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This paper is an attempt to come to a psychological understanding of conditioned reflexes and Pavlov's work. According to Pavlov, unconditioned reflexes have to do with fundamental instincts as feeling and defence. Conditioned reflexes can be formed in connection with these basic instincts. They can also sometimes be formed in connection with less vital functions. In the conditioned reflexes a total situation of a typical character has a tendency to reinstate itself when only part of the situation is present. Pavlov's reflexes are really complicated total reactions of the personality. Psycho-analysis deals with identical phenomena with different technique.
In creating his conditioned reflexes there first occurs an irradiation of stimuli, then later a concentration. This can be described psychologically thus—a situation is first perceived in general terms and, as learning progresses, one becomes able to distinguish a specific thing in a general group. The writer therefore questions whether Pavolv's processes are immediate expressions of physiological processes. The change from irradiation to specificity is similar to the change from symbolic thinking to thinking dealing with concrete facts.
Pavlov finds that if the conditioned stimulus is given several times without fulfilment it fails and in its place all other related points become conditioned. This is similar to the situation found in analysis when a related condition, i.e. cover memory, gains the position of the original.
Pavlov speaks of external and internal inhibitions. External ones are damaging influences which weaken the conditioned reflex. Internal inhibitions are more important. They may act in five ways—(1) extinction, (2) delay, (3) trace inhibition, (4) conditioned inhibition, and (5) inhibition by differentiation. Extinction occurs when the stimulus is given several times and not followed by the reward (food). Inhibition by differentiation (5) is closely related. In it the general conditi