Editing Classical conditioning (section)

==Definition==
Classical conditioning occurs when a conditioned stimulus (CS) is paired with an unconditioned stimulus (US). Usually, the conditioned stimulus is a neutral stimulus (e.g., the sound of a [[tuning fork]]), the unconditioned stimulus is biologically potent (e.g., the taste of food) and the unconditioned response (UR) to the unconditioned stimulus is an unlearned [[reflex]] response (e.g., salivation). After pairing is repeated the organism exhibits a conditioned response (CR) to the conditioned stimulus when the conditioned stimulus is presented alone. (A conditioned response may occur after only one pairing.) Thus, unlike the UR, the CR is acquired through experience, and it is also less permanent than the UR.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://psychology.about.com/od/cindex/g/condresp.htm |title=What Is a Conditioned Response? |first=Kendra |last=Cherry |name-list-style=vanc |work=About.com Guide |publisher=[[About.com]] |access-date=2013-02-10 |archive-date=2013-01-21 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130121043850/http://psychology.about.com/od/cindex/g/condresp.htm |url-status=live }}</ref>

Usually the conditioned response is similar to the unconditioned response, but sometimes it is quite different. For this and other reasons, most learning theorists suggest that the conditioned stimulus comes to signal or predict the unconditioned stimulus, and go on to analyse the consequences of this signal.<ref name="Shettleworth_2010">{{cite book |vauthors=Shettleworth SJ |date=2010 |title=Cognition, Evolution, and Behavior |edition=2nd |publisher=Oxford University Press}}</ref> [[Robert A. Rescorla]] provided a clear summary of this change in thinking, and its implications, in his 1988 article "Pavlovian conditioning: It's not what you think it is".<ref name="Rescorla_1988">{{cite journal |vauthors=Rescorla RA |title=Pavlovian conditioning. It's not what you think it is |journal=The American Psychologist |volume=43 |issue=3 |pages=151–60 |date=March 1988 |pmid=3364852 |doi=10.1037/0003-066X.43.3.151 |url=http://www.stanford.edu/class/psych227/RESCORLA%20(1988).pdf |citeseerx=10.1.1.156.1219 |access-date=2014-04-02 |archive-date=2014-06-11 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140611223201/http://www.stanford.edu/class/psych227/RESCORLA%20(1988).pdf |url-status=live }}</ref> Despite its widespread acceptance, Rescorla's thesis may not be defensible.{{Weasel inline|date=September 2024}}

A false-positive involving classical conditioning from chance (where the unconditioned stimulus has the same chance of happening with or without the conditioned stimulus) has been proven to be improbable in successfully conditioning a response. The element of contingency has been further tested and is said to have "outlived any usefulness in the analysis of conditioning."<ref>{{cite journal |vauthors=Papini MR, Bitterman ME |title=The role of contingency in classical conditioning |journal=Psychological Review |volume=97 |issue=3 |pages=396–403 |date=July 1990 |pmid=2200077 |doi=10.1037/0033-295X.97.3.396}}</ref>

Classical conditioning differs from [[Operant conditioning|''operant'' or ''instrumental'' conditioning]]: in classical conditioning, behaviors are modified through the association of stimuli as described above, whereas in operant conditioning behaviors are modified by the effect they produce (i.e., reward or punishment).<ref name="Bouton_2016">{{cite book |vauthors=Bouton ME |date=2016 |title=Learning and Behavior: A Contemporary Synthesis |edition=2nd |location=Sunderland, MA |publisher=Sinauer}}</ref>