2.4 - Who was Ivan Petrovich Pavlov and why is he our friend?
Ivan Petrovich Pavlov (from now on called Pavlov), was born in 1849 and died on the 27th of February 1936. He lived a century ago and he was the first who discovered classical conditioning. In his experiments he used dogs and famously conditioned them to drool in anticipation of eating just by using the ring of a bell. It is important to note that this does not only work with food but all biological stimuli. The example for one of those biological stimuli that is most important in our case is sexual arousal. It is important to note that classical conditioning or also called Pavlovian conditioning is different to operant or also called instrumental conditioning. To understand how Pavlovian conditioning is different though, we need to understand what operant conditioning is. If you didn’t do it already, you should read the prior chapter to understand operant conditioning and therefore understand the differences between both kinds of conditioning.
Now back to Pavlov. Pavlovian conditioning is different. It does not work with rewards or punishments but instead is used to link a sensation to a reward or a punishment with the goal for the linked sensation is able to cause the same reaction as the reward or the punishment would, without actually applying the reward or the punishment. To create this link, you need a strong biological stimulus. Pavlov famously used a bell to link it’s sound to getting food. He rang a bell every time the dogs were fed and after the conditioning the bell caused the same biological reaction as food does, even though no food is present. The bell was used to make the dogs drool.
Drooling because of anticipated food is not the only thing that can be linked like this. Any strong emotion and most involuntary reactions of the body can be linked like this. From now on I will call those things the reaction. A few examples and not a comprehensive list is anger, peace of mind, being happy, feeling rewarded, sexual arousal, disgust, nausea, gagging, feeling the urge to pee, being attentive and awaiting a command. Any emotion and any bodily reaction that you can trigger consistently, you can link to a stimulus. From now on I will call those emotions and bodily reactions the association. That stimulus must be pretty consistently and can not vary a lot. If you use the sound of a bell, you have to use the same bell every time and not switch between several different bells to get the best effect. If you use a taste or a smell, it is best to use some artificial source for that smell or taste because natural tastes or smells tend to be inconsistent. Sensations that can be used for example are smells, tastes, sounds, touches, specific pains, wearing a collar/clamps/plug/specific clothing/hairband/hairclip. You can use anything that is distinct, repeatable and rare enough in the subject’s life so that the subject does not get flooded with the chosen sensation. From now on I will call that chosen sensation the trigger.
There are three main ways to time your trigger. The trigger being applied before the association with a delay between them, the trigger being applied right before the association gets applied with no delay between them and the trigger being applied while the association gets applied.
During phase 1 you want to be very consistent with your triggers and apply them every time the subject experiences the association. You need to create a strong link between the trigger and the association and both always go together. You can not use the trigger randomly without the association following right after. Likewise, the subject should not experience the association without the trigger being present as well. Once that strong link has been established, you can switch to phase 2.
During phase 2 you want to use the trigger but slowly phase out the association. If phase 1 worked properly, you will notice that the reaction to the association can be observed after the trigger is applied even when the association is not present. The phasing out process should not be rushed so that you do not ruin the link you built in phase 1. Once you fully phase out the use of the association, you reached phase 3.
During phase 3 you can cause the reaction to the association at will, using the trigger, without the association being present. If the trigger does not get used on the subject for extended amounts of time, it will lose the intensity of its effect. It can also lose the intensity of its effect over time but that is not a given. The link can always be strengthened again and the intensity of the reaction can be enhanced by redoing the conditioning a couple of times.
Once a trigger is fully established, it can be used as an association as well. There are more ways to condition that I do not talk about here. If you are interested to learn more about the topic, you can read up on classical conditioning.
If you can cause the feeling of sexual pleasure or arousal in a subject, you can link it to a trigger and that way make the trigger arousing for the subject. Edges and orgasms work great for this but you need to have pretty strict control over a subject’s sexual behaviour to be able to go through a proper phase 1 using edges and or orgasms. There also is a limit on what you can use as a trigger. The reaction to the trigger can not be stronger than the reaction to the association. It helps if the subject has the same but less intense reaction to the trigger as to the association. For example, a subject that absolutely hates anal probably cannot be made to love anal through conditioning. If the reaction to anal is only slightly negative, neutral or even positive the subject can be conditioned to love anal by linking it to edges, orgasms and or other strong kinks.
Conditioning works best when the subject is not aware that it is happening but it still works when the subject is aware of what you are doing.