Classical & Operant Conditioni

             A COMPARISON BETWEEN CLASSICAL AND OPERANT CONDITIONING.
             This essay outlines the basic principles of classical and operant conditioning and considers the similarities and differences between these two models of learning.
             Classical conditioning is so named after the experimental procedure devised by the physiologist, Ivan Pavlov (1849-1936), when he changed his focus from the digestive system to conditioning, after noticing a dog salivate when it saw the bucket in which its food was kept.
             Pavlov devised an instrument to measure the salivation of the dog when giving it meat powder. The meat powder was the unconditioned stimulus (UCS) and the response was salivation, an unconditioned response (UCR). 'Unconditioned' means that the response is automatic, based on instinct. He then rang a bell, the neutral stimulus, and directly afterwards gave some meat powder (UCS) to the dog. The dog responded by salivating. Pavlov repeated this several times a day for 1 week and discovered that if he rang the bell but did not give the dog meat powder it still salivated. He now saw the bell as a conditioned stimulus (CS), and the salivation as a conditioned response (CR), as it had been learned.
             If a neutral stimulus that does not produce a response is repeatedly paired with a UCS that does produce a response, then the neutral stimulus will become a CS and also produce a response.
             An everyday example of this would be a person leaving a building upon hearing the fire alarm. The UCS is fear of a fire, the CS is the alarm's ring, and the CR is leaving the building.
             Principles to Classical Conditioning
             · Stimulus Generalisation - this refers to using similar stimuli to the CS, a bell with a slightly higher ringing tone to the original one, for example, that will probably evoke the salivary response. The more different the stimuli, the weaker the CR will be.
             · Stimulus Discrimination - this refers to the ability t...

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Classical & Operant Conditioni. (1969, December 31). In MegaEssays.com. Retrieved 05:15, March 28, 2024, from https://www.megaessays.com/viewpaper/39573.html