Classical Conditioning

In classical conditioning, an association is formed between a previously neutral stimulus and a physiological response controlled by the nervous system. This conditioning is also called Pavlovian conditioning, after the Russian physiologist, Ivan Pavlov who first described it. The typical procedure classical conditioning involves presentations of a neutral stimulus along with a stimulus of some significance. The neutral stimulus could be any event that does not result in an unordinary behavioral response from the organism under investigation. Pavlov also discovered that these reflexes originate in the cerebral cortex of the brain.