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Encyclopedia of Animal Cognition and Behavior pp 1–4Cite as

Naturalistic Stimuli

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Synonyms

Biologically significant stimuli; Ecological stimuli; Evolutionarily relevant stimuli; Functionally relevant

Definition

Naturalistic stimuli are cues that reliably precede biologically significant events (e.g., an unconditioned stimulus, US) that animals have encountered recurrently in their evolutionary histories. Thus, a natural precursor of a US is regarded as a naturalistic stimulus given its inherent relationship with the US.

Introduction

From the traditional associative perspective, conditioned responses should develop regardless of the preexisting relations between the conditioned stimulus (CS) and unconditioned stimulus (US). Accordingly, any stimulus could be paired with any US as effectively as any other stimulus to produce conditioned responding. This view calls forth the idea that prior to conditioning the CS, by definition, is “neutral” and therefore the CS is arbitrary with respect to its potential to elicit a CR after being paired with a US. As Pavlov once...

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, Faculty of Languages, History and Geography, Ankara University, Ankara, Turkey

    Hakan Çetinkaya

Authors
  1. Hakan Çetinkaya
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Correspondence to Hakan Çetinkaya .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Oakland University , Rochester, Michigan, USA

    Jennifer Vonk

  2. Department of Psychology, Oakland University Department of Psychology, Rochester, Michigan, USA

    Todd Shackelford

Section Editor information

  1. Southern Oregon University, Ashland, OR, USA

    Mark A. Krause

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Çetinkaya, H. (2018). Naturalistic Stimuli. In: Vonk, J., Shackelford, T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Animal Cognition and Behavior. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47829-6_2019-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47829-6_2019-1

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-47829-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-47829-6

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