IVÁN PÁVLOV: Biography and Theory of Classical Conditioning

Ivan Pavlov was a Russian physiologist and psychologist, whose research was pioneering and established key concepts in psychology. Despite starting his research in the field of the digestive system, he carried out one of the experiments most famous in psychology and his contributions continue to be valid and applied in the present. If you want to know more about the history and theory of this historical figure, keep reading our Psychology-Online article: Ivan Pavlov: biography and theory of classical conditioning, where you will find both the full biography and the summarized biography of Ivan Pavlov.

Index

1. Ivan Petrovich Pavlov: biography
2. Ivan Pavlov: short biography
3. Ivan Pavlov: theory
4. Ivan Pavlov: classical conditioning

Ivan Petrovich Pavlov was born in 1849 in Ryazan, Russia. The son of a housewife and an Orthodox priest, he began his studies in the field of theology initially on family advice. However, Pavlov was by then an avid reader of the works of Charles Darwin, so he eventually abandoned his studies in the field of theology and

In his student days Vladimir Bekhterev, a well-known Russian neurologist, neurophysiologist, and psychiatrist, was his main teacher. After receiving his doctorate from him in 1883 from the Academy of Medical Surgery, he moved to Germany with the purpose of expanding his knowledge, finally specializing in the human circulatory system and digestive physiology.

In 1890, already married and with a son, he obtained a position as professor of physiology at the Academia América Experimental. He in turn, he was also appointed director of the department of physiology of the Institute of Experimental Medicine of the city of Saint Petersburg, where he was for more than 45 years and he carried out his well-known investigations, among others, on the digestive system and conditioned reflexes. Likewise, his passion for the laboratory was reflected in his students, whom he supervised his research, helped in data interpretation and essay editing.

In the following years he devoted himself to studying and digestive system research and gastric and pancreatic juices, perfecting and creating physiological techniques in this field. His invention of a technique to study the functioning of the digestive system in live animals is especially recognized. His dedication and research in the secretory activity of the stomach was awarded in 1904 with the Nobel Prize in Physology or Medicine, becoming the first person of Russian nationality to receive this recognition of merit.

Pavlov is above all known for being the person who formulated the law of conditional reflex, which will be fully explained in the following sections. In the field of reflexology he was greatly influenced by Iván Séchenov, who was researching about brain reflexes. Pavlov focused his research on this higher nervous activity in 1907.

It should be noted that between 1910 and 1925, Pavlov's laboratory became the most equipped in the world. After the 1917 October Revolution in Russia, he was awarded the post of director of the department of physiology of the Institute of Experimental Medicine of the Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union. In the 1930s he published a series of investigations about reflexology in the area of ​​human language.

In 1935 the World Congress of Physiology took place in Moscow and Leningrad, with the presence of more than 900 scientists from all over the world. In this same congress he was recognized and named as the most important physiologist in the world. The following year, on February 27, 1936, Ivan Pavlov died of pneumonia at the age of 86.

Below, you will find a selection of the most relevant data from the biography of Iván Pávlov.

Ivan Pavlov: summary biography

• He was born in 1849.
• He studied medicine and chemistry.
• He received his doctorate in 1883.
• He married and had a son.
• He was a professor of physiology.
• He does research on the digestive system and conditioned reflexes.
• In 1904 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physology or Medicine.
• He formulated the law of conditional reflex.
• He was named the most important physiologist in the world.
• In 1936, he passed away at the age of 86.

Ivan Pavlov, in his studies on higher nervous activity, made use of the method of conditioned reflex. A conditioned reflex is a learned reflex, a response to a stimulus that previously did not cause any reaction. This learned reflex is the result of the repeated association between this stimulus that previously did not cause any response with another that is capable of causing it. This learning by associations is called classical conditioning.

Ivan Pavlov: learning theory

This discovery was a great contribution of Ivan Pavlov to the theory of learning in psychology, since it showed the most basic mechanism by which both people and animals were able to understand the relationships between stimuli, learn new answers and vary and adapt their behavior based on these. Therefore, Pavlov introduces and demonstrates one of the basic principles of learning theory.

Ivan Pavlov: behaviorist theory

On the other hand, Pavlov's legacy reaches into behaviorist theory, the current of psychology whose object of study is focuses on the observable behavior of animals and humans with the aim of establishing the common laws of behaviour. Although it was John B. Watson, an American psychologist, the one who founded the psychological current of behaviorism, the contributions of Ivan Pavlov to the behaviorist theory were essential and of great relevance. Watson himself claimed to have been impressed with the Russian physiologist's studies. Pavlov was the first to study the conditioned stimuli and his theory of classical conditioning is one of the key concepts and starting point of behaviorist theory.

Next, the experiment with which Pavlov discovers the mechanism that supports the so-called classical conditioning is explained.

Ivan pávlov: contributions

One of the great contributions of Iván Pavlov is he classical conditioning or associative learning. It consists of generating a connection between a neutral stimulus, that before the creation of this association he is unable to generate a concrete response, and an automatic reflex response. Through this association, the stimulus that was previously unable to elicit the reflex response can eventually provoke it.

Ivan Pavlov: experiment

The origin of this contribution is found in the Ivan Pavlov's experiment with dogs, one of the most famous experiments in the history of psychology. Pavlov observed that when putting food to a dog he salivated, what he called salivary reflex. However, he also came to perceive that the dog was able to salivate just by seeing or smelling the food. Thus, he focused his study on the so-called psychic secretions, secretions produced by the salivary glands in the absence of food in the mouth. That is why every time he gave the dog food he would ring a bell just before giving it to him, so that the dog will associate the bell with the food that he received moments later. After various associations between the bell and the food, the dog I salivated just hearing the bell, regardless of whether there was food afterwards. With this, it was achieved that the bell, a neutral and meaningless stimulus for the dog before the series of associations, elicited the same response as food, in this case salivation. In this way, the dog had learned to make an association.

With this experiment, the elements or variables of classical conditioning theory:

• Neutral stimulus (EN): stimulus without meaning and incapable of producing a reflex response, in this case the EN is the bell.
• Unconditioned stimulus (EI): stimulus that generates a response in the organism innately and automatically, the EI would be food, which causes salivation in a natural way.
• Conditioned stimulus (EC): it is the neutral stimulus once the association with the unconditioned stimulus has been made. Therefore, the conditioned stimulus would be the bell, once associated with food after the dog's learning process, capable of generating salivation by itself.
• Unconditional Response (IR): it is the innate response elicited automatically by the unconditioned stimulus. IR would be the salivation produced by food.
• Conditioned response (CR): the learned response, the one produced by the conditioned stimulus. In this case, the conditioned response would be salivation from the sound of the bell.

This whole process is what is known as classical conditioning, and to this day it remains one of the cornerstones of the behavioral and learning theory. Likewise, these contributions by Iván Pávlov are still used to explain the basis of the behaviors such as addictions and phobias, as well as a basis for aversive treatment for alcoholism and other addictions.

If you want to know more about conditioning, you can consult the following article: Excitatory conditioning and inhibitory conditioning.

This article is merely informative, in Psychology-Online we do not have the power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.

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• Gil, F. M. T., & Mollá, C. C. (2006). History of Psychology. McGraw-Hill, Interamerican of Spain.
• Gutiérrez, G. (1999). Ivan Petrovich Pavlov (1849-1936). Latin American Journal of Psychology, 31(3), 557-560.
• Sloth. M., & Cruz, J. AND. (2003). Concepts of classical conditioning in the basic and applied fields. Interdisciplinary, 20(2), 205-227.