Classical conditioning of meaning--II. A replication and triplet associative extension.
The meaning associated with verbal stimuli is modifiable by classical conditioning, suggesting that such "language conditioning" may be used clinically to modify a client's maladaptive associative history. The current research investigated the existence and generalizability of this phenomenon by attempting to replicate Staats and Staats' (1957) language conditioning effect and then extend it to a triplet conditioning paradigm (CS2----CS1----UCS). Previous research by the current authors replicated language conditioning, yet failed to extend it to a higher-order situation. Significant conditioning was obtained to the CS1, particularly for aware subjects, but no conditioning occurred to the CS2. Implications for verbal conditioning theory and clinical practice are discussed.
Cicero
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SD
Department of Psychology, Fordham University, Bronx, NY 10458.
Tryon
W W
WW
D000328:Adult; D001364:Awareness; D003214:Conditioning, Classical; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010153:Paired-Associate Learning; D012660:Semantics; D014706:Verbal Learning; D014825:Vocabulary