Within the School of Thought of Behaviourism, there are seen to be two strands of thinking around the learning and development of behaviours within an individual. These are Classical and Operant Conditioning.
Classical conditioning, or as it is also known as Pavlovian or respondent conditioning, is the original thought process on the development of behaviour. The idea coined by Pavlov, which is where the name Pavlovian conditioning comes from, started that learning behaviour is a process of things that need to be learnt and things that are not required for the development of behaviour. He saw behaviour more as an involuntary reflex to environmental stimulus than a concise cognitive reaction to an experience or situation.
Classical conditioning involves learning a new behaviour through what is known as the process of association. This is where two stimuli are linked together to produce a new learned response. For example, Pavlov discovered that any object or event that dogs learn to associate with food would trigger salvation.
All learning from language to actions is seen as a simple pattern of stimuli and response. With this theory, it attempts to break down the process in scientific terms and processes. It uses terms such as unconditioned stimuli and unconditioned response, which refer to a stimulus and response that have yet to be linked to one another by repetition and conditioning. The unconditioned stimulus and response are known as neutral stimulus as it does not produce a conditioned response and, as such, is neutral. However, once the stimulus and response are linked, the neutral stimulus is then known as a conditioned stimulus, as it is now linked to and produces a response.
Within the theory of classical conditioning, the process can be split into three strands, which explore each aspect from before conditioning occurs to during and after conditioning occurs. These strands are:
Strand 1: Pre-Conditioning:
Strand one occurs before the conditioning process has begun. Pre-conditioning can be split into three parts and will be joined together during the conditioning process. These are the response stimulus, neutral stimulus, and response behaviour.
The response stimulus is an environmental event, object or action that causes a specific behaviour or response from an individual, which is not a learnt but based on reaction only.
The neutral stimulus is an environmental stimulus that has no effect on an individual and, as such, does not produce a specific behaviour or response as it is unconnected to the previous stimulus or response.
The response within the Pre-conditioning strand is a specific behaviour or action that results from an environmental stimulus. This is normally unlearnt and responsive.
Strand 2: Conditioning:
In stand two of classical condition, this is where two neutral and unconditioned stimuli are joined together to elicit a specific response. This will be done through a process of joint connection. One stimulus will follow another to gain a specific response. For example, in Pavlov’s experiment around conditioning, the two stimuli were that of a bell (neutral stimulus) and dog food (response stimulus). The response behaviour of this experiment was that of the dogs salivating. Pavlov wanted to see if he was able to condition the dogs to salivate when hearing the bell ring. As such, he used joint connection with the bell and dog food. He provided the dogs with their food and rang the bell at the same time. This was repeated several times until the neutral stimuli elicited the response of salivation within the dogs even when the food had been removed or never provided and, as such, became the conditioned stimulus.
The processes of joint connection will need to be carried out over a number of occasions in order for the learnt response to be associated with the connected stimuli, which, as mentioned above, turns the neutral stimulus into the conditioned stimulus.
However, this process is not always the case, as it also depends on the learned response to a stimulus. If the response is severe or serious enough, joint connection can occur immediately rather than over a period.
Strand 3: Post-Conditioning:
In the strand, the joint connection has occurred, and as such, the stimulus now produces the desired response when presented.
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