Mr. Tenedor works on the assembly line building cars. His mouth begins to water whenever the noontime bell signals the beginning of lunch. One day the bell goes haywire and rings every 30 minutes throughout the day. By the end of the day, Mr. Tenedor realizes that he has stopped salivating to the bell, which means that ________ has occurred.
A) extinction
B) counterconditioning
C) spontaneous recovery
D) stimulus generalization

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

Extinction refers to the gradual weakening and eventual disappearance of a conditioned response when the conditioned stimulus is repeatedly presented without the unconditioned stimulus. In this scenario, Mr. Tenedor's salivation response to the lunch bell has gradually weakened and disappeared when the bell rang repeatedly throughout the day without the presentation of food. Thus, choice A is the correct answer. Counterconditioning refers to the process of changing an unwanted conditioned response to a more desirable one, spontaneous recovery refers to the reappearance of a previously extinguished response, and stimulus generalization refers to the tendency to respond to stimuli that are similar to the conditioned stimulus. None of these processes explain Mr. Tenedor's lack of salivation response to the lunch bell at the end of the day.

Mr Tenedor Works on the Assembly Line Building Cars