Your cat,Tikki,always comes running when he hears you shake the bag of cat food because he thinks you are going to feed him.Now,suddenly,he comes running when he hears you shake a bag of rice.This is an example of ___.
A) stimulus discrimination
B) stimulus generalization
C) higher-order conditioning
D) extinction

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

This is an example of stimulus generalization where the cat has generalized the sound of the bag being shaken to mean food is coming, even if it is not the same type of food as before. Stimulus discrimination would be the opposite, where the cat would only come running for the specific sound that is associated with its desired food. Higher-order conditioning would involve pairing a neutral stimulus with a previously conditioned stimulus, leading to a new conditioned response, and extinction would involve a gradual decrease in the conditioned response when the conditioned stimulus is repeatedly presented without the unconditioned stimulus.

Your Cat,Tikki,always Comes Running When He Hears You Shake the Bag