That’s as Queer as a Clockwork Orange

The title of the British film, “Clockwork Orange” is derived from the Cockney expression “that’s as queer as a clockwork orange.” The director of the film intended to allude to the classical conditioning (a form of associative learning) of the main character, Alex, in the title because his reactions after conditioning were similar to nothing other than clockwork after treatment. Alex landed himself in jail after he killed a woman living alone. Obviously, violence was neutral to Alex in jail before conditioning; in fact, he felt no remorse for the brutal murder and rape that he committed. Alex's desire to leave jail caused him to volunteer for an experimental treatment. Initially, in the Ludovico technique, the shot

(unconditioned stimulus) led to the sick feeling (unconditioned response) before Alex realized that violence (neutral) had anything to do with the sick feeling. The conditioning made the combination of violence and the shot make Alex feel nauseous. After treatment and conditioning, Alex made the connection between violence, which became the conditioned stimulus and sickness, which became the conditioned response and he immediately felt sick when he was presented with violent thoughts even without the injection. In conclusion, the Ludovico technique forced Alex to make the association between violence and sickness through the shot (unconditioned stimulus).

Classical conditioning was also used in a famous experiment by Pavlov who trained dogs to drool with the ring of a bell.