You probably very accurately predicted that the firecracker will explode.
Since the time of Aristotle, philosophers have recognized that one of the most important ways we learn
is by forming links or associations between events.
In this animation, and from past experience, you link the burning of a fuse to an explosion.
Philosophers could only guess at how learning look place.
The Russian physiologist Ivan Pavlov was the first person to do careful scientific studies of this type of learning.
Ivan Pavlov did not set out to study learning. He was a physiologist not a psychologist!
So, how did he come to study associations? He was studying salivation in dogs.
He attached a tube to the dog’s salivary glands to collect the secretions. He then used a tube to deliver powder to the dog,
and as you might expect, the dog started salivating. Then Pavlov noticed something odd.
Over time, the dog started to salivate before the meat powder was given to the animal. Why?
Pavlov wondered if the dog was forming a link between a recent event or stimulus,
say the sound of the experimenter's footsteps entering the room and the delivery of the meat powder.
He decided to study this apparent learning of an association.