Students are accustomed to a bell ringing to indicate the end of a class period. The principal decides to substitute popular music for the bell to indicate the end of each class period. Students quickly respond to the music in the same way they did to the bell. What principle does this illustrate?

Generalization is the correct answer.

In Psychology, the generalization principle is the tendency of individuals to respond in the same manner to similar but different stimuli. According to this concept, both humans and animals will use past learnings to react to present situations if the conditions involved are similar.