Anthony classically conditioned his cat to purr whenever the phone rang. One day, the phone rang for nearly two hours straight when Anthony wasn't home, and the cat's conditioned purring response underwent extinction. Today, the response has spontaneously recovered, but if the conditioned purring response were to undergo extinction again, Anthony should expect that it will
A)take less time to extinguish than it took for the original extinction.
B)take more time to extinguish than it took for the original extinction.
C)take the same amount of time to extinguish as it took for the original extinction.
D)be impossible to extinguish the response now that spontaneous recovery has occurred.

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

Extinction processes in classical conditioning often occur more quickly after a response has been extinguished and then spontaneously recovers. This is because the association between the conditioned stimulus (the phone ringing) and the conditioned response (purring) becomes weaker each time the extinction process occurs.

Anthony Classically Conditioned His Cat to Purr Whenever the Phone