Biography
John B. Watson was born on January 9, 1878 in South Carolina. He had a troubled adolescence, getting arrested for fighting and disorderly behavior, and performed poorly academically. Watson was heavily influenced by Vladimir Bekhterev and Ivan Pavlov, and he used principles of experimental physiology to examine all aspects of behavior. It wouldn't be until 1908 when Watson accepted a faculty position at Johns Hopkins University. During this time, Watson entered into an affair with one of his graduate students, Rosalie Rayner. After leaving the teaching profession, Watson entered the field of advertising, rising to an executive position in only two years. The couple remained together for 15 years until Rayner's death at the age of 36.
"Little Albert"
The "Little Albert" experiment was a famous psychology experiment conducted by behaviorist John B. Watson and graduate student Rosalie Rayner. Around the age of nine months, Watson and Rayner exposed the child to a series of stimuli including a white rat, a rabbit, a monkey, masks and burning newspapers and observed the boy's reactions. The boy initially showed no fear of any of the objects he was shown. The next time Albert was exposed the rat, Watson made a loud noise by hitting a metal pipe with a hammer. Naturally, the child began to cry after hearing the loud noise. After repeatedly pairing the white rat with the loud noise, Albert began to cry simply after seeing the rat.
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The Ways of Behaviorism
In The Ways of Behaviorism, Watson states that behaviorism is the scientific study of human behavior. It is simply the study of what people do. Behaviorism is intended to take psychology up to the same level as other sciences.
- Opposed mentalistic concepts
- Used contiguity to explain learning
- He considered emotion to be just another example of classical conditioning
- Rejected the notion of individual differences
- He thought complex behaviors came about through combinations of identifiable reflexes
- He was a chief proponent of "nurture" and believed that all human differences were the result of learning
- Believed that practice strengthens learning
Key Concepts & Vocab
- Neutral Stimulus: a stimulus that produces no response other than catching your attention
- Behaviorism: the theory or doctrine that human or animal psychology can be accurately studied only through the examination and analysis of objectively observable and quantifiable behavioral events
- Stimulus Generalization: the tendency for the conditioned stimulus to evoke similar responses after the response has been conditioned