A rat is first confined in a running wheel where it experiences inescapable shocksnext, and after a period of time it is placed in a box that allows it to jump onto a ledge to avoid shock. The failure of the rat to learn the jump response may be due to
A) competing responses.
B) generalized inhibitory conditioning.
C) discriminated passive avoidance.
D) generalized learned irrelevance.

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

Generalized learned irrelevance occurs when an organism learns that its behavior has no effect on the outcome of a situation. In this case, the rat may have learned that its behavior in the running wheel had no effect on the shocks, so it did not learn the jump response in the second situation.

A Rat Is First Confined in a Running Wheel Where