After that, I started to associate the sound of barking with fear. Whenever I heard a dog barking, I would start to feel scared.
One day, I was walking home from school when I saw a man wearing a hoodie. He was walking towards me, and he was carrying a bag. I started to feel scared, and I thought that he was going to attack me.
I ran away, and I didn't stop running until I was safe at home.
How this respondent behavior impacts me in my environment:
Now, whenever I see a man wearing a hoodie, I start to feel scared. I avoid eye contact with them, and I try to walk away as quickly as possible.
This respondent behavior can be inconvenient and embarrassing. It can also be dangerous, if I am in a situation where I need to interact with a man wearing a hoodie.
If this behavior impacts me in a negative way, describe the process I could use to extinguish the stimulus-stimulus pairing that elicits my conditioned response:
One way to extinguish the stimulus-stimulus pairing that elicits my conditioned response is to repeatedly expose myself to the neutral stimulus (the sight of a man wearing a hoodie) without the unconditioned stimulus (the sound of barking).
This is called counterconditioning.
In order to countercondition my fear of men wearing hoodies, I would need to repeatedly expose myself to the sight of men wearing hoodies in a safe and controlled environment.
For example, I could start by looking at pictures of men wearing hoodies. Then, I could gradually increase the amount of exposure I have to men wearing hoodies, until I am able to see them in person without feeling any fear.
If this behavior impacts me in a positive way, describe the process I could use to elicit the same response under the control of other stimuli:
If I wanted to elicit the same response (fear) under the control of other stimuli, I could use a process called operant conditioning.
In operant conditioning, a behavior is rewarded or punished in order to increase or decrease its frequency.
In this case, I could reward myself with something I enjoy (such as a piece of candy or a pat on the back) whenever I see a man wearing a hoodie without feeling any fear.
Over time, this would increase the likelihood that I would feel fear when I see a man wearing a hoodie, even if there is no sound of barking present.