Behavioralism: Three Perspectives

Behavioralism: Three Perspectives

Dennis Gardner

History of Psychology 310

July 17th 2011

Donna Allgood

Behavioralism: Three Perspectives

The behavioralist philosophy often makes people uncomfortable. We humans like to think of ourselves as somehow divorced from the forces that shape other "inferior" creatures. Indeed, we use terms such as "animalistic" and "beastly" to describe behavior unfit for the social arena. John Watson writes, "The behaviorist, in his efforts to get a unitary scheme of

animal response, recognizes no dividing line between man and brute. . . ." (Goodwin, 2008). This turn of phrase alone is enough to drive the egotistical among us to distraction...if we are to believe that humanity is to be held above all other conscious life on Earth. Behavioralism arose as a reaction to the introspective philosophies of the psychoanalyst movement of the 19th century. Beginning with an accidental discovery by the Russian physiologist Ivan Pavlov that a dog could be "conditioned" to salivate when a "conditioned stimuli" is associated with food, the idea that behavior is a reaction to environmental cues and stresses began to take form (Goodwin, 2008). A central tenet of behavioralism, which aims to take psychology from the subjective realm of the interpreter and into the laboratory of the scientist, is in fact that the environment, which is directly observable and somewhat controllable, is the only factor of psychological development and influence worthy of study.

John B. Watson is considered the father of modern behavioralism. Having come from a dysfunctional family, it may come as no surprise that Watson grew to believe that environmental factors are the predominant force in shaping human behavior. Early in his career he studied the work of Jacques Loeb, a materialist, whose work on tropisms, the autonomic movements of organisms, he considered influential (Goodwin, 2008). Watson's studies with rats (apparently white rats, appropriately enough) and mazes proved to have interesting results. The mazes in his study contained sections that could be removed, thus shortening the maze without drastically altering their course. When rats that had learned to solve the long-form maze were placed in the shorter version they ran headlong into walls where an extended corridor should be. When rats used to the shorted mazes were placed in the longer ones they would turn in mid-straightaway expecting a turn (Goodwin, 2008). These behaviors showed Watson not only that the rats had committed a map to memory but that their memory was translating into learned behavior.

Watson was against the study of consciousness as a basis for behavior, favoring animal studies and the use of "pre-conscious" children in attempts to render consciousness irrelevant. In his seminal study with a boy known as "Little Albert" Watson used classical conditioning to induce a fear of white rats into the infants behavior. After a short time Albert's fear came to include all white, furry objects, thus strengthening Watson's claim that he could condition the behavior of human beings as well as giving credence to his claim that the primary human emotional responses are fear, rage, and love (Watson, E. 1999). Watson's primary belief was that the study of psychology is flawed due to the fact that previous studies of the mind and consciousness relied on introspection and subjective interpretation instead of scientific experimentation and method (Watson, E. 1999).

Following in Watson's footsteps was one Burrhus Frederic Skinner. During a long and successful career at Harvard University Skinner developed his theory of learning. Key to his theory is the assumption that if one observes a person's behavior exactly one can determine precisely what it is that motivates, or in Skinnerian lingo, reinforces that person's behavior (2011). This is the central concept to his learning theory and is in direct opposition to psychoanalytic theory and other psychological models of human behavior and personality. In Skinner's view human motivation is not an internal force driven by sexual energy, the need to self-actualize, or be validated by others; it is a learned behavior that has been repeatedly reinforced in a positive manner (2011). Skinner called this motivational reinforcement operant conditioning and he believed it could account for all behavior, even language. Skinner believed that behavior is essentially a learned skill. The learning of complex behaviors, such as language, simply required a longer sequence of steps to be acquired and more reward to be reinforced (2011). In basic terms, all language is learned and reinforced because to do so generates positive reward for the person acquiring the