Preview

Skinner B.F. ''Two Types of Conditioned Reflex and a Pseudo Type''

Powerful Essays
Open Document
Open Document
3477 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Skinner B.F. ''Two Types of Conditioned Reflex and a Pseudo Type''
TWO TYPES OF CONDITIONED REFLEX : A REPLY TO KONORSKI AND MILLER
B.F. Skinner (1937)
First published in Journal of General Psychology, 16, 272-279.

Before considering the specific objections raised by Konorski and Miller(4) against my formulation of a second type of conditioned reflex, I should like to give a more fundamental characterization of both types and of the discriminations based upon them. Let conditioning be defined as a kind of change in reflex strength where the operation performed upon the organism to induce the change is the presentation of a reinforcing stimulus in a certain temporal relation to behavior. All changes in strength so induced come under the head of conditioning and are thus distinguished from changes having similar dimensions but induced in other ways (as in drive, emotion, and so on). Different types of conditioned reflexes arise because a reinforcing stimulus may be presented in different kinds of temporal relations. There are two fundamental cases: in one the reinforcing stimulus is correlated temporally with a response and in the other with a stimulus. For "correlated with" we might write "contingent upon". There are the types that I have numbered I and II respectively. Konorski and Miller refer to the second as Type I and to a complex case involving the first (see below) as Type II. To avoid confusion and to gain a mnemonic advantage I shall refer to conditioning which results from the contingency of a reinforcing stimulus upon a stimulus [p.273] as a Type S and to that resulting from contingency upon a response as of Type R. If the stimulus is already correlated with a response or the response with a stimulus, a reinforcement cannot be made contingent upon the one term without being put into a similar relation with the other. That is to say, if a reinforcing stimulus is correlated temporally with the S in a reflex, it is also correlated with the R, or if with the R, then also with the S. It is not



References: (1) Hudgins, C. V. Conditioning and the voluntary control of the pupillary reflex. J. Gen. Psychol., 1933, 8, 3-51. (2) Skinner, B. F. Two types of conditioned reflex and a pseudo type. J. Gen. Psychol., 1935, 12, 66-77. (3) ----------. The rate of establishment of a discrimination. J. Gen. Psychol., 1933, 9, 302-350. (4) Konorski, J. A., & Miller, S. M. On two types of conditioned reflex. J. Gen. Psychol., 1937, 16, 264-272.

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Ps210 Unit 6 Assignment

    • 906 Words
    • 4 Pages

    John B. Watson famous “Little Alert Experiment” was best known as a case study showing and proving evidence of classical conditioning and also an example of stimulus generalization. It was carried out by John B. Watson and his graduate student, Rosalie Rayner, at Johns Hopkins University and its’ first findings were published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology.…

    • 906 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Conditioning - the acquisition of specific patterns of behavior in the presence of well-defined stimuli…

    • 1665 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    3. Responses are acquired—that is, initially learned—best when the CS is presented half a second before the US. This finding demonstrates how classical conditioning is biologically adaptive because it helps organisms prepare for good or bad events. 
Higher order conditioning occurs when the conditioned stimulus from one conditioning procedure is paired with a new neutral stimulus, creating a second, often weaker, conditioned stimulus. 
Extinction refers to the diminishing of a conditioned response when the conditioned stimulus occurs repeatedly without the unconditioned stimulus. Spontaneous recovery is the reappearance, after a pause, of an extinguished…

    • 1734 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    OTL 502

    • 1904 Words
    • 7 Pages

    The philosophy of operant conditioning has been demonstrated in many experiments using different types of species such as animals and humans. Operant conditioning refers to the process of reinforcing a response that is made in the company of a stimulus. In today’s life we are pulled and pushed by many events in our environment. We sometimes just don’t act to a stimulus, we also conduct ourselves in ways that seem designed to create or get certain environmental changes or stimuli. Most of the days in our lives seem to demonstrate this type of behavior. However this article was restricted to work with animals.…

    • 1904 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Ap Psych Chapter 6

    • 774 Words
    • 4 Pages

    1. Stimulus Generalization; stimulus similar to but not identical to the CR ( elicits the conditioned response…

    • 774 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    PSY 422 Study Guide #1

    • 494 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Chapter 3 begins with a brief examination of the history of classical conditioning. The research of Pavlov, Twitmyer, Vul’fson and Snarskii is presented. The historical accounts are used as a basis for defining the classical conditioning paradigm. Several experimental situations, including fear conditioning, eyeblink conditioning, sign tracking, and taste-aversion learning, are described in detail. The specifics of excitatory and inhibitory conditioning are then presented. These specifics include definitions, conditioning and control procedures, and measurement of the conditioned responses. The chapter concludes with an examination of the prevalence of classical conditioning. Classical conditioning mechanisms involved in responses during causal judgment, food preference learning, nursing, and sexual behavior are presented.…

    • 494 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Little Albert

    • 401 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Watson J. B., & Rayner, R. (1920). Conditioned emotional reactions. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 3(1), 1–14.…

    • 401 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Traditional learning viewpoints considered classical and operant conditioning to be automatic processes involving only environmental events that did not depend at all on biological or cognitive factors. Research on which of the following concepts cast doubt on this point of view?…

    • 2606 Words
    • 20 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Socio Take Home Quiz

    • 406 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Sluggishness, tremors, and twitches similar to those of Parkinson's disease are most likely to be associated with the excessive use of certain ________ drugs.…

    • 406 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    Cherry, K. (no date). Introduction to Classical Conditioning. Available: http://psychology.about.com/od/behavioralpsychology/a/classcond.htm. Last accessed 5th Oct 2014.…

    • 1713 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    Classical conditioning is a procedure by which a previously neutral stimulus comes to elicit a response after it is paired with a stimulus that automatically elicits that response, the first type of learning to be systematically studied (Kowalski & Weston, 2011, pg. 164). The unconditional…

    • 1075 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    Watson, John B. & Rayner, Rosalie. (1920). Conditioned emotional reactions. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 3, 1-14. Retrieved from http://www.psychology.sbc.edu/Little%20Albert.htm…

    • 1194 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    Learning new behavior through the process of association is considered conditioning. Multiple stimuli are linked to produce a learned behavior or response. In each of the three stages of classical conditioning the responses and stimuli are assigned specific scientific terms. Stage one is known as the UCS. The unconditioned stimulus produces a USR or an unconditioned response. In this stage, no new behavior is learned, but a natural response is induced by the introduction of a stimulus in…

    • 1110 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Women In The Giver

    • 1308 Words
    • 6 Pages

    What is a mother? A woman who gives labor to a child, for one, but there is more to the equation, for example: a person who cares for a newborn, who raises the child, and who child considers their mother. When women become pregnant, they are faced with decisions and choices that, depending on their environment, they may not have a say in. Which begs the question: do women have a choice when it comes to procreation? Essentially, women within dystopian and utopian literature do not have the choice to (or not to) become pregnant because without them, the future of their collective communities would be compromised. When Charlotte Gilman wrote Herland in the late 1970’s, America was fighting for equality…

    • 1308 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    The response conditioning theory suggests that if a neutral stimulus is followed closely in time by an unconditioned stimulus that elicits an unconditioned response, then the previous neutral stimulus will also tend to elicit that response in the future (with respect to that specific response). This project demonstrates this theory of response conditioning. The MC worked as the unconditioned stimulus (US) and the lemon water as the conditioned stimulus (CS). The physical reactions from the lemon water (salivation, lip puckering and eyebrow rising) worked as the unconditioned response (US) and the learned physical reaction to the cup worked at the conditioned response (CR). By pairing the NS (cup) with the CR (physical reactions from lemon water), I formed as associated between the MC and the sour taste. This associated elicited the responses of salivation, lip puckering and eyebrow rising from just looking at the…

    • 548 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays