On Sat, 08 Feb 2014 19:24:05 -0800, Jeffry Ricker wrote:
On Feb 8, 2014, at 6:46 PM, Mike Palij wrote:
I suppose that Janet Leigh's shock at being stabbed in the shower
is a UCS and the shower is CS but doesn't really sound right to me.
Yes, I agree that my labeling of these objects as stimuli is not valid
if we
are designing and conducting an experimental study (e.g., see my
previous
comments about Watson & Rayner, 1920). On the other hand, when trying
to
explain the basics of classical (and operant) conditioning to
intro-psych
students, I am much more lax in my use of the terminology. One reason
is that I
want to make sure that students see the relevance of classical
conditioning to
their everyday lives. Another reason is that, at that level, few
students
appreciate the need to describe with extreme precision the stimuli
being
presented in a conditioning experiment.
I understand what you're saying but what if this entire argument, that
is,
vicarious classical conditioning (VCC) is a phenomenon best understood
as the relationship among stimuli and responses, is wrong? I have
searched
on the web and in PsycInfo but I cannot find any reference with both VCC
and *mirror neurons*. Stop and consider how mirror neurons are supposed
to operate (for one description see the Wikipedia entry on this topic
and
I'm sure the interested reader can find better sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror_neuron ). Mirror neuron activity
seem
to better explain the type of phenomena VCC seem to represent while
explaining the phenomenon in neural terms and better explains some
aspects
(e.g., the apparent one trial learning that occurs in VCC).
The kicker, apparently, is whether mirror neurons actually exist (the
Wikipedia
entry provides arguments pro and con). If mirror neurons don't exist,
then
some form of associative learning is involved but my bet would that it
is not
based on traditional conditioning explanations (e.g., may be based on a
Hebbian
rule).
This, of course, leads to a critical question: Are there no Pavlovian
conditioning
experts on Tips? If so, how about some sugar? ;-)
-Mike Palij
New York University
m...@nyu.edu
P.S. In thinking about the Janet Leigh shower scene in "Psycho", I
vaguely
recall it serving as an unconditioned stimulus for an erotic response (a
response
I usually have while watching an attractive woman taking a shower). The
fact that she got stabbed in the shower changed that response to a
turn-off
but I imagine that there probably was some response competition between
the erotic and fearful. This suggests that one should expect more women
than men to develop fear from the shower scene under the assumption that
they did not have an initial erotic response or had just plain neutral
one. I wonder
if anyone has done any research on this?
P.P.S. In general, I don't care for Spielberg films and did not find
"Jaws"
or Bruce (Spieflberg's name for the shark) frightening. Whenever the
music
came on in the film, I'd interpret it as a signal to expect the
appearance of the
shark and in neutral emotional terms. When the music was used outside
of film,
I usually found it funny because it was an obvious attempt to induce
fear
(the Saturday Night Live sketches that start with the music and with
Chevy Chase
knocking on a door saying "Candygram" and then when the door opens and
it's
revealed that he's a "land shark" also made it difficult to find the
music
fear inducing). Mirror neurons, with the mental simulation of being
stabbed,
seems more credible to me than the fear expressed on Janet Leigh's face
which was visible for a very, very short period of time.
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