Instructor Response to Assignmet #2

Dear Mr. Holt,

Pavlov referred dog food as a conditioned stimulus (CS). Conversely,

presentation of the significant stimulus necessarily evokes an innate,

often reflexive, response. Pavlov called these the unconditioned

stimulus (US) and unconditioned response (UR), respectively. If the CS

and the US are repeatedly paired, eventually the two stimuli become

associated and the organism begins to produce a behavioral response to

the CS. called this the conditioned response (CR).



If the above is true, than I would say the shock is the CS because

like the food the shock is the stimulus the evokes the innate, reflex

of jumping and freezing.



Is this correct? I am over-thinking this and getting myself confused.



Thank you,

Hi Alice,
The only thing that I see that needs to be fixed is that the dog food would be considered the Unconditioned Stimulus (US). That is, the food automatically produces the salivation (salivation is the UR here). The
US->UR relationship is really just reflexive (no learning required for the UR; food automatically elicits salivating).

The part that is interesting is when you pair a previously neutral stimulus with the US several times, after which the previously neutral stimulus alone can come to elicit a response. In classical conditioning terms we are talking about pairing the CS(any stimulus, e.g., a tone) and US(food). After several pairings, an association is made between the CS and US such that the CS alone comes to elicit a response (Conditioned Response). This is really what is exciting because we have evidence of learning through paired associations.
Shock would indeed be analogous to the food except that both are the US (not the CS).
One good thing about the Classical Conditioning model is that there are only 4 things you have to learn: CS, US, UR, and CR. If you can identify each of these you are in pretty good shape. You then should learn the relationship between the factors.

US--;UR

[CS-US] ---;UR - several pairings

CS ---; CR



Dan

Me -; I had to look up analogous: Alike, similar  having analogy;
1. corresponding in some particular: A brain and a computer are analogous.
2. Biology. corresponding in function, but not evolved from corresponding organs, as the wings of a bee and those of a hummingbird.