Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-r5fsc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T01:30:29.006Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Pavlov and Associationism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 April 2014

Nicholas J. Mackintosh
Nicholas J. Mackintosh*
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge
*
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to N.J. Mackintosh, Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3EB, England. E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Pavlov's contribution to experimental psychology was to invent a technique that allowed him to undertake a prolonged and systematic series of well-controlled experiments that, astonishingly enough, uncovered many if not most of the phenomena of what is rightly called Pavlovian conditioning. It was not for another 30 years or more that English-speaking psychologists began to match that achievement. Of course there have been new developments and discoveries since his time. Two examples are discussed: the important role of variable associability or attention even in simple conditioning, and the rigorous application of associative learning theory to the behavior of adult humans.

La contribución de Pavlov a la psicología experimental fue inventar una técnica que le permitió acometer una serie prolongada y sistemática de experimentos bien controlados que desvelaron muchos, si no la mayoría, de los fenómenos de lo que justamente se llama condicionamiento pavloviano. Los psicólogos angloparlantes tardarían 30 años o más en igualar ese logro. Por supuesto, se han dado nuevos desarrollos y descubrimientos desde su época. Se comentan dos ejemplos: el importante papel de la asociabilidad variable o la atención incluso en el condicionamiento simple y la aplicación rigurosa de la teoría del aprendizaje asociativo a la conducta de los seres humanos adultos.

Keywords

Pavlovassociationismattentionassociative learningPavlovasociacionismoatenciónaprendizaje asociativo
Type
Research Article
Information
The Spanish Journal of Psychology , Volume 6 , Issue 2: Special Issue: A Century of Pavlovian Theory: The Madrid Lecture (Pavlov, 1903) , November 2003 , pp. 177 - 184
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2003

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aitken, M. R. F. (1996). Peak shift in pigeons and human categorisation. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Cambridge.Google Scholar
Cheng, P. W. (1997). From covariation to causation: A causal power theory. Psychological Review, 104, 367–405.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cook, R. G., Cavoto, K. K., & Cavoto, B. R. (1995). Same-different texture discrimination and concept learning by pigeons. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, 21, 253–260.Google Scholar
Guthrie, E. R., & Horton, G. P. (1946). Cats in a puzzle box. New York: Rinehart Press.Google Scholar
Haberlandt, K. (1971). Transfer along a continuum in classical conditioning. Learning and Motivation, 2, 164–172.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hanson, H. M. (1959). Effect of discrimination training on stimulus generalization. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 58, 321–334.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kamin, L. J. (1969). Selective association and conditioning. In Mackintosh, N. J. & Honig, W. K. (Eds.), Fundamental issues in associative learning (pp. 42–64). Halifax: Dalhousie University Press.Google Scholar
Konorski, J. (1948). Conditioned reflexes and neuron organisation. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Lawrence, D. H. (1952). The transfer of a discrimination along a continuum. Journal of Comparative and Physiological Psychology, 45, 511–516.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Logan, F. A. (1966). Transfer of discrimination. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 71, 616–618.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lubow, R. E. (1973). Latent inhibition. Psychological Bulletin, 79, 398–407.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Mackintosh, N. J. (1975). A theory of attention: Variations in the associability of stimuli with reinforcement. Psychological Review, 82, 276–298.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mackintosh, N. J. (1995). Categorisation by people and pigeons. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 48B, 193–214.Google Scholar
Mackintosh, N. J. (1997). Has the wheel turned full circle? Fifty years of learning theory, 1946-1996. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 50A, 879–898.Google Scholar
Mackintosh, N.J. (2000). Abstraction and discrimination. In Heyes, C. & Huber, L. (Eds.), The evolution of cognition (pp. 123–141). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mackintosh, N. J., & Little, L. (1970). An analysis of transfer along a continuum. Canadian Journal of Psychology, 24, 362–369.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
McLaren, I. P. L., & Mackintosh, N. J. (2000). An elemental model of associative learning: I. Latent inhibition and perceptual learning. Animal Learning and Behavior, 26, 211–243.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moore, B. R., & Stuttard, S. (1979). Dr. Guthrie and Felis domesticus, or, tripping over the cat. Science, 205, 1031–1033.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Pavlov, I. P. (1927). Conditioned reflexes. London: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Pavlov, I. P. (1928). Lectures on conditioned reflexes. New York: International.Google Scholar
Pavlov, I. P. (1932). The reply of a physiologist to psychologists. Psychological Review, 39, 91–127.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pearce, J. M. (1991). The acquisition of abstract and concrete categories by pigeons. In Dachowski, L. & Flaherty, C. (Eds.), Current topics in animal learning: Brain, emotion and cognition (pp. 141–164). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Pearce, J. M., & Hall, G. (1980). A model for Pavlovian learning: Variations in the effectiveness of conditioned but not of unconditioned stimuli. Psychological Review, 87, 532–552.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rescorla, R. A., & Wagner, A. R. (1972). A theory of Pavlovian conditioning: Variations in the effectiveness of reinforcement and nonreinforcement. In Black, A. & Prokasy, W. F. (Eds.), Classical conditioning: II. Current research and theory (pp. 64–99). New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.Google Scholar
Rosenzweig, M. R. (1962). The mechanisms of hunger and thirst. In Postman, L. (Ed.), Psychology in the making (pp. 73–143). New York: Alfred A. Knopf.Google Scholar
Scahill, V., & Mackintosh, N. J. (2003). Transfer along a continuum and perceptual learning in flavour aversion conditioning (submitted).Google Scholar
Shanks, D. R., & Dickinson, A. (1988). Associative accounts of causality judgment. In Bower, G. H. (Ed.), The psychology of learning and motivation, 21 (pp. 229–261). New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Shaw, G. B. (1944). Everybody's political what's what? London: Constable.Google Scholar
Skinner, B. F. (1938). The behavior of organisms: An experimental analysis. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.Google Scholar
Spence, K. W. (1937). The differential response to stimuli varying within a single dimension. Psychological Review, 44, 430–444.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wagner, A. R. (1981). SOP: A model of automatic memory processing in animal behavior. In Spear, N. E. & Miller, R. R. (Eds.), Information processing in animals: Memory mechanisms (pp. 5–47). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Wills, S. J., & Mackintosh, N. J. (1998). Peak shift on an artificial dimension. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 51B, 1–31.Google Scholar
Wills, S. J., & Mackintosh, N. J. (1999). Relational learning in pigeons? Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 52B, 31–52.Google Scholar
Wright, A. A., Cook, R. G., Rivera, J. J., Sands, S. F., & Delius, J. D. (1988). Concept learning by pigeons: Matching-to-sample with trial-unique video picture stimuli. Animal Learning and Behavior, 16, 436–444.CrossRefGoogle Scholar