The Clockwork Orange as it Pertains to Classical Conditioning

In the 1971 film, A Clockwork Orange, a twisted method of reform is put into use upon a young man, Alex DeLarge, who is sentenced to fourteen years for murder. Desperate to be freed from his sentence, Alex subjects himself to an experiment under the eye of Doctor Ludovico whose approach involved conditioning Alex to associate violence with severe, debilitating physical sickness by administering to him a shot that induces nausea and sickness and then forcing him to watch deeply disturbing scenes. The doctor's experiment can be associated with none other than a form of learning known as Classical Conditioning.
Classical conditioning is the process by which someone or something learns to associate one stimulus with another - a series of cause and effect. The first aspect of this type of learning is the unconditioned stimulus (this produces a response without prior learning). In Alex's particular case, this stimulus would be the shot given to him prior to each viewing. The conditioned stimulus, in this case the violent scenes, is then coupled with the unconditioned stimulus to elicit an unconditioned response. The unconditioned response in Alex's story is the nausea that is induced by shot without his knowing (because he does not know the shot induces the illness, he believes the scenes truly sicken him). It is not until the end of his experiences under Dr. Ludovico's guidance that Alex encounters, the conditioned response. When Alex is declared "cured" of his evil ways he is released back into society. The conditioned response is most prevalently noticed when he is about to hit the man that is now staying in his room at his parent's house. As he raises his fist, he is overcome by a great feeling of sickness that almost causes him to collapse.
There is only one person involved in Alex's ordeal that seems to see the dangers involved in releasing him back into society. The priest from the prison claims that Alex is still inherently evil and is deterred only by the pain and not by the will of internal goodness. Unfortunately, the priest is proven correct in the end when extinction (the disappearance of the conditioned response) occurs and Alex kills yet again.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rT1DCun3U9M