Condition a response, then extinguish it
Three steps, the way the exam actually works: work through the lab, write down your own measurements, then answer a 6-point free response. What you recorded goes to the grader with your writing, so a conclusion that does not follow from your own numbers will cost you the point — exactly as it would with a real reader.
Predict before you look
- In classical conditioning, which stimulus is neutral before learning, and which already produces the response on its own?
- Extinction weakens a conditioned response. Does it work by erasing the learning or by suppressing it? Your answer predicts what happens after a rest interval.
Nothing to submit here — these are to think through, so the prediction below is an informed one rather than a guess.
Commit to an answer now. It is not graded and being wrong costs nothing — the point is to have something specific to reconcile against once you have the data.
Answer every prediction to unlock the lab. A sentence is enough.
Run the investigation
Predictions first
The procedure and the simulation unlock once you have committed above. Observing before predicting is how a wrong intuition survives a lab intact.
Record what you measured
These are your numbers, not ours. The grader sees them, so your conclusions have to follow from what you actually recorded.
| Number of bell-plus-food pairings you ran | |
|---|---|
| Response strength after those pairings | |
| Number of bell-alone trials you ran | |
| Response strength after the bell-alone trials |
Answer the free response
You ran a classical conditioning procedure. (a) Identify the neutral stimulus, the unconditioned stimulus, the unconditioned response, the conditioned stimulus, and the conditioned response in your procedure. Be precise about which stimulus changes its label and when. (b) Describe the shape of the acquisition curve you produced, citing your recorded response strength, and explain why the gains from each additional pairing get smaller. (c) Explain what happened during the bell-alone trials, name that process, and explain why it is evidence that the original association was not erased. (d) Predict what would happen to the response if the subject rested for a day and then heard the bell again. Name the phenomenon.
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