Define discriminative stimuli, and provide two real-life examples of its use

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

ANSWER: Answer will include that discriminative stimuli is stimuli that precede rewarded and non-rewarded responses in operant conditioning. Examples will vary, but may include the use of stimuli that allow us to discriminate among different brands of cars, different types of music, or different answers on a psychology test. Another discriminative stimuli are the red and green traffic lights that indicate when it is safe to cross the intersection. A police car is also a discriminative stimulus that indicates that you are likely to get a ticket if you speed, tailgate, or improperly change lanes. Animal trainers use hand signals as discriminative stimuli to control the performance of the animals. Using different ring tones on a cell phone would also be an example of using discriminative stimuli in which you use one ring tone for people you want to speak to, one for people you do not, and another for calls from strangers. Lastly, "sniffer" dogs that locate drugs and explosives at airports and border crossings are taught to respond and bark to these dangerous stimuli and not to nonhazardous ones.