A little boy is allowed to play with a laboratory rat and shows no fear of it. Then, a scientist makes a scary noise by banging an iron bar whenever the little boy reaches for
The rat. Soon, the boy begins crying whenever the rat comes near him. In this study, the
Scary noise is the ______.

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

The scary noise is the unconditioned stimulus because it naturally (without prior learning) elicits a response of fear or crying, which is the unconditioned response. The process described is classical conditioning, where an initially neutral stimulus (the rat) becomes associated with an unconditioned stimulus (the scary noise) that naturally elicits a response.

A Little Boy Is Allowed to Play with a Laboratory