Jonas is a veteran of the war in Iraq. He suffers from PTSD. Now, back home in a quiet California neighborhood, he jumps when he hears a firecracker or a car backfire. In the terminology of classical conditioning, these sounds are best thought of as ________ stimuli.

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

The sounds of firecrackers or a car backfiring act as conditioned stimuli for Jonas because they have become associated with the traumatic experiences of war, triggering a PTSD response similar to the reactions he had to gunfire or explosions in Iraq. This is a result of classical conditioning, where a neutral stimulus (the sounds) becomes conditioned to elicit a response (PTSD symptoms) after being associated with an unconditioned stimulus (actual war experiences).

Jonas Is a Veteran of the War in Iraq