Evaluative conditioning is Pavlovian conditioning: Issues of definition, measurement, and the theoretical importance of contingency awareness

In her commentary of Field (1999), Hammerl (1999) has drawn attention to se veral interesting points concerning the issue of contingency awareness in e valuative conditioning. First, she comments on several contentious issues a rising from Field's review of the evaluative conditioning literature, secon d she critiques the data from his pilot study and finally she argues the ca se that EC is a distinct form of conditioning that can occur in the absence of contingency awareness. With reference to these criticisms, this reply a ttempts to address Hammerl's comments by exploring the issues of how awaren ess is defined, how it is best measured, and whether it is reasonable to be lieve that EC uniformly occurs in the absence of contingency awareness. The article concludes that the available evidence supports Field's proposition that EC is, in fact, Pavlovian learning. (C) 2000 Academic Press.