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In
psychology Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Psychology includes the study of conscious and unconscious phenomena, including feelings and thoughts. It is an academic discipline of immense scope, crossing the boundaries betwe ...
, a stimulus is any object or event that elicits a sensory or behavioral response in an organism. In this context, a distinction is made between the ''distal stimulus'' (the external, perceived object) and the ''proximal stimulus'' (the stimulation of sensory organs). *In
perceptual psychology Perceptual psychology is a subfield of cognitive psychology that concerns the conscious and unconscious innate aspects of the human cognitive system: perception. A pioneer of the field was James J. Gibson. One major study was that of affordances, i ...
, a stimulus is an energy change (e.g., light or sound) which is registered by the
sense A sense is a biological system used by an organism for sensation, the process of gathering information about the world through the detection of Stimulus (physiology), stimuli. (For example, in the human body, the brain which is part of the cen ...
s (e.g., vision, hearing, taste, etc.) and constitutes the basis for
perception Perception () is the organization, identification, and interpretation of sensory information in order to represent and understand the presented information or environment. All perception involves signals that go through the nervous system ...
. *In
behavioral psychology Behaviorism is a systematic approach to understanding the behavior of humans and animals. It assumes that behavior is either a reflex evoked by the pairing of certain antecedent stimuli in the environment, or a consequence of that individual ...
(i.e., classical and
operant Operant conditioning, also called instrumental conditioning, is a learning process where behaviors are modified through the association of stimuli with reinforcement or punishment. In it, operants—behaviors that affect one's environment—are c ...
conditioning), a stimulus constitutes the basis for
behavior Behavior (American English) or behaviour (British English) is the range of actions and mannerisms made by individuals, organisms, systems or artificial entities in some environment. These systems can include other systems or organisms as wel ...
. The
stimulus–response model The stimulus–response model is a characterization of a statistical unit (such as a neuron). The model allows the prediction of a quantitative response to a quantitative stimulus, for example one administered by a researcher. In psychology, stimulu ...
emphasizes the relation between stimulus and behavior rather than an animal's internal processes (i.e., in the
nervous system In biology, the nervous system is the highly complex part of an animal that coordinates its actions and sensory information by transmitting signals to and from different parts of its body. The nervous system detects environmental changes th ...
). *In
experimental psychology Experimental psychology refers to work done by those who apply experimental methods to psychological study and the underlying processes. Experimental psychologists employ human participants and animal subjects to study a great many topics, in ...
, a stimulus is the event or object to which a response is measured. Thus, not everything that is presented to participants qualifies as stimulus. For example, a cross mark at the center of a screen is not said to be a stimulus, because it merely serves to center participants' gaze on the screen. Also, it is uncommon to refer to longer events (e.g. the Trier social stress test) as a stimulus, even if a response to such an event is measured.


History

The study of the stimulus in psychology began with experiments in the 18th century. In the second half of the 19th century, the term ''stimulus'' was coined in
psychophysics Psychophysics quantitatively investigates the relationship between physical stimuli and the sensations and perceptions they produce. Psychophysics has been described as "the scientific study of the relation between stimulus and sensation" or, m ...
by defining the field as the "scientific study of the relation between stimulus and
sensation Sensation (psychology) refers to the processing of the senses by the sensory system. Sensation or sensations may also refer to: In arts and entertainment In literature *Sensation (fiction), a fiction writing mode *Sensation novel, a British ...
". This may have led
James J. Gibson James Jerome Gibson (; January 27, 1904 – December 11, 1979) was an American psychologist and is considered to be one of the most important contributors to the field of visual perception. Gibson challenged the idea that the nervous system ...
to conclude that "whatever could be controlled by an experimenter and applied to an observer could be thought of as a stimulus" in early psychological studies with humans, while around the same time, the term ''stimulus'' described anything eliciting a
reflex In biology, a reflex, or reflex action, is an involuntary, unplanned sequence or action and nearly instantaneous response to a stimulus. Reflexes are found with varying levels of complexity in organisms with a nervous system. A reflex occurs ...
in animal research.


In behavioral psychology

The stimulus concept was essential to
behaviorism Behaviorism is a systematic approach to understanding the behavior of humans and animals. It assumes that behavior is either a reflex evoked by the pairing of certain antecedent (behavioral psychology), antecedent stimuli in the environment, o ...
and behavioral theories of
B. F. Skinner Burrhus Frederic Skinner (March 20, 1904 – August 18, 1990) was an American psychologist, behaviorist, author, inventor, and social philosopher. He was a professor of psychology at Harvard University from 1958 until his retirement in 1974. ...
and
Ivan Pavlov Ivan Petrovich Pavlov ( rus, Ива́н Петро́вич Па́влов, , p=ɪˈvan pʲɪˈtrovʲɪtɕ ˈpavləf, a=Ru-Ivan_Petrovich_Pavlov.ogg; 27 February 1936), was a Russian and Soviet experimental neurologist, psychologist and physiol ...
in particular. Within such a framework several kinds of stimuli have been distinguished. In the theory of
classical conditioning Classical conditioning (also known as Pavlovian or respondent conditioning) is a behavioral procedure in which a biologically potent stimulus (e.g. food) is paired with a previously neutral stimulus (e.g. a triangle). It also refers to the learni ...
, ''unconditioned stimulus'' (US) is a stimulus that unconditionally triggers an unconditioned response (UR), while ''conditioned stimulus'' (CS) is an originally irrelevant stimulus that triggers a conditioned response (CR). Ivan Pavlov's dog experiment is a well-known experiment that illustrates these terms. The unconditioned stimulus is the dog’s food that would naturally cause salivation, which is an unconditioned response. Pavlov then trained the dog by ringing the bell every time before food. The conditioned stimulus is the ringing bell after training, which causes salivation as a conditioned response. Moreover, an ''eliciting stimulus'' was defined as a stimulus that precedes a certain behavior and thus causes a response. A ''discriminative stimulus'' in contrast increases the probability that a response will occur but does not necessarily elicit the response. A ''reinforcing stimulus'' usually denoted a stimulus delivered after the response has already occurred; in psychological experiments, it was often delivered on purpose to reinforce the behavior. ''Emotional stimuli'' were regarded as not eliciting a response; instead, they were thought to modify the strength or vigor with which a behavior is carried out.


See also

*
Sensory cue Sensory may refer to: Biology * Sensory ecology, how organisms obtain information about their environment * Sensory neuron, nerve cell responsible for transmitting information about external stimuli * Sensory perception, the process of acquiri ...
*
Stimulation Stimulation is the encouragement of development or the cause of activity generally. For example, "The press provides stimulation of political discourse." An interesting or fun activity can be described as "stimulating", regardless of its physica ...


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Stimulus (Psychology) Behavioral concepts et:Stiimul eo:Stimulo ru:Раздражитель