Chapter 10

The Psychologist, the Baby, and the Hammer

“Little Albert” Study:

• John Watson and Rosalie Rayner conducted experiments to test learning

• A child is distracted while Watson strikes a steel rod with a hammer

• The child reacts violently

• Watson’s conditioning works when associations are made between stimuli and response

• Adult fears, anxieties, and phobias are conditioned emotional responses that were established in infancy and childhood and stay with us throughout our lives

John B. Watson

• Indifferent student

• Enrolled in Furman to become a minister

• Went to University of Chicago to study philosophy for grad school

• Learned about mechanism from Loeb and psychology from Angell

• Graduated at 25, and was told his dissertation was not as good as Helen Woolley’s

• Founded behaviorism (did not originate it)

• His efforts are a crystallization of the ideas already emerging within psychology

• Distinction between Watson and his predecessors:

  • Watson announced an intentional goal of founding a new school

The Development of Behaviorism

Watson:

• Psychic or mental concepts have no value for a science of psychology

• Official launch of behaviorism: Psychological Review (Watson, 1913)

• Argued for the acceptance of animal psychology and described the advantages of using animal subjects in psychological research

• Wanted behaviorism to be of practical value, applied to the real world as well

• The goal of psychology is prediction and control of behavior

Watson’s Second Career

• Forced to resign from John Hopkins after 12 years

• Began a career in advertising

• Consumers were just machines, to be studied in the lab

• Published in popular media

  • Promoted behaviorism

Watson’s Views on Children and Women

• Psychological Care of the Infant and Child

  • Proposed environmentalists parenting practices

• Women who wanted the right to vote were sexually dissatisfied

The Reaction to Watson’s Program

• Watson’s program was not embraced immediately or universally

  • Critics questioned his rejection of introspection

  • Use of animals

• By the 1920s

  • Universities were offering courses in behaviorism

  • Term was becoming acceptable in the professional journals

The Methods of Behaviorism

• Watson insisted that psychology restrict itself to the data of the natural sciences (what could be observed)

• Methods (all based on the concept of observation

  • Observation with and without the use of instruments

  • Testing methods

  • The verbal report method

    • Suggested that speech reactions, because they are objectively observable are as meaningful for behaviorism as any other type of motor response

  • The conditioned reflex method

    • Watson responsible for its widespread use

• New Methods= change in the nature and role of the human subject in the psychology laboratory

  • Subjects no longer responsible for the observing

  • Role of experimenter is now more important than the subject

  • Subjects merely behaved: reinforced the view of people as machines

The Subject Matter of Behaviorism

• Focus on elements of behavior: body’s muscular movements and glandular secretions

• Psychology would deal only with acts that could be described objectively, without using subjective or mentalistic terminology

  • Explicit

  • Implicit

• Underlying belief: all areas of behavior would be considered in objective S-R terms

Instincts

• Watson accepted the role of instincts in behavior early on

• 1925: Watson revised his position and eliminated the concept of instinct

  • Refused to admit to his system any inherited capacities, temperaments, or talents of any kind

  • Behaviors that seemed inherited were traced to early childhood training

  • Optimistic viewpoint: children could be trained to be whatever one wanted them to be

Emotions

• Emotions: physiological responses to specific stimuli

  • Physical manifestations: blushing, perspiration, increased pulse rate

  • Denies anu conscious perception of the emotion or the sensations from the internal organs

• Three primary unlearned reactions:

  • Fear-produced by loud noises and loss of support

  • Rage-restriction of bodily movements

  • Love-rocking, patting, caressing

Albert, Peter, and the Rabbits

• Conditioning of little Albert leads Watson to reject the notion of the unconscious because it could not be objectively observed

• Mary Cover Jones: conducts a study with three-yearold Peter, who already showed a fear of rabbits

  • Successfully eliminates the fear response through conditioning

  • Precursor to behavioral therapy

Thought Processes

• Watson: thought processes occur in the absence of muscular movements

  • They are not accessible to observation and experimentation

  • Attempted to reduce thinking to implicit motor behavior

  • Reduced thinking to sub-vocal talking that relies on the same muscular habits we learn for overt speech

Behaviorism’s Popular Appeal

• Reasons for popularity of behaviorism

  • Possibility of controlled behavior; free of myths, customs, and conventional behaviors

  • Studies provide evidence that all undesirable behaviors can be eliminated, especially in childhood

  • Theory does not blame individual for negative behaviors

  • Replace religion-based ethics with experimental ethics

An Outbreak of Psychology

• 1920s, following behaviorism’s announcement:

  • General public was convinced that psychology provided the path to health, happiness, and prosperity

  • Joseph Jastrow wrote for public audiences on:

    • curing the blues

    • the psychology of crooks

    • fears and worries

    • the meaning of IQ scores

    • inferiority complexes

    • family conflicts

    • and why we drink coffee

  • Albert Wiggam teaches the public how to explore one’s mind

Criticisms of Behaviorism

• Criticiszed because system:

  • Proposes sweeping revision

  • Blatantly attacks the existing order

  • Suggests that the earlier vision of the truth be discarded

  • Is said to have omitted important components (sensory and perceptual processes)

  • Strict objectivity was too hard to achieve

• Karl Lashley (1890-1958):

  • Former advocate of Watson’s behaviorism

  • Two famous principles:

    1. Law of mass aciton

    2. Principle of equipotentiality

• William McDougall (1871-1938):

  • Forcefull opponent of Watson

  • Known for his instinct theory of behavior: suggests there are innate tendencies to thought and action

Contributions of Watson’s Behaviorism

• An effective agent of the Zeitgeist

• More objective in methods and terminology

• Overcame earlier positions in psychology

• Strong conceptual base for modern psychology

• Watsonian behaviorism was replaced by other forms of psychological objectivism that built on it