Psychology2016

Learning 183

higher-order conditioning

occurs when a strong conditioned

stimulus is paired with a neutral

stimulus, causing the neutral stimu-

lus to become a second conditioned

stimulus.

Figure 5.4 Higher-Order Conditioning
In Stage 1, a strong salivation response is conditioned to occur to the sound of the metronome (CS 1 ). In
Stage 2, finger snapping (NS) is repeatedly paired with the ticking of the metronome (CS 1 ) until the dog
begins to salivate to the finger snapping alone (now CS 2 ). This is called “higher-order conditioning,” because
one CS is used to create another, “higher” CS.

Stage 1

Stage 2

ConditioningCR (salivation)

CR (salivation)

UCR (salivation)

CR (salivation) High-Order

Conditioning

Metronome (NS)

UCS (food)

Metronome (CS 1 )

Metronome (CS 1 ) Snapping (CS 2 )

Snapping (NS)

Interactive

HIGHER-ORDER CONDITIONING Another concept in classical conditioning is
higher-order conditioning (see Figure 5. 4 ). This occurs when a strong conditioned
stimulus is paired with a neutral stimulus. The strong CS can actually play the part of a
UCS, and the previously neutral stimulus becomes a second conditioned stimulus.
For example, let’s revisit the point when Pavlov has conditioned his dogs to salivate at
the sound of the metronome. What would happen if just before Pavlov turned on the met-
ronome, he snapped his fingers? The sequence would now be “snap-ticking-salivation,”
or “NS–CS–CR” (“neutral stimulus/conditioned stimulus/conditioned response”). If this
happens enough times, the finger snap will eventually also produce a salivation response.
The finger snap becomes associated with the ticking through the same process that the tick-
ing became associated with the food originally and is now another conditioned stimulus.
Of course, the food (UCS) would have to be presented every now and then to maintain the
original conditioned response to the metronome’s ticking. Without the UCS, the higher-or-
der conditioning would be difficult to maintain and would gradually fade away.

WHY DOES CLASSICAL CONDITIONING WORK? Pavlov believed that the conditioned
stimulus, through its association close in time with the unconditioned stimulus, came
to activate the same place in the animal ’s brain that was originally activated by the
unconditioned stimulus. He called this process stimulus substitution. But if a mere asso-
ciation in time is all that is needed, why would conditioning fail to happen when the CS
is presented immediately after the UCS?
Robert Rescorla (1988) found that the CS has to provide some kind of information
about the coming of the UCS in order to achieve conditioning. In other words, the CS must
predict that the UCS is coming. In one study, Rescorla exposed one group of rats to a tone,
and just after the tone’s onset and while the tone was still able to be heard, an electric shock
was administered for some of the tone presentations. Soon the rats became agitated* and

*agitated: excited, upset.