Higher Order Conditioning In Psychology (second order conditioning):

Higher-order conditioning happens in three phases.

The first is acquisition when the conditioned stimulus (conditioned stimulus) and unconditioned stimulus (unconditioned stimulus) are paired together.

In the second phase, extinction, the conditioned stimulus is presented without the unconditioned stimulus.

In the final phase, spontaneous recovery, the Conditioned Stimulus is presented again after a period of time in which it was not present (Williams, 2002).

Acquisition

In the first phase of higher-order conditioning, the conditioned stimulus (conditioned stimulus) and unconditioned stimulus (unconditioned stimulus) are paired together.

For example, if a tone is paired with food, then the tone will come to elicit salivation.

This pairing of the conditioned stimulus and Unconditioned Stimulus is known as conditioning (Williams, 2002).

Extinction

As with first-order conditioning, higher-order conditioning is subject to extinction — that is, the conditioned response will disappear if the conditioned stimulus is no longer associated with the unconditioned stimulus.

However, higher-order conditioning is often more resistant to extinction than first-order conditioning (Williams, 2002).

In the second phase of higher-order conditioning, the conditioned stimulus is presented without the unconditioned stimulus.

For example, if the tone is presented without food, then it will no longer elicit salivation.

This is because the conditioned stimulus has become associated with the unconditioned stimulus (in this case, food), and so when the unconditioned stimulus is not present, the conditioned response (CR) — in this case, salivation — is also not elicited (Williams, 2002).

Spontaneous recovery

In the final phase of higher-order conditioning, the Conditioned Stimulus is presented again after a period of time in which it was not present.

For example, if the tone is presented again after a period of time in which it was not paired with food, then it will once again come to elicit salivation.

This is because the association between the conditioned stimulus and unconditioned stimulus has not been completely extinguished, and so the CR can still be elicited (Williams, 2002).

Higher-order conditioning has been demonstrated in honeybees.

In one experiment, a conditioned stimulus (conditioned stimulus; sucrose) and an unconditioned stimulus (unconditioned stimulus; quinine) were paired together.

The bees were then presented with the conditioned stimulus alone, and it was found that they showed a reduced proboscis extension reflex.

This means that the bees were less sensitive in their antennas when it came to determining whether or not they should extend their nectar-sucking proboscis when they were around a stimulus.

This shows that the bees had been higher-order conditioned: the conditioned stimulus (sucrose) had come to inhibit the response to the unconditioned stimulus (quinine) (Hussaini, Komiscke, Mennzel, & Lachnit, 2007).

In another experiment, a different conditioned stimulus (conditioned stimulus; sucrose) and unconditioned stimulus (unconditioned stimulus; quinine) were again paired together.

However, in this case, the conditioned stimulus was presented without the Unconditioned Stimulus.

It was found that the bees showed no reduction in their proboscis extension reflex.

This shows that the higher-order conditioning had been extinguished: the association between the conditioned stimulus and unconditioned stimulus had been broken, and so the conditioned stimulus no longer inhibited the response to the unconditioned stimulus (Hussaini, Komiscke, Mennzel, & Lachnit, 2007).

Higher-order conditioning has also been found to occur in humans.

For example, one study found that after participants were exposed to pictures of snakes and spiders paired with an unpleasant noise, they exhibited increased fear responses when shown pictures of the animals alone.

Conditioned emotional responses (CERs) can be elicited through higher-order conditioning. For example, after pairing a picture of a snake with an unpleasant noise, the picture alone may elicit fear (Williams, 2002).

Second-order and higher-order classical conditioning are often employed in consumer product marketing.

For example, a company may pair its product with a celebrity endorser who is already associated with positive feelings.

In this way, the company’s product comes to be associated with those positive feelings, and consumers are more likely to have positive attitudes toward the product (Schachtman, Walker, & Fowler, 2011).

Similarly, a company might pair a competitor’s product with a negative stimulus in order to create a negative association. For example, a company might associate its product with an unflattering picture of a competitor’s product.

In this way, consumers will come to have negative associations with the competitor’s product and positive associations with the company’s own product, driving their purchase decisions (Schachtman, Walker, & Fowler, 2011).

Humans are wired to learn which food is safe and what is not safe. Say that someone eats a sickness-inducing food that gives them food poisoning.

They will likely feel nauseous, vomit, and have diarrhea. They will also learn to associate the taste, smell, or sight of that food with the sickness.

This is an example of higher-order conditioning: the taste (or smell or sight) of the food has become a conditioned stimulus that elicits the unconditioned response of sickness (Bond & Harland, 1975).

As a result of this higher-order conditioning, you are likely to develop a taste aversion to that food.

This means that you will no longer want to eat it because you have learned that it makes you sick.

Taste aversions can be very powerful: even if someone is hungry, they may not want to eat the food if they have developed a strong feeling of disgust around it (Bond & Harland, 1975).