ROMANCE,LOVE AND RELATIONSHIP

Ivan Pavlov was a physiologist who stumbled upon one of the most important principles in all of psychology.

Pavlov discovered that he could teach dogs to salivate at the sound of a tone if he repeatedly paired the tone with the presentation of food. The dogs learned that the tone was a good predictor for food (which they liked and which naturally elicited a salivary response). Thus, by repeatedly pairing the tone and the food, the dogs learned to salivate to the sound of the tone... regardless of whether or not food was present.

This is known as classical conditioning and it's quite a common phenomenon which influences most every aspect of our lives... especially our love lives.

You see, EMOTIONS are particularly susceptible to classical conditioning. Emotions are very often "elicited" by certain circumstances as a result of past learning experiences (that is, previous pairings or associations).

An obvious example is the emotion of fear. People often learn to fear things because of previous unpleasant associations. For example, a person may come to fear dentists (or perhaps the sound of a drill) because of past painful dental procedures.

A woman who has been attacked may develop a fear of strangers or a fear of men. Or maybe it's the garage or neighborhood in which she was attacked that come to elicit feelings of fear and anxiety. It's a simple pairing of a particular situation (or person) with an emotion which causes similar situations (or persons) to elicit similar emotions in the future.

On the positive side, think about an old girlfriend of yours that you adored. (Everybody has at least one that they blew it with.) You were crazy about this girl and would have done anything for her. As a result you may have done a few things you didn't really care too much for.

Maybe she was really into Italian food but you weren't. Frequently you wound up in Italian restaurants in order to keep her happy. As a result of the pairing of Italian food with this adorable lady, you NOW love Italian food. Or maybe it's a particular Italian restaurant that you two frequented that you NOW love.

Perhaps she used to love hiking so now you do. Or she was crazy about cats and now you have several. Or maybe it was a particular movie that the two of you saw together that still makes you feel queasy. Or a particular song (your song) that brings back a flood of vivid memories and intense emotions. Whatever it is, your feelings for her were transferred to various other objects, situations, or people as a result of being paired with her.

It's