Essay On Ivan Pavlov's Contribution To Classical Conditioning

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Ivan Pavlov was a Russian scientist who was interested in studying how digestion works in animals. Pavlov found classical conditioning, part of his work was studying what causes dogs to salivate. However, he noticed that what caused the dogs to salivate was deeper than he anticipated. He then ran a study where he ran a bell every time he fed the dogs. Pavlov explained that the conditioned stimulus was the bell and that by itself it will not produce a response, while the food is the unconditioned stimulus which will produce an unconditioned response, in this case, would be the salvation. If the conditioned stimulus the bell and the unconditioned stimulus the food is paired the dog will associate the bell and the food together and respond by salivating to the conditioned stimulus alone, this response is the conditioned response. …show more content…

Excitatory conditioning is when the conditioned stimulus (the bell) and the unconditioned stimulus (the food) are paired up, and the dog produces a response by salivating. Conditioned inhibition is the opposite of excitation, instead of trying to train the dog to produce a response, the dog is trained to stop a response. For example, extinction which is to present the bell (CS) alone and to stop bringing the food (US) out that the dog will eventually stop salivating because it realizes there is no food coming anymore will inhibit the dog from salivating. From his study, he believed that learning is the result of association and that the stimulus precedes the

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