Stimulus Generalization, Higher Order Conditioning, Discrimination, and Extinction in Classical Conditioning.
In classical conditioning the four terms listed above have a very important role to play in this small area of psychology.
The first term that we will start with is stimulus generalization. Stimulus generalization is defined as; "the tendency for the conditioned stimulus to evoke similar responses after the response has been conditioned." That means if a child has been conditioned to fear a white rat other things such as, a toy rat will evoke the same response as the real thing.
The second term is higher order conditioning. Higher order conditioning can be defined as; "a procedure in which the conditioned stimulus in one conditioning experience is paired with a neutral stimulus, creating a second conditioned stimulus." This means that if a dog is conditioned to associate a certain tone with being fed, it may also learn that the light goes with the sound and eventually it will associate food with the light alone.
The next term is discrimination. The official definition of discrimination is, the ability to differentiate between a conditioned stimulant and other stimuli that have not been paired with an unconditioned stimulus. An example of this would be a certain color such as red, being the conditioned stimulant, and being able to differentiate between red and other similar colors such as pink or orange.
The last term is extinction. Extinction in regards to classical conditioning is defined as, "the weakening of a conditioned response over time."
I posted a link about each of the four aforementioned subjects that were discussed above. You'll have to forgive me for breaking the three link rule just this one time. The first link concerns stimulus generalization. It provides a good example through explaining Watson's experiment with Little Albert. The second link goes over higher order conditioning. It just gives a great summery on higher order conditioning and how it relates to other ares of psychology such as neutral stimulus. The third link goes over discrimination. The second paragraph on this site has a great example of discrimination. Lastly the fourth link is about extinction. It gives a good, short little explanation on how extinction occurs in both operant and classical conditioning.
Links:
http://psychology.about.com/od/sindex/g/stimgen.htm
http://www.alleydog.com/glossary/definition.php?term=Higher+Order+Conditioning
http://psychology.about.com/od/dindex/g/discrimination.htm
http://psychology.about.com/b/2013/06/28/extinction-psychology-definition-of-the-week.htm
The first term that we will start with is stimulus generalization. Stimulus generalization is defined as; "the tendency for the conditioned stimulus to evoke similar responses after the response has been conditioned." That means if a child has been conditioned to fear a white rat other things such as, a toy rat will evoke the same response as the real thing.
The second term is higher order conditioning. Higher order conditioning can be defined as; "a procedure in which the conditioned stimulus in one conditioning experience is paired with a neutral stimulus, creating a second conditioned stimulus." This means that if a dog is conditioned to associate a certain tone with being fed, it may also learn that the light goes with the sound and eventually it will associate food with the light alone.
The next term is discrimination. The official definition of discrimination is, the ability to differentiate between a conditioned stimulant and other stimuli that have not been paired with an unconditioned stimulus. An example of this would be a certain color such as red, being the conditioned stimulant, and being able to differentiate between red and other similar colors such as pink or orange.
The last term is extinction. Extinction in regards to classical conditioning is defined as, "the weakening of a conditioned response over time."
I posted a link about each of the four aforementioned subjects that were discussed above. You'll have to forgive me for breaking the three link rule just this one time. The first link concerns stimulus generalization. It provides a good example through explaining Watson's experiment with Little Albert. The second link goes over higher order conditioning. It just gives a great summery on higher order conditioning and how it relates to other ares of psychology such as neutral stimulus. The third link goes over discrimination. The second paragraph on this site has a great example of discrimination. Lastly the fourth link is about extinction. It gives a good, short little explanation on how extinction occurs in both operant and classical conditioning.
Links:
http://psychology.about.com/od/sindex/g/stimgen.htm
http://www.alleydog.com/glossary/definition.php?term=Higher+Order+Conditioning
http://psychology.about.com/od/dindex/g/discrimination.htm
http://psychology.about.com/b/2013/06/28/extinction-psychology-definition-of-the-week.htm