Classical Conditioning

Classical Conditioning

Introduction

For many years, scholars believed that learning occurred solely through the processes of conditioning. Although these processes are fundamental, recent studies claim that learning can occur through a variety of ways. Conditioning is a process of learning and behavior modification through stimulus-response mechanisms of the central nervous system of the individual. This process is linked to Behaviorism or Behaviorism, which is the set of ideas present in psychology that sees behavior as unique and should be the object of study of Psychology.

Discussion

Classical conditioning was defended by Ivan Palov, Russian doctor born in 1849, which stated that the results of learning associations between stimuli and responses. In a study of the action of enzymes in the stomach of animals (who had given him a Nobel Prize), became interested in salivation in the dogs that appeared without the presence of food. Pavlov wanted to elucidate how the conditioned reflexes were acquired. Dogs naturally salivate for food, so the correlation between Pavlov called the unconditioned stimulus (food) and unconditioned response (salivation) other hand reflex when a stimulus does not cause any kind of response, called a neutral stimulus (sound of the bell). Pavlov's experience consisted of associate an unconditioned stimulus (food) with the presentation of a neutral stimulus (sound of a bell.) After repeating this combination of stimuli found that the dog learned to salivate before the stimulus before that did not evoke any response (neutral) even in the absence of the unconditioned stimulus (food). So this behavior would be called the conditioned response (learned) (Gormezano & Thompson, 1987).

The first type of conditioning, called Classical Conditioning was developed by Russian physiologist Ivan Pavlov. Pavlov did an experiment involving a dog, a bell and a piece of meat. The physiologist realized that when the dog saw the piece of meat, he salivated, which ...