Ivan Pavlov is regarded as the father of classical conditioning as he discovered that both animals and human beings produced unconscious responses to stimuli, and with time, they could be conditioned to produce responses to different stimuli (Eelen, 2018) . John Watson did not believe that studies and experiments that were concerned with consciousness were flawed. He, however, believed that the behaviors in individuals could be determined based on how they had been programmed to react based on their experiences (Haselgrove & McLaren, 2019) . Watson's approach to observing and controlling the inborn qualities of an organism came to be known as behaviorism. Watson's research stated that individuals were afraid of objects because of the terrifying associations that they connect with them in the past (Haselgrove & McLaren, 2019) . B.F. Skinner's study came to be known as operant conditioning, where he believed that positive and negative behaviors could be reinforced through reward (Eelen, 2018) . Skinner stated that positive reinforcement of behaviors through reward increased the desired behavior, which was contrary to the theories of Watson and Pavlov.
Behaviorism is important to learning as it is used to identify the relationship between the specific actions of an individual and the immediate predecessor and the consequence of their actions (Meyer, Cogan & Robinson, 2014) . Operant conditioning is widespread in learning as students engage in activities such as reading or doing an assignment because of the reward associated with learning, such as passing exams, getting to know to college, or attaining a high paying job after passing college exams (Wells, 2014) . Classic conditioning is the way behavior is taught through association and also helps in the acquisition of new information. At the workplace, strict attendance policies can help produce more disciplined employees and hence increase productivity (Meyer, Cogan & Robinson, 2014) .
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Conditioning can be used to develop personality by helping reinforce good behavior and discourage the display of undesired behavior. Conditioning can be used in the breaking of bad habits such as smoking by looking at the smoker's body picture and conditioning oneself to save the money once you feel the urge to smoke (Wells, 2014) .
References
Eelen, P. (2018). Classical Conditioning: Classical Yet Modern. Psychologica Belgica , 58 (1), 196-211. DOI: 10.5334/pb.451
Haselgrove, M., & McLaren, I. (2019). The psychology of associative learning: Editorial. Quarterly Journal Of Experimental Psychology , 72 (2), 93-97. DOI: 10.1177/1747021818814401
Meyer, P., Cogan, E., & Robinson, T. (2014). The Form of a Conditioned Stimulus Can Influence the Degree to Which It Acquires Incentive Motivational Properties. Plos ONE , 9 (6), e98163. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0098163
Wells, V. (2014). Behavioural psychology, marketing, and consumer behaviour: a literature review and future research agenda. Journal Of Marketing Management , 30 (11-12), 1119-1158. DOI: 10.1080/0267257x.2014.929161
