Classical Conditioning occurs when a conditioned stimulus (CS) is paired with an unconditioned stimulus (US).  An example we have studied quite often in class is the classical conditioning of Pavlov’s dogs.  When Pavlov would ring a bell, the dogs would begin to salivate because the ringing of the bell had been paired with the visual of food.  The unconditioned stimulus (UCS) is the food, the unconditioned response (UCR) is the salivation, while the conditioned stimulus (CS) was the bell, and as a result, the conditioned response (CR) became the salivation.  I was recently watching the show “The Office” and scene that Professor Wede showed earlier in the year came about and had a great example of classical conditioning.

In the scene, Jim Halpert pretends to reboot his computer which makes a noise.  Every time the noise surfaces, he offers his co-worker, Dwight Schrute, an Altoid.  He continues to reboot his computer and then follows the noise it makes by giving Dwight the Altoid.  The last time he does it, Dwight reaches his hand out for an Altoid and Jim asks what he’s doing.  Dwight looks confused and says he doesn’t know what he is doing and that he has a bad taste in his mouth.

This is a great example of classical conditioning and also seeing the episode while learning about it helped me further understand the concept of it.  In the scene, the UCS would be the mint, the UCR would be the feeling of bad breath that Dwight experiences, the CS would be the sound the computer makes when Jim reboots, and finally the CR would be Dwight putting his hand out expecting a mint.  It can be tricky sometimes to figure out which of the four parts of classical conditioning is associated with what in the experiment.  So, seeing a different example of classical conditioning helped me get a better understanding of how the UCS, UCR, CS, and CR are related and how they are defined.