Did

you know that

Pavlov viewed classical conditioning as a technique for studying the
brain?
classical conditioning is not limited to glandular and visceral responses?
the conditioned response is not always like the unconditioned response?
conditioned stimuli become part of the behavior system activated by the
unconditioned stimulus?
conditioning not only results in new responses to the conditioned stimulus,
but it also changes how organisms interact with the unconditioned
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stimulus?
which stimulus can serve as a conditioned stimulus in classical
conditioning depends on the unconditioned stimulus that is used?
associative learning is possible in the random control procedure?
Pavlovian conditioning is involved in a wide range of behaviors, including
preferences and aversions, fears and phobias, drug tolerance and
addiction, and maternal and sexual behavior?

In Chapter 3, I described ways in which behavior is changed by experience with individual

stimuli. Habituation requires presenting the same stimulus over and over again and is
sometimes referred to as single-stimulus learning. We are now ready to consider how
organisms learn to put things together—how they learn to associate one event with another.
Associative learning is different from single-stimulus learning in that the change in behavior
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 that develops to one stimulus depends on when that stimulus previously occurred in relation to
a second stimulus. Associative learning involves learning about combinations of stimuli. The
first form of associative learning that we will consider is Pavlovian or classical conditioning.

Pavlov’s Proverbial Bell

The basic elements of Pavlovian or classical conditioning are familiar to most of students.
Accounts usually describe an apocryphal experiment in which Professor Pavlov rang a bell
just before giving a bit of food powder to the dogs that he was testing. The dogs were loosely
harnessed and hooked up to an apparatus that enabled Pavlov to measure how much they
salivated. At first the dogs salivated only when they were given the food powder. However,
after several trials with the bell being paired with the food, the dogs also came to salivate
when the bell sounded.
The story of Professor Pavlov training his dogs to salivate to a bell is useful for
introducing some important technical vocabulary. A stimulus such as food powder that elicits
the response of interest without prior training is called an unconditioned stimulus, or US.
Salivation elicited by the food powder is an example of an unconditioned response, or UR.
The bell is an example of a conditioned stimulus, or CS, and the salivation that develops to the
bell is called the conditioned response, or CR.
Pavlov’s proverbial bell illustrates associative learning because salivation to the bell
depends on presenting the bell in combination with food powder. Ringing the bell each time the
dog is about to receive a bit of food presumably results in an association of the bell with the
food. Once the bell has become associated with the food, the dog starts to respond to the bell
as if it were food; it salivates when it hears the bell.
Although Pavlov’s bell is familiar and helpful in introducing the technical terms used to
describe Pavlovian or classical conditioning, the story is misleading in several ways. First,
Pavlov rarely, if ever, used a bell in his experiments. Initial demonstrations of classical
Copyright © 2017. American Psychological Association. All rights reserved.

conditioning were conducted with visual CSs (the sight of the food that was to be placed in the
dog’s mouth) rather than auditory cues. Second, the story suggests that classical conditioning
primarily involves the modification of visceral and glandular responses. B. F. Skinner elevated
this implication to an axiom, postulating that classical conditioning can only modify glandular
and visceral responses (e.g., Skinner, 1953). However, subsequent research has shown this
assumption to be unwarranted (Domjan, 2016). Pavlovian conditioning can produce many
types of CRs, including approaching a signal for food or approaching the food cup, both of
which are skeletal rather than glandular or visceral responses.

Contemporary Conditioning Situations

Although classical conditioning was discovered in studies of salivary conditioning with dogs,
dogs are not used in such experiments any longer, and salivation is rarely the response that is
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 conditioned. Instead, pigeons, rats, rabbits, and college students commonly serve in the
experiments, and various skeletal and physiological responses are conditioned. In some
contemporary Pavlovian conditioning situations, the US is a desirable or appetitive stimulus,
like food. These preparations are used to study appetitive conditioning. In other situations, an
unpleasant or aversive event is used as the US. Such preparations are used to study aversive or
fear conditioning.

APPETITIVE CONDITIONING
Appetitive conditioning is frequently investigated with pigeons and laboratory rats. Pigeons
that serve in appetitive conditioning experiments are mildly hungry and are tested in a small
experimental chamber called a Skinner box (see Figure 4.1). The CS is a circular spot of light
projected onto a small plastic disk or touch screen above a food cup. Pecks at the light are
automatically detected. The conditioning procedure consists of turning on the key light for a
few seconds and then presenting a small amount of food.

FIG URE 4. 1
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Typical trial for conditioning sign tracking or autoshaping in pigeons. The conditioned stimulus (CS) is
illumination of a small circular disk or pecking key for 6 seconds. The unconditioned stimulus (US) is
access to food for 4 seconds. CS–US trials are repeated, with an intertrial interval of about 1 minute.

After a number of pairings of the key light with food, the pigeons come to approach and
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 peck the key when it is lit (Hearst & Jenkins, 1974; Tomie, Brooks, & Zito, 1989). The
conditioned approach and pecking behavior develop even if the key light is located some
distance from the food cup (Boakes, 1979). The light becomes a signal for food, and the
pigeons go where the light is located. Hence, this type of conditioned responding is called sign
tracking. Because the procedure results in the pigeons pecking the response key without
elaborate training or shaping by the experimenter, the procedure is also called autoshaping.
Laboratory rats are also used in studies of Pavlovian conditioning with food as the US. If
an auditory cue is used as the CS that is presented before each food delivery, the rats approach
and search the food cup as the CR to the auditory cue (Meyer, Cogan, & Robinson, 2014). This
type of behavior is referred to as goal tracking because the CR tracks the location of the goal
object or food. Sign tracking and goal tracking have been also found in sexual conditioning
with domesticated quail, where the CS comes to signal access to a potential sexual partner
(Burns & Domjan, 2001).
Whether sign tracking or goal tracking develops as the CR depends on the CS that is
employed and other details of the conditioning procedure. In addition, there are significant
individual differences that determine which type of conditioned behavior occurs. These
individual differences have been discovered in studies with rats using a retractable lever
apparatus (Flagel, Akil, & Robinson, 2009). In these experiments, the extension of a response
lever into the experimental chamber was used as the CS. Each conditioning trial started with
extension of the response lever, followed by the delivery of food into a food cup (see Figure
4.2 for an example of a rat in lever-press apparatus). With this procedure, about one third of
the rats developed sign tracking and approached and made contact with the lever. Another third
of the rats showed goal tracking and approached and searched the food cup. The remaining
subjects showed a combination of these responses.
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 FIG URE 4. 2

Rat in a conditioned suppression experiment. Pressing the response lever occasionally produces a pellet
of food. Periodically a tone is presented, ending in a brief shock through the grid floor. The rat comes to
suppress lever pressing during the tone.

Individual differences in sign tracking versus goal tracking have attracted a great deal of
interest because they are reflections of individual differences in the propensity to acquire
incentive motivation. Incentive motivation plays a major role in addictions where exposure to
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signals for the drug of choice makes the procurement of an appetitive reinforcer irresistible.
Individuals addicted to alcohol, for example, find the urge to drink irresistible when they see
or smell an alcoholic drink. For them, the sight and smell of alcohol has become a strong
incentive stimulus. Responses to the sight and smell of alcohol are sign tracking CRs (Zito &
Tomie, 2014). Fascinating research has shown that individual differences in sign tracking and
goal tracking are genetically based and related to neurobiological differences associated with
impulsivity and drug abuse (Flagel et al., 2011).

AVERSIVE OR FEAR CONDITIONING

Aversive conditioning has been extensively investigated using the eye-blink response. The eye-
blink is an early component of the startle reflex. Eye-blink conditioning was first developed
with human participants (see Kimble, 1961, pp. 55–59). A mild puff of air to one eye served as
the US, and a light served as the CS. After a number of pairings of the light with the air puff,
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 the light came to elicit a conditioned eye-blink response. Subsequently, techniques for studying
eye-blink conditioning were also developed for use with albino rabbits and rats to facilitate
investigations of the neurophysiology of learning. With these species, irritation of the skin near
one eye serves as the US, and a brief visual or auditory cue serves as the CS. Pairings of the
CS and US result in a conditioned eye-blink response when the CS is presented (Gormezano,
Kehoe, & Marshall, 1983).
Another common laboratory technique for studies of aversive conditioning is fear
conditioning. This procedure, typically carried out with rats or mice, takes advantage of the
fact that animals (including people) tend to become motionless, or freeze, when they are afraid.
A tone or light serves as the CS, and a brief shock applied through a grid floor serves as the
US. After a few pairings of the tone or light with the shock, the CS comes to elicit a freezing
response. In the freezing posture, the rat exhibits total lack of movement except for breathing
(N. S. Jacobs, Cushman, & Fanselow, 2010).
In a variant of fear conditioning known as the conditioned suppression procedure, rats are
placed in an experimental chamber that has a response lever that is continually present (rather
than being inserted into the chamber as a signal for food). The rats are trained to press the
lever to obtain a pellet of food. Food is then provided only intermittently for lever presses,
which keeps the rats pressing the lever at a steady rate. After the lever pressing is well
established, aversive conditioning trials are introduced. On each of these trials, a tone or light
CS is presented for a minute, followed by a brief foot shock. Within a few conditioning trials,
presentation of the CS results in suppression of the food-reinforced lever-press response. The
degree of lever-press suppression provides a measure of how much fear has become
conditioned to the CS (Ayres, 2012).

The Nature of the Conditioned Response

In Pavlov’s salivary conditioning experiments, the CR (salivation to a CS) was a glandular
Copyright © 2017. American Psychological Association. All rights reserved.

visceral response similar in form to the UR (salivation to food powder). These features of the
CR were considered to be universal characteristics of classical conditioning during much of
the 20th century. Pavlovian conditioning was considered to be primarily a mechanism for
adjusting physiological and glandular responses to the environment through experience
(Skinner, 1938), and the CR was assumed to always be similar to the UR (e.g., Mackintosh,
1974). However, neither of these assumptions is valid for the laboratory situations that are
commonly used in contemporary research on Pavlovian conditioning.
Sign tracking, goal tracking, and conditioned eye-blink responses are skeletal rather than
glandular responses. In eye-blink conditioning, the CR is similar to the UR. But this is not the
case in fear conditioning. Here the foot shock that serves as the US elicits a vigorous startle
and jump response, but the CS comes to elicit a contrasting freezing response. In many
Pavlovian situations, the CR is not similar to the responses that are elicited by the US.
If we cannot assume that the CR will always be similar to the UR, how can we predict
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 what kind of behavior will develop with Pavlovian conditioning? This remains a challenging
question. A promising approach to answering the question is based on the identification of
preexisting behavior systems that may be activated by a Pavlovian conditioning procedure.
I introduced the concept of behavior systems in Chapter 2. The concept is relevant to the
present discussion because the US in a Pavlovian conditioning procedure activates the
behavior system relevant to that US. Presentations of food to a hungry animal activate the
feeding system, presentations of shock activate the defensive behavior system, and
presentations of a sexual US activate the reproductive behavior system. The CR that develops
depends on how the CS becomes incorporated into the behavior system activated by the US
(Domjan & Krause, in press).
The feeding system, for example, involves a sequence of response modes starting with
general search and then moving on to focal search and ingestive or consummatory behavior
(see Figure 4.3). If a CS is presented before the animal receives each portion of food, the CS
will become incorporated into one of the response modes of the feeding behavior system,
which will in turn determine what type of CR the organism will perform (Timberlake, 2001). If
the CS becomes incorporated into the focal search mode, the CR will consist of focal search
responses such as sign tracking or goal tracking (Wasserman, Franklin, & Hearst, 1974). In
contrast, if the CS becomes incorporated into the ingestive, consummatory response mode, the
CR will involve handling and chewing the CS (Boakes, Poli, Lockwood, & Goodall, 1978).

FIG URE 4. 3
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Behavior systems and Pavlovian conditioning. Conditioning procedures with food as the unconditioned
stimulus (US) involve the feeding system. As a result of pairings of the conditioned stimulus (CS) with food,
the CS becomes incorporated into the feeding system and comes to elicit food-related responses.

In aversive conditioning, the nature of the CR is determined by the defensive behavior

system (Rau & Fanselow, 2007). Foot shock used in studies of conditioned fear is an external
source of pain, much like being bitten by a predator, and the response to shock is similar to the
response to being bitten. When a rat is bitten by a snake, it leaps into the air. Similarly, rats
jump when they receive a brief shock to the foot. The rat’s defensive response to an impending
or possible attack is different from its response to the attack itself. If a rat sees or smells a
snake that is about to strike, the rat freezes. In the fear conditioning procedure, the CS signals
an impending attack. Therefore, the CS comes to elicit the freezing defensive behavior.
Because the CS usually precedes the presentation of a US in a Pavlovian conditioning
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 procedure, responses to the CS are anticipatory responses. What kind of anticipation is
appropriate depends on how long you have to wait during the CS before the US is presented.
Therefore, the interval between the onset of the CS and the onset of the US is critical in
determining the nature of the CR. In aversive conditioning, for example, a long CS–US interval
results in conditioned anxiety, whereas a short CS–US interval results in conditioned fear or
panic (Waddell, Morris, & Bouton, 2006). In sexual conditioning, a long CS–US interval
activates the general search mode, whereas a short CS–US interval activates the focal search
mode (Akins, 2000).

Conditioned Modifications of the Unconditioned Response

In the preceding discussion, I followed the common practice of talking about Pavlovian
conditioning as learning to anticipate a biologically significant event, the US. Why should
organisms respond in anticipation of something? What is the advantage of anticipation? The
value of anticipating a significant event is that you can deal with that event more effectively
when it occurs. This suggests that Pavlovian conditioning should alter how organisms interact
with the US. That is in fact the case. There is a growing body of evidence confirming that
presentation of a CS alters how organisms interact with the US.
One of the first areas of research in which Pavlovian conditioning was found to change
how organisms interact with the US is drug conditioning. When we take a drug for either
recreational or therapeutic reasons, we focus on its pharmacological or unconditioned effects.
However, there is also a strong conditioning component because drugs are typically
administered using a ritual of some sort. The pharmacological effects of caffeine or a glass of
wine, for example, are preceded by the smell and taste of the drinks and the particular place or
time of day when the drugs are ingested. Smell, taste, and other cues related to drug
administration function as CSs that become associated with the unconditioned pharmacological
effects of caffeine and alcohol.
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Drugs are disruptive to normal physiological functioning or physiological homeostasis.

With repeated administrations of a drug, the body comes to anticipate these disruptive effects
and learns to make compensatory adjustments in anticipation of the drug. The anticipatory
adjustments are elicited by drug-conditioned cues and serve to attenuate the impact of the drug
once it is ingested. Through this process, the impact of the drug is gradually reduced, an
outcome known as drug tolerance.
An important implication of these learning mechanisms is that tolerance to a drug can be
reversed if the drug is taken in a new place or in the absence of the usual drug-administration
cues. Extensive research has confirmed this prediction, as well as numerous other implications
of the conditioning model of drug tolerance (Siegel, 2008). One unfortunate consequence of the
reversal of drug tolerance is that familiar doses of a drug that previously were not lethal
become life threatening if the drug is taken in the absence of the usual drug-administration cues
(Siegel, 2016).
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 The conditioning model of drug tolerance is not only of clinical significance. It also
supports the idea that Pavlovian conditioning serves to modify how organisms respond to the
US. This new perspective has been documented in a variety of Pavlovian conditioning
situations, including fear conditioning, defensive conditioning, and sexual conditioning
(Domjan, 2005). In the sexual conditioning of male quail, for example, a CS is paired with
access to a sexually receptive female and ensuing copulation or coitus. With repeated pairings,
the CS will acquire incentive motivational properties and elicit sign tracking. However, a
more important result is that exposure to a sexual CS significantly changes how the male
copulates with the female. The sexual CS reduces the male’s latency to initiate copulation, it
increases courtship responses, it increases the efficiency of copulatory behavior, and it
enhances the release of sperm and the fertilization of eggs (Domjan & Akins, 2011). All of
these changes in behavior represent changes in how the male interacts with the US, which in
this case is a female sexual partner.

Stimulus Factors in Classical Conditioning

Early investigators of Pavlovian conditioning assumed that just about any stimulus the
organism could detect could be effectively used as a CS. This assumption has turned out to be
incorrect. In this section, I describe two factors that determine the effectiveness of a CS: the
novelty of the CS and the nature of the US.

CS NOVELTY AND THE LATENT INHIBITION EFFECT

Novelty of a stimulus is a powerful factor determining its behavioral impact. As we saw in
Chapter 3, repeated exposures to a stimulus may result in a habituation effect, making highly
familiar stimuli less effective in eliciting vigorous behavioral reactions than novel stimuli.
Habituation can also reduce the effectiveness of a stimulus that is later used as a CS in a
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Pavlovian conditioning procedure. This phenomenon is called the latent inhibition effect
(Lubow & Weiner, 2010).
Studies of the latent inhibition effect are usually conducted in two phases, the preexposure
phase and the conditioning phase. In the preexposure phase, participants are given repeated
presentations of the stimulus that will be used later as the CS. For example, a tone that
subsequently will be paired with food may be presented a number of times during the
preexposure phase. During this phase, the tone is presented by itself, without the US. After the
preexposure phase, the tone is paired with the food US, using conventional classical
conditioning procedures. The typical outcome is that CS preexposure retards the subsequent
development of conditioned responding to the tone.
The CS preexposure effect has been interpreted as reflecting attentional processes.
Repeated presentations of a tone (for example) during the preexposure phase are assumed to
reduce the participant’s attention to the tone, and this in turn is assumed to disrupt subsequent
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 Pavlovian conditioning of the tone (e.g., Schmajuk, 2010). Because of the involvement of
attentional processes, the latent inhibition effect has become popular as a technique for
studying brain mechanisms and disorders such as schizophrenia that involve deficits in
attention (Lubow, 2011).

CS–US RELEVANCE AND SELECTIVE ASSOCIATIONS

The effectiveness of a stimulus as a CS in Pavlovian conditioning also depends on the US that
is used. As I noted earlier, presentations of a US (e.g., food) serve to activate the behavior
system relevant to that US. Thus, the feeding behavior system is activated when food is
repeatedly presented to a hungry pigeon. As I previously emphasized, each behavior system is
associated with its own distinctive set of responses. Behavior systems are also characterized
by enhanced reactivity to a distinctive set of stimuli. Pigeons, for example, tend to locate food
by sight and become highly attuned to visual cues when their feeding system is activated. This
makes visual cues especially effective in Pavlovian conditioning with food for pigeons.
The first clear evidence that the effectiveness of a CS depends on the US that is used was
obtained in studies of aversion conditioning in laboratory rats. The conditioned suppression
phenomenon illustrates one type of aversion conditioning. Here a tone or light is paired with
shock, with the result that the CS acquires aversive properties. Another type of aversion
conditioning is taste-aversion learning. Here a novel taste is followed by postingestional
illness (e.g., a mild case of food poisoning), and the organism learns an aversion to the novel
taste as a result.
The conditioned suppression and taste-aversion learning phenomena demonstrate that both
auditory and visual cues and taste cues are highly effective as CSs. Interestingly, however, they
are effective only in combination with their own particular US (see Figure 4.4). Rats do not
easily learn an aversion to an auditory or visual cue paired with illness, nor do they easily
learn an aversion to a taste cue paired with shock (Garcia & Koelling, 1966). Such results
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illustrate the phenomenon of CS–US relevance, or selective association. The Garcia–Koelling

selective association effect met with great skepticism when it was first reported, but much of
that skepticism has been laid to rest by subsequent research that has confirmed the phenomenon
in a variety of contexts and under circumstances that have ruled out various alternative
interpretations (Domjan, 2015).

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 FIG URE 4. 4

Procedure and results of the experiment by Garcia and Koelling (1966) demonstrating selective
associations in aversion learning.

Like laboratory rats, people also learn aversions to stimuli selectively. People who
experience some form of gastrointestinal illness are more likely to learn an aversion to a novel
food they ate just before becoming sick than they are to learn an aversion to other types of
stimuli they may have encountered. Consistent with the selective association effect, people do
not report acquiring a food aversion if they hurt themselves in a physical accident or if they
develop an irritating skin rash (Logue, Ophir, & Strauss, 1981; Pelchat & Rozin, 1982). Only
illness experiences are effective in inducing a food aversion.
Since the initial demonstration of the selective association effect in aversion learning, such
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effects have been found in other forms of learning as well. For example, Shapiro, Jacobs, and
LoLordo (1980) found that pigeons are more likely to associate a visual stimulus than an
auditory stimulus with food. However, when the birds are conditioned with shock, the auditory
cue is more likely to become conditioned than the visual cue. Selective associations also occur
in primate fear conditioning (Mineka & Öhman, 2002). Monkeys and people learn to be fearful
of the sight of snakes more easily than the sight of flowers. This seems to be the result of an
evolutionary predisposition. Enhanced sensitivity to the sight of snakes has been observed in
human infants as young as 8 to 14 months of age (LoBue & DeLoache, 2010).

The Control Problem in Pavlovian Conditioning

The critical feature of Pavlovian conditioning is that it involves the formation of an association
between a CS and a US. Therefore, before any change in behavior can be attributed to
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 Pavlovian conditioning, one must demonstrate that the effect is not produced by other factors
that do not involve an association.
To promote the development of an association, the conditioned and US have to be
presented in combination with one another. It is particularly effective, for example, to present
the CS just before the presentation of the US on each conditioning trial. (I have more to say
about this in Chapter 5.) In addition, a number of conditioning trials are usually needed to get a
learning effect. Thus, a Pavlovian conditioning procedure involves repeated presentations of
the CSs and USs. However, as we saw in Chapter 3, repeated presentations of stimuli can also
result in habituation and sensitization effects. This implies that habituation and sensitization
effects can occur during the course of Pavlovian conditioning.
Habituation and sensitization effects due to repeated CS and US presentations do not
depend on the formation of an association between the CS and US and therefore do not
constitute Pavlovian conditioning. Habituation effects are typically of little concern because
habituation results in decreased responding, whereas Pavlovian conditioning involves
increased responding to the CS. Increased responding to the CS can be due either to
sensitization resulting from CS exposures or to dishabituation or sensitization resulting from
US presentations. Control procedures have to be used to rule out such sensitization effects in
studies of Pavlovian conditioning.
A universally applicable and acceptable solution to the control problem in Pavlovian
conditioning has not been found. Instead, a variety of control procedures have been used, each
with its own advantages and disadvantages. In one procedure, CS sensitization effects are
evaluated by repeatedly presenting the CS by itself. Such a procedure, called the CS-alone
control, is inadequate because it does not take into account the possibility of increased
responding to the CS due to dishabituation or sensitization effects of the US. Another control
procedure involves repeatedly presenting the US by itself (the US-alone control) to measure
US-induced sensitization. This procedure, however, does not consider possible sensitization
effects due to repeated CS presentations.
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In 1967, Rescorla proposed an ingenious solution, known as the random control

procedure, that appeared to overcome the shortcomings of the CS-alone and US-alone controls.
In the random control procedure, the CS and US are both presented repeatedly, but at random
times in relation to each other. The random timing of the CS and US presentations is intended
to prevent the formation of an association between them without interfering with sensitization
processes.
The random control procedure became popular soon after its introduction, but as
investigators began to examine it in detail, they discovered some serious difficulties (Papini &
Bitterman, 1990). Studies demonstrated that this procedure is not entirely without effect, or
neutral, in producing learning. Associative learning can develop in a random control procedure
(e.g., Kirkpatrick & Church, 2004). One source of such learning is that random CS and US
presentations permit occasional instances in which the CS is presented in conjunction with the
US. If such occasional CS–US pairings occur early in a sequence of random CS and US
presentations, conditioned responding may develop (Benedict & Ayres, 1972).
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 Associative learning can also result when the US is presented without the CS in a random
control procedure. In such instances the US is being presented with the background contextual
cues of the experimental chamber. These background cues were ignored throughout much of the
early development of Pavlovian conditioning theory. However, more recent research has
shown that the repeated presentation of a US in the absence of an explicit CS can result in
substantial conditioning of background cues (Balsam & Tomie, 1985).
Although no entirely satisfactory control procedure for Pavlovian conditioning is
available, the discriminative control procedure is a reasonable strategy. This procedure is
summarized in Figure 4.5. The discriminative control involves two CSs, a CS+ and a CS−. The
two CSs may be, for example, a brief tone and a brief light. On half the trials, the CS+ is
presented and paired with the US. (The + sign indicates that the US is presented with the CS.)
On the remaining trials, the CS− is presented, and the US does not occur. (The − sign indicates
that the US is omitted.) CS+ and CS− trials are alternated randomly. For half the participants,
the tone serves as the CS+, and the light serves as the CS−; for the remaining participants, these
stimulus assignments are reversed.

FIG URE 4. 5

Diagram of the discriminative control procedure for Pavlovian conditioning. Two types of trials occur in
Copyright © 2017. American Psychological Association. All rights reserved.

random alternation. On some trials, one conditioned stimulus, the CS+, is paired with the unconditioned
stimulus (US). On the remaining trials, another conditioned stimulus, the CS−, is presented alone.
Stronger conditioned responding to CS+ than to CS− is evidence of associative learning rather than some
form of sensitization.

What would happen if presentations of the US only sensitized responding to the light and
tone CSs? Sensitization is not based on an association and thus does not depend on the pairing
of a stimulus with the US. Therefore, sensitization is expected to elevate responding to both the
CS+ and the CS−. If only sensitization occurred in the discriminative control procedure, the
participants would respond to the CS+ and CS− in a similar fashion.
How about associative learning? In contrast to sensitization, associative learning should
be specific to the stimulus that is paired with the US. Therefore, associative learning should
elevate responding to the CS+ more than the CS−. Greater responding to the CS+ than to the CS−
Domjan, Michael. The Essentials of Conditioning and Learning, American Psychological Association, 2017. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/kuleuvenul/detail.action?docID=5116675.
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 in the discriminative control provides strong evidence of associative learning.
The discriminative control procedure permits the evaluation of associative effects within a
single group of subjects (based on how those subjects respond differently to the CS+ and the
CS−). Another approach that is frequently used is the unpaired control procedure. In this
procedure, the CS and US are presented repeatedly, but the stimulus presentations are
deliberately scheduled so that the CS and US never occur together or on the same trial. This
procedure is administered to a control group, which is compared with an experimental group
that receives the CS paired with the US. Greater responding in the paired group compared with
the unpaired group is considered evidence of associative Pavlovian conditioning.

Prevalence of Pavlovian Conditioning

Classical conditioning is typically investigated in laboratory situations. However, we do not
have to know a lot about classical conditioning to realize that it is common outside the
laboratory as well. Classical conditioning is most likely to develop when one event (the CS)
reliably occurs shortly before another (the US). This happens in many areas of life. Most of the
stimuli we encounter occur in an orderly temporal sequence because of the physical constraints
of causation. Some things simply cannot happen before other things have occurred. Social
institutions and customs also ensure that events occur in a reliable sequence. Whenever one
stimulus reliably precedes another, classical conditioning may take place, enabling you to
predict what will happen next on the basis of antecedent events that serve as CSs.
One area of research that has been of particular interest is how people come to judge one
event as the cause of another. In studies of human causal judgment, participants are exposed to
repeated occurrences of two events (e.g., pictures of a blooming flower and a watering can
briefly presented on a computer screen) in various temporal arrangements. In one arrangement,
for example, the watering can always occurs before the flower; in another, it occurs at random
Copyright © 2017. American Psychological Association. All rights reserved.

times relative to the flower. After observing numerous presentations of both objects, the
research participants are asked to indicate their judgment as to the strength of the causal
relation between them.
Studies of human causal judgment are analogous to studies of Pavlovian conditioning in
that both involve repeated experiences with two events and responses based on the extent to
which those two events are related to one another. In view of these similarities, one might
expect that there is considerable commonality between the results of causal judgment and
Pavlovian conditioning experiments. That expectation has been borne out in numerous studies
(Allan, 2005), suggesting that Pavlovian associative mechanisms may play a role in the
numerous informal judgments of causality we all make in the course of our daily lives.
I described earlier in this chapter how Pavlovian conditioning can result in the acquisition
of fear. The mechanisms of fear conditioning are of considerable interest because of the role of
fear conditioning in anxiety disorders, phobias, and panic disorder (Craske, Hermans, &
Vansteenwegen, 2006; Oehlberg & Mineka, 2011). As I already discussed, Pavlovian
Domjan, Michael. The Essentials of Conditioning and Learning, American Psychological Association, 2017. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/kuleuvenul/detail.action?docID=5116675.
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 conditioning is also involved in drug tolerance and addiction (Siegel, 2008). Cues that reliably
accompany drug administration can come to elicit drug-related responses through conditioning.
In discussing this type of learning on the part of crack addicts, Dr. Scott Lukas of McLean
Hospital in Massachusetts described the effects of drug-conditioned stimuli by saying that
“these cues turn on crack-related memories, and addicts respond like Pavlov’s dogs”
(Newsweek Staff, 2001, p. 40).
Pavlovian conditioning is also involved in infant and maternal responses during nursing.
Suckling involves mutual stimulation for the infant and mother. To successfully nurse, the
mother has to hold the baby in a special position, which provides special tactile stimuli for
both the infant and the mother. The tactile stimuli experienced by the infant may become
conditioned to elicit orientation and suckling responses on the part of the baby (Blass,
Ganchrow, & Steiner, 1984). Olfactory cues experienced by the infant also become
conditioned during suckling episodes. Infants come to prefer suckling-associated cues, with the
preference evident as long as a year after the conditioning episode (Delaunay-El Allam et al.,
2010).
Pavlovian conditioning is also important in learning about sexual situations. Clinical
observations indicate that human sexual behavior can be shaped by learning experiences, but
the most extensive experimental evidence for sexual conditioning has been obtained in studies
with laboratory animals (Domjan & Akins, 2011). In these studies, males typically serve as
participants, and the US is provided either by the sight of a sexually receptive female or by
physical access to a female. Subjects come to approach stimuli that signal the availability of a
sexual partner. The presentation of a sexually CS also facilitates various aspects of
reproductive behavior. After exposure to a sexual CS, males are quicker to perform copulatory
responses, compete more successfully with other males for access to a female, show more
courtship behavior, release greater quantities of sperm, show increased levels of testosterone
and luteinizing hormone, and produce more offspring.
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Summary
Although studies of Pavlovian conditioning began with the conditioning of salivation and other
glandular responses in dogs, contemporary investigations focus on conditioning skeletal
responses in sign tracking, fear conditioning, and eye-blink conditioning. These investigations
have shown that different types of CRs can develop, depending on the nature of the CS and the
behavior system activated by the US.
Because Pavlovian conditioning involves the learning of an association between a CS and
a US, behavioral changes due to mere repetition of the CS and US have to be excluded. The
random control procedure is not effective in this regard because it can result in associative
learning. Although an entirely satisfactory control procedure is not available, the
discriminative control and unpaired control procedures are reasonably effective. In the
discriminative control procedure, one CS is paired with the US and another CS is presented
Domjan, Michael. The Essentials of Conditioning and Learning, American Psychological Association, 2017. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/kuleuvenul/detail.action?docID=5116675.
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 without the US. Differential responding to the two CSs provides evidence of associative
learning. In the unpaired control procedure, the CS is presented at times when the US is certain
to not occur.
Pavlovian conditioning may occur wherever one event reliably precedes another.
Examples include causality judgments, drug tolerance and addiction, suckling and nursing, and
learning to predict potential sexual encounters.

Suggested Readings
Bouton, M. E., Mineka, S., & Barlow, D. H. (2001). A modern learning theory perspective on
the etiology of panic disorder. Psychological Review, 108, 4–32.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0033-295X.108.1.4
Domjan, M. (2005). Pavlovian conditioning: A functional perspective. Annual Review of
Psychology, 56, 179–206. http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/annurev.psych.55.090902.141409
Flagel, S. B., Akil, H., & Robinson, T. E. (2009). Individual differences in the attribution of
incentive salience to reward-related cues: Implications for addiction.
Neuropharmacology, 56(Suppl. 1), 139–148.
Papini, M. R., & Bitterman, M. E. (1990). The role of contingency in classical conditioning.
Psychological Review, 97, 396–403.
Siegel, S. (2008). Learning and the wisdom of the body. Learning & Behavior, 36, 242–252.
http://dx.doi.org/10.3758/LB.36.3.242

Technical Terms
Appetitive conditioning
Associative learning
Copyright © 2017. American Psychological Association. All rights reserved.

Autoshaping
Aversive conditioning
CS–US relevance
Conditioned response (CR)
Conditioned stimulus (CS)
Conditioned suppression
Discriminative control
Latent inhibition
Random control
Selective association
Sign tracking
Skinner box
Taste-aversion learning
Unconditioned response (UR)
Domjan, Michael. The Essentials of Conditioning and Learning, American Psychological Association, 2017. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/kuleuvenul/detail.action?docID=5116675.
Created from kuleuvenul on 2018-10-01 03:09:22.
 Unconditioned stimulus (US)
Unpaired control procedure
Copyright © 2017. American Psychological Association. All rights reserved.

Domjan, Michael. The Essentials of Conditioning and Learning, American Psychological Association, 2017. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/kuleuvenul/detail.action?docID=5116675.
Created from kuleuvenul on 2018-10-01 03:09:22.