Behavior analysts describe two basic kinds of learning. In one, a stimulus that comes before behavior gains new power because it has been paired with another stimulus. In the other, behavior changes because of what happens after it. Real cases often involve both.
Why it matters
Picking the wrong kind of conditioning leads to the wrong intervention. If a teenager's racing heart and sweating at the sight of a needle were conditioned by painful past injections, rearranging consequences for "acting nervous" will not remove the elicited reaction. If a child's crying at the dentist reliably ends the exam, though, the crying may be operant behavior maintained by escape, and changing the consequences matters a great deal.
Practice vignettes usually ask you to name a stimulus (US, CS, SD) or decide which kind of control explains a change in behavior.
Key ideas
- Respondent behavior is elicited. A preceding stimulus reliably produces it. Some stimulus–response relations are unlearned reflexes from our species' evolutionary history: a puff of air on the eye produces a blink, and food in the mouth produces salivation.
- Respondent conditioning is stimulus–stimulus pairing. A neutral stimulus (NS) is presented just before, or overlapping with, an unconditioned stimulus (US). After repeated pairings, the former NS alone elicits a response similar to the original one. It is now a conditioned stimulus (CS), and the response it elicits is a conditioned response (CR). It is also called classical or Pavlovian conditioning.
- Timing matters. Conditioning is usually strongest when the NS starts shortly before the US. Presenting the NS after the US (backward pairing) tends to produce little or no conditioning.
- Higher-order conditioning. A CS can act like a US for a new neutral stimulus. If a new stimulus is paired with an existing CS, the new stimulus can also come to elicit a CR, even though it was never paired with the original US.
- Operant behavior is emitted and selected by consequences. It operates on the environment, and its future frequency depends on the consequences that followed it in the past. Reinforcement makes similar responses more likely; punishment makes them less likely.
- Antecedents work differently in each. A CS elicits a respondent because of a pairing history. A discriminative stimulus (SD) evokes an operant because that response has been reinforced in its presence and not in its absence. The SD signals that reinforcement is available; it does not force the response.
- The two processes run side by side. A stimulus can be a CS for an emotional reaction and an SD for an operant at the same time.
Definitions
- Respondent behavior: behavior elicited by antecedent stimuli, including unlearned reflexes and responses conditioned through pairing.
- Unconditioned stimulus (US): a stimulus that elicits a response without any prior learning history.
- Unconditioned response (UR): the unlearned response a US elicits, such as salivating when food is in the mouth.
- Conditioned stimulus (CS): a formerly neutral stimulus that elicits a response because it has been paired with a US or with another CS.
- Conditioned response (CR): the learned response a CS elicits; it resembles the UR but is usually weaker.
- Respondent conditioning: the process by which pairing a neutral stimulus with an eliciting stimulus gives the neutral stimulus the power to elicit a similar response.
- Operant conditioning: the process by which the consequences that follow behavior change how often similar behavior occurs in the future.
- Discriminative stimulus (SD): a stimulus in whose presence a response has been reinforced (and not reinforced in its absence), so the response becomes more likely when that stimulus is present.
Examples from a session
Telling the processes apart
- Respondent conditioning (clinic): Over several dental visits, the high-pitched sound of the drill came just before painful pressure on 8-year-old Amara's tooth. Now the sound alone elicits muscle tension and a racing heart. The pressure was the US; the drill sound is now a CS.
- Higher-order conditioning (home): Darnell, a 40-year-old man, receives weekly allergy shots from a visiting nurse at home. The alcohol swab, which always comes right before the injection, now makes his arm tense. When the nurse starts saying "Quick wipe!" before each swab, the phrase alone begins to produce the same tensing.
- Operant conditioning (school): When 14-year-old Kai raises her hand in science class, her teacher calls on her and praises her ideas. Hand raising increases over the term. The behavior changed because of its consequences.
- Both at once: The same drill sound that elicits Amara's tension also sets the occasion for her to say "Stop!", which her dentist honors. Her tension is respondent; saying "Stop!" is operant behavior maintained by escape.
Ask what controls the behavior. If a preceding stimulus produces it regardless of what follows, think respondent. If it changes when its consequences change, think operant.
Common mistakes / exam traps
- Sorting by "voluntary" vs. "involuntary". That shortcut is unreliable. Classify by the controlling variables: eliciting stimuli or a history of consequences.
- Calling an SD a CS. An SD signals that a response will be reinforced. A CS elicits a response because of stimulus pairing. Look for "reinforced in its presence" (SD) versus "paired with" (CS).
- Mixing up the two kinds of extinction. Respondent extinction is presenting the CS repeatedly without the US. Operant extinction is withholding the reinforcer that maintained a response.
- Assuming the CR and UR are identical. The CR usually resembles the UR, but it is often weaker and may differ in form.
Exam trap
CS vs. SD. If a stem says a stimulus was "paired with" another stimulus and now produces a reaction on its own, think CS. If it says a response was "reinforced when" a stimulus was present, think SD.
Exam trap
Respondent vs. operant by topography. The trap: an option classifies coughing, crying, or blinking by what it looks like. The same form can be either. Coughing elicited by dust is respondent; coughing that increases because it ends a group task is operant. Ask whether the behavior changes when its consequences change.
Quick check
Which piece of evidence best shows that a behavior is operant rather than respondent?