AO1

• Humans and animals are born with natural reflexes e.g. reflex action of salivation when food is placed in mouth. These reflexes are made up of a stimulus e.g. food, and it’s naturally occurring response e.g. salivation. When other stimuli are consistently associated with this stimulus then eventually, they can trigger the same response and the animal is said to be classically conditioned.
• Before conditioning

  UCS (food) -> UCR (salivating)

  During conditioning

  UCS (food) + NS (bell) -> UCR (salivate)

  After conditioning

  CS (bell) -> CR (salivate)
• Timing – if the NS cannot be used to predict the UCS or time interval between the two is too great then conditioning does not occur.
• Extinction – if not repeated the CR becomes forgotten.
• Spontaneous recovery – following extinction if the CS and UCS are then paired together again, link between them is made quicker.
• Stimulus generalisation – once an animal has been conditioned, they will also respond to other stimuli that are similar to the CS.