Neo Behaviourism Vs Watson Neo Behaviorism

Behaviorism was the staple of psychology from the 1920’s to the 1950’s. It started as a concept from Pavlov’s famous experiment where he came across the phenomenon of classical conditioning. Unfortunately it wasn’t until much later that the concept of conditioning became a paradigm for psychologists worldwide. Not long after Pavlov’s experiment was published a man named John Watson would soon pioneer a new scientific front in the field of psychology.

Psychology could not convince people of its usefulness and practical problem and the founder of behaviorism John Watson believed that both structuralism and functionalism were subjective and introduced behaviorism as objective. (Moore ,2011) which was considered to be a transformation from one phase of science to another . (Gardner ,1985)

The movement was founded by John B. Watson, and one of his biggest premises was that thoughts were unobservable and, therefore, should not be studied. Actions, or behaviors, on the contrary, were the only objective aspects worthy of scientific inquiry. Such proponents of this theory include classic experimental psychologists such as Ivan Pavlov and B.F. Skinner. The major tenets of behaviorism are targeted at a stimulus and a response. For example, an individual was placed in this situation which caused them to behave this way.

The 20th century saw a response to Edward Titchener’s critique of Wundt’s experimentation. This contributed to the study of behaviorism by John Watson. Behaviorism was proposed to emphasizing the study of obvious behavior. In the final decades of the 20th century saw a rise of the cognitive science which is a interdisciplinary approach to studying the human mind. Cognitive science considers the mind as subject for investigation

In 1913 Watson gave a lecture called “Psychology as the Behaviorist Views It”. It was in this speech that Watson proposed the idea of an objective psychology of behavior called “behaviorism”. John saw psychology as the study of people’s actions and their ability to predict and control their actions. This became known as the behaviorist’s theory. During the next few years, different ideas about behaviorism was studied. (Muskingum.edu) Behaviorism came to be widely accepted among psychologists and the general public, becoming a popular field of study in the 1920’s through the 1960’s. It was a huge contradiction to the views of the eugenics movement, which claimed that heredity was the primary force determining a person’s potential and behavior. Behaviorism, with its promise of the possibility of change, and even improvement. (A science Odyssey, published by

Psychologists today like John B. Watson who wrote Behaviorism, believe that all human behavior is a result of conditioning. Therefore humans can be taught to act any way the manipulator wants them too. Behaviorism, a school of psychology, founded by John B. Watson, is the concept that all behavior stems from a form of conditioning. This conditioning could be being betrayed and thrown in jail, or having you father murdered. In Watsons’s book Behaviorism, Watson states:

Though this theory mainly focuses on Skinner, another theorist named John B. Watson is mentioned. Watson believed that human behavior is the result of specific stimuli that elicited certain responses. His basic idea was that the conclusions about human development should be based on the observation of overt behavior rather than speculation. Watson was also a professor of psychology at Hopkins University and “By the time he left the field for good in the early 1930s, behaviorism had succeeded in taking center stage within American psychology” (Wozniak, 1997).

Behaviorism has been a topic of many controversies in the early stages of developing. This paper will present a synthesis of several articles discussing behaviorisms and its development through various schools of theories, in addition known researchers and conclusions. The first article that illustrates behaviorism is, “Behaviorism at 100” by Ledoux (2012), which details the last 50 years of the study of behaviorism. The next article is “Behaviorism” by Moore (2011), maps the beginning of behaviorism with B.F.Skinner and addressing functionalism and structuralism. The article named “Psychology as the behaviorist views it”, written by Watson (1913) put his emphasis the aspects of psychology and how behaviorist view introspection. Green (2009) article “Darwinian Theory functionalism and the First American psychological revolution”, is very adamant to have is readers to know that functionalism was the foundation that behaviorism was built. Clark (2004) article “The classical origins of Pavlov’s conditioning”, give insight into classical conditioning abroad and in the United States. The last article named “Little Albert’s alleged neurological impairment” written by Digdon , Powell and Harris (2014), focus on ethical concerns and that may have been overlooked. The synthesis paper will provide behaviorism and conclusions that can draw overall messages from the articles mentioned above.

Many ideas were shared between Watson, Tolman, and Skinner who all played a role in the forming of behaviorism. They did, however, differ on some of their beliefs as well as their methods of study. At this time, methods of studying psychology as well as psychology in general were in the developing stages. Watson was largely credited with the foundation of behaviorism, however, he was by no means the only one to make contributions. There has been some debate as to whether Watson’s contributions were enough to make him the “founder of behaviorism.” It is important to examine contributions from several of the early

There are 4 different approaches to psychology such as Cognitive, Biological, Psychodynamic and Behaviourism (Jarvis, M. et al. 2004). Cognitive approach deals with the mental processes such as the memory, the way of thinking and problem solving which is a necessity to process information. It concentrates on the mental process, which contrasts with behaviourism (Woods, B. 2006). Behaviourism approach focuses on how an individual behaves in different circumstances. It states that behaviour is formed through positive and negative reinforcements as well as the behaviour are a response to a stimulus.

John Watson a theorist who rejected the idea of introspection and every part of the psychodynamic theory, suggested the Behaviourist view is an

Psychologists have been focused on observing and understanding human behavior for centuries, dating back to the Greek philosophers when psychology and philosophy were considered one.Today, Psychology is the study of human behavior, beginning before birth and lasting until death. It is clear that the observance human behavior is a vast and profound source of data for psychologists. Early philosophers relied on methods of observation and logic. A physiologist named Wilhelm Wundt in the 1800’s began using scientific research methods in his study of mental processes. However, the situation was totally different in the beginning of 20th century when psychology still struggled to be regarded as a separate discipline with practical value(Mastering,2011). Psychologists had only begun to be accepted as a science. It was John B. Watson who established the school of Behaviorism and inspired many other psychologists to study patterns of human behavior and their mechanisms. Watson 's contribution to psychology is important not to underestimate; he studied animal and human behavior to come up with a methodology that would give Psychology a respected status among other scientific disciplines. This essay will focus on the biography and works of John B. Watson with a purpose to show why his works are important for Psychology today(Hergenhahn & Henley, 2013).

Although Watson was not the first to suggest an empirical and objective approach to psychological research he was the first to offer a coherent and organized program, and is often viewed as the catalyst for behaviorism, especially among American psychologists (Bewsbury, 2013). Perhaps the most famous behaviorist is B.F. Skinner (b.1904-d.1990). Skinner’s approach almost completely disregarded anything outside of observable behaviors, and his strict approach to looking at anything other than observable behaviors resulted in the development of the term radical behaviorism (Feist et al., 2013).

“Why don’t we make what can be observed the real field of psychology” (Watson, 1929). Watson (1878-1958) was born into a poor family in South Carolina. His mother was a religious woman, and his father drank a lot and had multiple affairs (Watson, 1999). Watson himself married twice, having two children in each marriage. He didn’t seem to have good relationships with his children – it is said that one of the main reasons for this may be because he used his children throughout his research. He studied in the University of Chicago where he later became known as the founder of Behaviourism. He wrote an essay in 1914 titled “Psychology as the Behaviourist views it” where he stated that behaviourism is an objective experimental branch of natural science (Watson, 1914). Behaviourism is a theory of learning that argues that all behaviours are acquired through conditioning (Carver & Scheier, 2012). Behaviourists believe

A significant piece of several psychological theories in the late nineteenth century was introspection, which is “the examination or observation of one's own mental and emotional processes” (Press, 2013). In retort to this theory behaviorism came about. Behaviorism is predominantly concerned with observable and measurable aspects of human behavior. In other words behaviorism does not look at the biological aspects but it suggests that all behaviors are learned habits and changes in response to the environment. It endeavors to explain how these particular habits are formed. Behaviorism claimed that the causes of behavior was not necessarily found in the complexities of the mind but could be observed in one’s immediate environment, from stimuli that produced, reinforced, and punished certain responses also known later on as conditioning. It wasn’t until the twentieth century that the scientist began to discover the actual systems to learning, thereby laying a foundation for behaviorism. A theorist by the name of Ivan Pavlov was a major contribution to the discovering of significant behavioral theories.