psychologists define learning as a long-lasting change in behavior as a result of experience classical and operant conditioning both lead to learning so what's the difference between them classical conditioning was first described by Ivan Pavlov and is the association of a stimulus with an involuntary response it focuses on involuntary automatic behaviors Pavlov noticed that a neutral stimulus before a reflex causes an association he conducted an experiment in which he rang a bell before presenting dogs with food when dogs see or smell food they salivate even though it is not a learned behavior rather they're salivating is an unconditioned response to seeing food which is an unconditioned stimulus of course a dog would not normally salivate in response to a random stimulus like a bell ringing since such an event is a neutral stimulus however Pavlov found that if he always rang a bell before presenting dogs with food then they eventually began to salivate as soon as they heard the Bell even when there was no food around at this point the Bell had become a conditioned stimulus and the dogs salivating to it sound was a conditioned response operant conditioning first described by BF Skinner is the Association of a voluntary behavior with the consequence Skinner found three types of environmental responses or operands that can follow a behavior reinforcers Punishers and neutral operants reinforcers increase the probability of a behavior recurring Punishers decrease the probability or extinguish the behavior and neutral operants do neither to demonstrate positive reinforcement Skinner put a rat in a box with a lever on accidentally bumping the lever the rat discovered that it would receive a food pellet with this positive reinforcement the rat learned to keep pressing the lever negative reinforcers remove unpleasant stimuli to demonstrate negative reinforcers Skinner put a rat in a box which had a mild electric current that caused the rat discomfort on wandering around the box the rat randomly hit a lever to turn the current off when exposed to the electric current in the box the rat learned to always press the lever something called escaped learning similarly Skinner eventually also taught the rat to flip a switch that prevented the electric current from being turned on in the first place something called avoidance learning punishment weakens a behavior by linking it to an aversive consequence just like reinforcement it can occur through the addition or removal of a stimulus for example if a rat receives an electric shock when it pushes a button it will avoid that button or if you're an unfortunate raccoon that decides to wash his cotton candy before eating it only to watch it dissolve before your very eyes that is punishment through the removal of a positive stimulus it should be noted that punished behavior is not forgotten but is suppressed if a punishment is no longer present the behavior returns also unlike reinforcement it does not guide towards the desired behavior but only suppresses undesired behavior there have been further experiments done with rats in the Skinner box after a rat has received operant learning and has learned to press a lever to receive a food pellet what happens if the lever is pressed but no food pellet is received at first the rat will keep pressing the lever but eventually it will stop and the behavior will be extinguished why press this thing without payment however a rat can learn or unlearn a behavior at different rates with different schedules of reinforcement this has been termed the response rate the rate at which behavior repeats and the extinction rate how soon the behavior stops let's see what happens with five different reinforcement schedules with continuous reinforcement the response rate is slow an extinction is fast with a fixed ratio reinforcement schedule where positive reinforcement is offered after a fixed number of repetitions of a behavior the response rate is fast and extinction is medium for a fixed interval reinforcement schedule where positive reinforcement is provided as long as a quota is fulfilled within a given time schedule the response and extinction rates are medium for a variable ratio reinforcement schedule where positive reinforcement is given after an unpredictable number of repetitions the response rate was fast and extinction was slow this is the equivalent of gambling for a variable interval reinforcement schedule where a reward is given if a quota is fulfilled within an unpredictable amount of time the response rate is again fast an extinction is slow if you liked this video like and subscribe you can also support me by following the link to my patreon if you have any topics you'd like me to cover please leave a comment