He studied conditioned reflexes in animals. His work had a great impact on behavioural theory and learning theory. Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine 1904. Pavlov was born in Ryazan and studied in St Petersburg at the university and the Imperial Medical Academy, where he became professor 1890. Studying the physiology of the circulatory system and the regulation of blood pressure, Pavlov devised animal experiments such as the dissection of the cardiac nerves of a living dog to show how the nerves that leave the cardiac plexus control heartbeat strength. Pavlov's work relating to human behaviour and the nervous system also emphasized the importance of conditioning. He deduced that the inhibitive behaviour of a psychotic person is a means of self-protection. The person shuts out the world and, with it, all damaging stimuli. Following this theory, the treatment of psychiatric patients in Russia involved placing a sick person in completely calm and quiet surroundings. Pavlov summarized his Nobel prizewinning work in Die Arbeit der Verdauungsdruesen/Lectures on the Work of the Principal Digestive Gland 1897.
