Experiments

Although Pavlov was a well known physiologist, he will most likely beremembered for his development of the concept of the conditioned reflex.

In his experiments, he "conditioned" dogs and sea anemones. In hismost famous experiment, Pavlov rang a bell every time he fed meat to a specificdog. As time went by, the reflex which brought saliva to the dog's mouth at thetaste of meat could begin by ringing the bell without the sight of meat. Forthe dog, the sound of the bell acted as a stimulus of appetite.

In a less famous experiment , a sea anemone was conditioned to open its mouthwhen its tentacles are touched, which it does not ordinarily respond to. Duringclassical conditioning, an animal is offered two different stimuli. The first iscalled the Conditioned Stimulus which, in this experiment, is touch. Thesecond stimulus is the Unconditioned Stimulus which causes the desiredbehavior. Squid juice was used in this experiment, as it causes the sea anemoneto open its mouth. During classical conditioning, the UnconditionedStimulus may be given while the Conditioned Stimulus is beingdelivered. In this case, the sea anemone was touched first, then given squidjuice. After a time, the sea anemone opened its mouth when touched although nosquid juice was offered. This is the wanted end result of ClassicalConditioning.