Pavlov (1972)

Aim?

To learn about the salivation reflex. Pavlov was interested in explaining the role of conditioned reflexes in the eating behaviours of dogs. He was also interested in exploring how salivation becomes associated with new stimuli supposedly unrelated with food.

How was salivation measured?

The drops were counted.

Preparation for the procedure?

The experimenters built a special chamber for the dog, so that even hearing footsteps outside of the room was not possible. This was to isolate all variables to that the study of reflex behaviour was possible.

How did Pavlov test the salivation reflex of the dogs?

By putting meat into their mouths

Procedure?

Pavlov paired a metronome with food - the sound of an electric buzzer, made louder over time and played for about 5-10 seconds (a neutral stimulus) with food (an unconditioned stimulus) to test salivation reflex in the dogs. He presented the food to the dog paired with the sound of the electric buzzer about 20 times, seeing whether he could eventually get the dog to salivate and lick its lumos when it heard the bell in the absence of food.

A procure to show the concerto of forward conditioning (that the conditioned stimulus must become before the unconditioned stimulus) was also carried out. Pavlov tested whether the order in which the meat and buzzer were shown to the dogs affected salivation.

Numerical results of the metronome study?

Salivation started after 9 seconds, and by 45 seconds 11 drops had been collected

What did Pavlov find when testing the dogs salivation reflexes to JUST the meat?

Immediate salivation

What were the other findings?

• When an electric buzzer sounded after the meat had been given, it did not achieve salivation, but an electric buzzer sounded before the meat did produce salivation

• The dog had to be alert and no other stimuli could be present to distract the dog from the learning process in order for classical conditioning to occur

Strength?

The study had a standardised procedure - Pavlov used a carefully controlled experiment and environment, giving the study a high internal validity as the only variable affecting the salivation production was the metronome. This meant that they could conclude that the salivation was related to the electric buzzer and, therefore, the process of classical conditioning.

Weakness?

Brain activity could not be measured. At the time Pavlov was working, he was unable to measure brain activity in any direct way. This meant that Pavlov had to assume what was happening in the cerebral cortex from his experiments. He felt he had shown inbuilt pathways that led from the unconditioned stimuli to the unconditioned responses and he felt he showed new associations, which would be new pathways, between conditioned stimuli and conditioned responses. However, he could not study the exact mechanism as we can today, using techniques such as fMRI scanning. Therefore, the study is not considered scientific and lacks empiricism.