It’s interesting you bring up Pavlov. From a lay perspective /understanding it seems the important inferences from his study was the associative aspect of the bell ringing and the expectation of being presented with food. Actually as I type this it makes me think those experiments could be revisited with eye toward more fully understanding ‘dog consciousness’? Perhaps they suggest aspects of a more robust capacity for abstraction in dog ‘thought’? Recognition of future results?, hmm anyways..
Given what we know about human consciousness , current and future understanding not necessarily withstanding , a disassociative technique can be very powerful in ‘short circuiting’ an urge or desire. Without getting too far in the weeds pertaining to dopamine release and other brain chemical reactions to stimulae both concrete and abstract, the bell ringing effect of the unindulged desire brings the concomitant salivation of the feelings of unease of not indulging.
How long does it take for the bell ringing not followed by presentation to affect the salivation response ? The analogy really only holds loosely , but in either case the ringing isn’t really what brings the presentation , just the expectation , yeah? Sorry this is a rather stream of consciousness thingy.