Psychology : The Influential Bunch

Erikson believed that people develop in psychosocial stages. He emphasized developmental change throughout the human life span. In Erikson's theory, eight stages of development result as we go through the life span. Each stage consists of a crisis that must be faced. According to Erikson, this crisis is not a catastrophe but a turning point. The more an individual resolves the crises successfully, the healthier development will be.

John B Watson the “father of behaviorism once quoted “ Give me a dozen healthy infants, well formed and my own specified world to bring them up in and I will guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select – doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant chief and yes, even beggar man, and thief, regardless of his talents pendants, tendencies, abilities, vocations and race of his ancestors. Watson had a plan as to what he wanted to accomplish. He new what his goals were. He had a plan as to how he wanted to conduct the Little Albert Experiment and Classical Conditioning. Watson believed that psychology shoed be seen as a purely objective experimental branch of natural science, he wanted to see the prediction and control of behavior not just the understanding of the mind (Mcleod, 2008).

Eric Erikson was one of the most famous theorists of the twentieth century; he created many theories. One of the most talked about theories is his theory of psychosocial development. This is a theory that describes stages in which an individual should pass as they are going through life. His theory includes nine stages all together. The original theory only included eight stages but Erikson‘s wife found a ninth stage and published it after his death. The nine stages include: trust vs. mistrust, autonomy vs. shame and doubt, initiative vs. guilt, industry vs. inferiority, identity vs. identity confusion, intimacy vs. isolation, generativity vs. stagnation, integrity vs. despair, and hope and faith vs. despair (Crandell and Crandell,

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

The study that John Watson is best known for was that of Little Albert. In this study, Watson and his assistant placed an infant, baby Albert, in a room along with a white rat. At first, Albert attempted to reach out toward the rat as it moved around him however soon after Watson slammed together two steel pipes creating a noise loud enough to scare Albert. After this initial scare, the pipes were hit together each time Albert would reach for the rat eventually resulting in his complete fear of the rat and anything that resembled it (Watson & Rayner, 1920). It was in this study that Watson was using a strategy of conditioning that would pair Albert with an unconditioned stimulus and then conditioning him to become fearful of this stimulus. Do to his research in the field, Watson became known as the founder of behaviorism.

Watson is known as the father of behaviorism. He was born on January 9, 1878 in Greenville, South Carolina. He attended Furman University at 16 and graduated with a master’s degree. Watson then attended the University of Chicago where he became interested in the field of psychology. Watson received his doctorate 1903 and later became an associate professor of psychology at John Hopkins University. John B Watson established behaviorism when he delivered his lectured entitled “Psychology as the Behaviorist Views It” at Colombia University. Watson’s most famous experiment was the “Little Albert” experiment. In the experiment Watson conditioned a child to fear a white rat. He did so by pairing a white rat with a loud noise. Watson was asked to retire from Hopkins because of an affair he was having with his assistant. After leaving John Hopkins University Watson began working for an advertising agency where he used his knowledge of behaviorism to improve the effects of

Just like Sigmund Freud, Erikson believed in the significance of early childhood. However, he believed that an individual’s personality development occurs over the individual’s entire course of life. In the early 1960s, Erik Erikson proposed a theory that provided a description of eight different stages of human development (Scheck, 2014). According to him, in each phase, individuals face new challenges and the outcome of the stage depends on how individuals handle the encountered challenges (Scheck, 2014). The stages are named based on the possible outcomes.

Erikson’s main contribution to psychology was his developmental theory. He developed eight psychosocial stages of development and believed that each stage presents

Behaviorism is “the view that psychology should be an objective science that studies behavior without reference to mental processes” (Myers, 2011, p. 6). John Watson believed that science is based upon observation. Therefore, Watson developed behaviorism based upon the idea that while you cannot observe a feeling or thought of a person, you can observe their reactions

THe Behavioral perspective believes that our behavior is the result of the environment we are in. Behaviorists believe that psychologists should rely on the stimuli in the environment and our response to the stimuli. There perspective was that our behaviors are the result of our upbringing and environment. The behavioral perspective works on the molecular level to understand an individual 's behavior. They developed research generated evidence. John Watson was the founder of American behaviorism. Watson advocated that psychology is a science and it should be limited to observable, measurable behaviors. Watson studied babies and how they learned everything from their environment. He advocated that nurture was stronger than nature. Watson was famous for his experiment with Baby Albert and a white rat. Baby Albert did not fear the white at at first but began to fear it once it was associated with a loud sound. Watson proved through his experiments that parents should take

John Broadus Watson, the father of Behaviorism, was born in South Carolina on January 9, 1878 to Emma and Pickens Watson. John grew up in a mixed up household, his father was a known drinker while his mother was a devout Christian. Although he took after his father and got himself into some trouble growing up, he managed to gain admission to Furman College at age sixteen. Upon graduation from Furman, one of John’s professors turned mentor Gordon Moore helped him make the next step, and the following year he enrolled in the University of Chicago’s graduate program.

John B. Watson made many contributions to the study of psychology. Especially with his behaviorism school of thought which later became an entire branch of psychology. Watson defined behaviorism as “a natural science approach to psychology that focuses on the study of environmental influences on observable behavior.” (Powell, Symbaluk & Honey, 2008. p. 14). Watson strongly believed this study should be limited to behavior that can be observed since it is the only one hat can be predicted and controlled objectively without any fictitious constrains as those associated with conscious experiences and beliefs. Watson dismisses the usability of the consciousness concept in psychology. Behaviorism scholars are opposed to the idea that a person’s behavior can be studied using thought or even beliefs. These according to them, are fabricated constructs that mislead the human’s understanding of behavior.

“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

Erik Erikson is known for his psychoanalytic theory of psychosocial development comprising eight stages from infancy to adulthood. Psychologist Erik Erikson, is a major contributor to developmental psychology, who proposed a comprehensive theory of the ways that individuals develop their identity, a sense of who they are, and society's influence on that development. Erikson stated that people go through crisis at each stage of their lives. The stages each had a developmental task to be mastered. As an individual resolved these various crises an individual would have a better harmony with their social environment that they live in. If an individual could not successfully resolve a crisis, they would be” out of step”, and the individual would have a greater difficulty in their dealing with a crisis in the future. Erikson did however recognize that an individual can develop through a stage negatively and still go on with their life. Erikson stated that each of the psychological stages have a basic conflict and important event leading to growth. The theory was developed from his hundreds of clinical observations in children.

     John B. Watson was an early psychologist that didn't agree with many other psychologist's ideas about learning only relating to consciousness and thought processes. As the founder of behaviorism, Watson studied learning in a behavioral perspective, an approach that emphasizes the relationship between outwardly observable behaviors and environmental events, rather than mental processes.