pavlov’s own study which may be difficult to generalise to humans.
• however having said this in Watson and Raynor’s study they were able to classically condition a human child,

Question 18

why might classical conditioning have high internal validity regarding the way that it is studied?

Answer 18

Classical conditioning can easily be demonstrated in a

laboratory where extraneous variables can be controlled and cause and effect identified.

Question 19

how can classical conditioning explain real life explanations?

Answer 19

Classical conditioning can be
demonstrated in real life
situations such as television
advertisements or salivating
at just the sight of a box of
chocolates.