by Dr. Amy Mistler

Getting a good night's sleep can be a challenge for many people. The good news is that once we understand the psychological mechanisms involved in getting restful sleep, there are specific things that we can do to improve the quality of our sleep.

Classical conditioning. You may have heard of Pavlov's famous experiments with salivating dogs. We expect dogs to salivate when presented with food. Meanwhile, Pavlov found that the dogs in his experiment began salivating before they were presented with food, in response to the sound of the footsteps of the experimenter. The dogs had paired those footsteps with food.