"Criminal behavior can also be classically conditioned when such behavior is associated with a secondary or conditioned stimulus. A simple example: A teen runaway who’s been living on the streets for some time finds a gun and decides to commit an armed robbery to acquire money to live. Immediately following the robbery, the offender is rewarded with a wallet full of cash. The anxiety of the offender had been experiencing over having no financial resources is immediately alleviated. In this case, the offender’s robbery behavior is positively reinforced by acquiring the ash and negatively reinforced by the alleviation of anxiety. However, what if immediately following the robbery a bystander intervenes, tackling and severely beating the offender? Rather than receiving reinforcements (money, decreased anxiety), the offender receives punishment (attack, beating) and the likelihood of repeating the behavior is reduced. This is an example of “operant conditioning.” Classical conditioning is somewhat different in that behavior is increased through pairing of stimuli. When the offender commit the robbery, the act of robbing someone at gunpoint generates feelings of exhilaration. After committing a number of subsequent robberies and experiencing this physiological arousal each time, the offender begins to associate armed robbery with feeling good. This pairing of an unconditioned or secondary stimulus (the act of robbing someone) with unconditioned or primary stimuli (physiological arousal produced by fear and uncertainty) increases the likelihood of future robbery behavior."