As you can surmise references to this phenomena are likening whatever action to the ringing of the bell, which makes the subject expect an action that has been previously associated with the bell, allowing for effective training. The Dog does not know why it expects food when the bell rings, just that when the bell rings it gets hungry and expects food to be there.

[–] Patnou@lemmy.world 2 points 19 hours ago (2 children)

Thanks for the answer... no sarcasm. How does that relate to like rape, battered women, ptsd. I really don't see the jump.

[–] vagrancyand@sh.itjust.works 2 points 16 hours ago

Both negative (when bell, I will hit you) and positive reinforcement (when bell, I will give food) are associated with Pavlov's dog experiments (for shockingly obvious reasons).

For PTSD and other traumatic things, this is an example of negative reinforcement; something bad happened and something neutral happened, now they are associated forever in the victim's mind. i.e.

Soldiers seeing their friends get blown up while in a humvee and associating any music playing or the humvee engine sound with that scene.

When you have a 'Pavlovian response' it is a stimulus (bell) that makes your mind consciously or unconsciously remember the reward/punishment (food) that happened at the same time; causing an involuntary response (hunger/salivation in the original experiment).

[–] BCsven@lemmy.ca 2 points 17 hours ago

PTSD is the conditioned response your body and mind go to from repeated negative situations. Even though you may be out of the War (as an example) loud noises can trigger the previous war mode of fight/flight in you