What term describes learning where a neutral stimulus signals an unconditioned stimulus and comes to elicit a response?

Prepare for the ACVREP Orientation and Mobility (OandM) Exam. Use our study aids and multiple-choice questions, each with detailed explanations. Boost your confidence and succeed!

This describes classical conditioning, where a neutral stimulus becomes meaningful by signaling an unconditioned stimulus and eventually triggers a learned response. At first, the unconditioned stimulus naturally elicits an unconditioned response. Through repeated pairings, the neutral stimulus becomes a conditioned stimulus, and the response it evokes—now the conditioned response—occurs even without the original unconditioned stimulus. This is the defining pattern of classical conditioning: learning through association between two stimuli. Desensitization involves reducing a response through gradual exposure, shaping builds a target behavior by reinforcing closer approximations, and extinction is the gradual reduction of a conditioned response when the conditioned stimulus is presented without the unconditioned stimulus.