biography

Full name: Ivan Petrovich Pavlov

Date of birth: September 14, 1849.

Nationality: Russian.

Death: February 27, 1936.

 

 Ivan Petrovich Pavlov was born on September 14, 1849 at Ryazan, Russia. Because he was born into a large family, poverty was always an issue. His father, Peter Dmitrievich Pavlov, was the village priest and young Ivan tended to the church property. Pavlov inherited many of his father's characteristics including a strong will to succeed.

He was educated first at the church school in Ryazan and then at the theological seminary there. In 1870 he enrolled in the physics and mathematics faculty to take the course in natural science.

Pavlov became passionately absorbed with physiology, which in fact was to remain of such fundamental importance to him throughout his life. It was during this first course that he produced. In 1875 Pavlov completed his course with an outstanding record and received the degree of Candidate of Natural Sciences.  After that he decided to continue his studies and proceeded to the Academy of Medical Surgery to take the third course there. He completed this in 1879 and was again awarded a gold medal. After a competitive examination, Pavlov won a fellowship at the Academy, and this together with his position as Director of the Physiological Laboratory at the clinic of the famous Russian clinician, S. P. Botkin, enabled him to continue his research work. In 1883 he presented his doctor's thesis on the subject of “The centrifugal nerves of the heart”.

In 1890 Pavlov was invited to organize and direct the Department of Physiology at the Institute of Experimental Medicine and he was appointed Professor of Pharmacology at the Military Medical Academy and five years later he was appointed to the then vacant Chair of Physiology, which he held till 1925.

In the early stages of his research Pavlov received world acclaim and recognition. In 1901 he was elected a corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, in 1904 he was awarded a Nobel Prize as a skilled surgeon, and in 1907 he was elected Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences; in 1912 he was given an honorary doctorate at Cambridge University and in the following years honorary membership of various scientific societies abroad. Finally, upon the recommendation of the Medical Academy of Paris, he was awarded the Order of the Legion of Honour (1915).
After the October Revolution, a special government decree, signed by Lenin on January 24, 1921, noted “the outstanding scientific services of Academician I.P.Pavlov, which are of enormous significance to the working class of the whole world”.

The Communist Party and the Soviet Government saw to it that Pavlov and his collaborators were given unlimited scope for scientific research.

Pavlov nurtured a great school of physiologists, which produced many distinguished pupils. He left the richest scientific legacy - a brilliant group of pupils, who would continue developing the ideas of their master, and a host of followers all over the world.

In 1881, Pavlov married Seraphima (Sara) Vasilievna Karchevskaya, a teacher, the daughter of a doctor in the Black Sea fleet. She first had a miscarriage, said to be due to her having to run after her very fast-walking husband. Subsequently they had a son, Wirchik, who died very suddenly as a child; three sons, Vladimir, Victor and Vsevolod, one of whom was a well-known physicist and professor of physics at Leningrad in 1925, and a daughter, Vera.

Dr. Pavlov died in Leningrad on February 27, 1936.

(Ivan Pavlov's family)

THEORY

Pavlov's research into the physiology of digestion led him logically to create a science of conditioned reflexes. In his study of the reflex regulation of the activity of the digestive glands, this is caused by food stimuli at a distance from the animal. By employing the method he developed by his colleague D. D. Glinskii in 1895. He establishing fistulas in the ducts of the salivary glands, Pavlov was able to carry out experiments on the nature of these glands. A series of these experiments caused Pavlov to reject the subjective interpretation of «psychic» salivary secretion and, on the basis of Sechenov's hypothesis that psychic activity was of a reflex nature, to conclude that even here a reflex - though not a permanent but a temporary or conditioned one - was involved.

 

In 1903, at the 14th International Medical Congress in Madrid Pavlov read about his theory. The definition of conditioned and other reflexes was given and it was shown that a conditioned reflex should be regarded as an elementary psychological phenomenon, which at the same time is a physiological one. It followed from this that the conditioned reflex was a clue to the mechanism of the most highly developed forms of reaction in animals and humans to their environment and it made an objective study of their psychic activity possible.

Pavlov deduced three principles for the theory of reflexes: the principle of determinism, the principle of analysis and synthesis, and the principle of structure.

Pavlov concluded that he was able to pair a neutral stimulus with an excitatory one and have the neutral stimulus eventually elicit the response that was associated with the original, unlearned reflex. In Classical Conditioning terminology, an unconditioned stimulus (US) is an event that causes a response to occur, which is referred to as the unconditioned response (UR). And, in Pavlov's study with dogs, the food within the dog's mouth is the US, and the salivation that results is the unconditioned response. Pavlov took a step further and added an element known as the nonexcitatory, conditioned stimulus (CS), which is paired with the US.

Pavlov used a metronome as the conditioned stimulus which he rang first, then fed the dogs. This pairing would eventually establish the dog's conditioned response of salivating to the sound of the metronome. After repeating this procedure several times, Pavlov was able to remove the unconditioned stimulus (food) and by only ringing the bell the dogs would salivate (CR). Since the bell alone now produced the unconditioned response (salivation), the association had been established (Conditioned). Pavlov continued to present the conditioned stimulus with any pairing with the unconditioned stimulus until the CR no longer occurred. This elimination of the CR is known as extinction. However, waiting a few days and then reintroducing ticking metronome resulted in the dogs once again salivating to the conditioned stimulus. Pavlov termed this, spontaneous recovery.

 

 

 

 

Pavlov continued of the conditioned response. He replaced the metronome with other stimuli for use as the conditioned stimulus. He conditioned the dogs using a buzzer, the flash of a light, a touch on the dog's harness, and the use of different pitches of a whistle in which the dogs had to differentiate between to determine which pitch resulted in access to food.

Pavlov's experimental research gained much respect throughout Russia as well as America and the rest of the nations. Although he began his investigations late in life he managed to develop the major constructs of a fully realized field of learning.

 

 

 

 

 

 

HOW TO USE THIS THEORY IN CLASSROOM

Through this theory teachers’ understand how they will face students. If a teacher face them a smile, they will smile. For example in the first day teacher face students with a big smile and treat them a friendly way so they also give a smile and talk friendly. The teacher continues this in several days. In the result of this when they saw teacher, they will smile. They always think that teacher is very friendly and they can say what they want. Students want to study because the teacher attitude, the way she teach and treat them. After 2 or 3 months when they saw the class they will smile. The teacher was there or not they will automatically smile.

In this stage students are friendlier to the classroom and they love that place. So the teacher can teach easily to the students.