Final answer:
Ivan Pavlov discovered classical conditioning through experiments where a bell's sound became associated with food for dogs, leading them to salivate at the sound. This differs from operant conditioning, where behavior is reinforced with rewards or punishments, unlike the mere association of stimuli and responses in classical conditioning.
Step-by-step explanation:
Ivan Pavlov, a Russian physiologist with an interest in the digestive system, conducted research on dogs which led to his discovery of classical conditioning. During his experiments, Pavlov initially noted that dogs salivated naturally in response to food, an unconditioned response. In his pursuit to understand this, he established a series of experiments where he would ring a bell whenever food was presented. Over time, he observed that dogs began to salivate even when no food was presented, but just the bell was rung. Thus, the sound of the bell became a conditioned stimulus, causing a conditioned response similar to the natural unconditioned response of salivating in anticipation of food.
One of the other examples of classical conditioning was associating a lever in a box with the arrival of food, such that the dogs learned to push the lever to receive a reward. Pavlov's experiments became a fundamental model for understanding how organisms develop associations between stimuli and responses, a process different from operant conditioning, which involves rewards or punishments for behaviors, rather than the creation of associations.
Operant conditioning is used to train a pet to perform a trick by rewarding the behavior, thus reinforcing it. In contrast, classical conditioning would be like a pet learning to anticipate a walk upon hearing the jingle of leash because it has been associated with going outside. Similarly, if you learned that studying likely will improve your grade on an AP test, this is an example of operant conditioning where the reward (higher grade) reinforces the studying behavior.