Birth of Behaviorism

1. Birth of Behaviorism • Behaviorism, as we know it, was first outlined in paper published 1904 by a Russian researcher … • “[translated] for psychology to be a science, the research must focus on the observable – the environment [stimulus] and the behavior of an organism [response].” • … the approach achieved more and more important findings, and behaviorism quickly took over experimental psychology.

2. Sechenov (before 1904) • It was Ivan Sechenov (1829-1905), a Russian physiologist of the mid-1800s, who proposed the main ingredient of behaviorism. • In 1863, he wrote “Reflexes of the Brain” in which he argued that stimulation causes all behavior, making him the first true behaviorist. • He also proposed that the central nervous system could inhibit the nerves (as well as excite the nerves).

3. Bekhterev (1857-1927) • In a 1904 paper entitled, “Objective Psychology,” Vladimir Bekhterev outlined the nature of behaviorism. • He called the objective study of stimulus-response associations “reflexology” . • He independently discovered the “association reflex,” but Pavlov would make it more widely known as the “conditioned reflex.”

4. Ivan Pavlov (1849-1936) • Became the most famous Russian Behaviorist when he won the Nobel Prize in Physiology in 1904. • The award was officially for research in the study of digestion in animals. His finding was the ability to train dogs to salivate at the ringing of a bell – a “conditioned reflex.” • The finding, of course, was more relevant to the young field of psychology than to physiology.

5. Pavlov’s Behaviorism • Behaviorism was not about mental activity, but of reflexes – responses to stimuli. • Pavlov never opposed the idea that experimental psychology could study mental activity, but he never addressed mental activity in his research. • Pavlov defined the major terms of behaviorism, and they would be the first set of “universal principles” in the field of psychology …

6. Birth of Classical Conditioning • At the time, it was not known as “classical” conditioning, but “classical” distinguishes it from the later “operant” conditioning (Skinner). • The unconditioned stimulus and the unconditioned response were natural reflexes. • Unconditioned stimulus (environment) – part of the naturally occurring environment. • Unconditioned response (organism) – an unlearned response to the natural environment.

7. Classical Conditioning • The conditioned stimulus and conditioned responses depend on the natural “reflexes.” • Conditioned stimulus – paired with the unconditioned stimulus. E.g. Pavlov paired a bell with the presentation of meat powder. • Conditioned response – the learned response. The dogs responded to the bell in the same manner as responding to meat powder.

8. Classical Conditioning (cont.) • The conditioned response is strengthened with repeated pairing of the conditioned stimulus with the unconditioned stimulus. • Extinction – the conditioned response can be weakened, and even lost, with repeatedly presenting the conditioned stimulus without the unconditioned stimulus.

9. Conditioning and Psychology • Conditioning can be more complex. For example, dogs can learn one bell means meat, but another bell means NO meat. • By expanding on the idea of complex conditioning patterns, we can begin to appreciate how behaviorism can explain our human nature. • Many behaviorists indeed proposed that human nature can be reduced to a complex pattern of learned responses to stimuli.

10. John Watson (1878-1958) • In 1913, nine years after Pavlov and Bekhterev established behaviorism, Watson’s publication “Psychology as a Behaviorist views it” appeared in Psychological Review. • Watson presented psychology as a combination of Russian behaviorism and British empiricism. In other words, he believed that the study of the mind was a study of building higher mental capacity through stimulus-response behavior.

11. Watson’s Psychology • Established and defined behaviorism in U.S.A. • He saw the 1904 rise of Russian behaviorism, but he already had a similar position due to his views of empiricism and functionalism. • He wanted to go beyond learned behavior. His intentions were to take stimulus-response research and turn it into a study of the mind. • In 1919, after the end of the first World War, Watson and behaviorism began a take-over of empirical psychology.

12. Watson’s Famous Quote: “Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-informed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I’ll 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, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors.”

13. http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Xt0ucxOrPQEhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Xt0ucxOrPQE

14. Watson via Locke • Using Locke’s model of mental processes, we can view Watson’s behaviorism as abstracted stimulus-response sets. With control over the stimuli, we can decide the abstract response sets.

15. Little Albert • “Little Albert” is the public name of Watson’s most famous experiment – on a real baby! • He conditioned Albert to be afraid of white rats after seven pairings of the rats with loud noises. • Little Albert quickly generalized his fears to other white fuzzy things such as cotton. • Watson repeated the conditioning on a three-year old, then de-conditioned the child.

16. Watson’s Psychology:More Advanced Ideas • Language and thinking – language was learned through social stimulus-response bonds based on trial and error. Thoughts are internalized language. • Watson endorsed “Radical Environmentalism” and he completely rejected the existence of both instincts and inherited abilities. • Behavior therapy – his de-conditioning of a conditioned response became a model for behavioral therapy.

17. Watson Mishaps • In 1920, when he was 42, Watson had an affair with a student. • He was released from his university, and took on a new career in advertising. Using his behavioral background, he was very successful. • He never went back to research, but still wrote many more successful books in psychology.

18. Albert Einstein • Einstein is not considered important to psychology, but he is important to science. • His major ideas were (1905) matter is condensed energy [E=mc2, i.e., the energy content of a body is equal to the mass of the body times the speed of light squared).and (1915) everything in the universe is relative to the speed of light. • His theories helped other scientists conclude that the universe began as a point of unity (better known as the “big bang theory”).

19. Einstein’s Science • Einstein’s work led us to see a universe that started with a “big bang.” This added to Newton’s notion that the universe governed by laws of motion and Darwin’s natural theory of the origin of species. • Scientists were now able to describe atoms and the universe, seemed ready to explain everything. • Like Newton, Einstein widened the gap between religion and science. • Also, just as Newton did, Einstein privately said he saw God in his theories.

20. Science Changes(1905-1925) • Behaviorism was the result of efforts to make psychology as objective as the natural sciences. • But just as behaviorism was beginning to take hold, the natural sciences were becoming more theoretical and less empirical. • Atoms and atomic activity could be predicted with theoretical, non-observable “forces.” • The light from distant galaxies could reveal the history of the universe – by applying a theoretical interaction with gravity.

21. The Paradigm Changes • The natural sciences took on more and more theoretical (assumed) activity in their research. • Many researchers and philosophers started to ask what was actually observed and what was merely theory within the natural sciences. • In 1924, “logical positivism” was proposed by a group of philosophers to explain the increased reliance on theoretical speculation in the natural sciences.

22. Logical Positivism • First, logical positivism separates observations from theories in scientific inquiry. • Observational terms – empirically observed. • Theoretical terms – unobserved explanations. • After that, a theoretical term must be logically connected to the empirical observation in a manner that can be supported or rejected by other observations. (this is a precursor to empirical “falsifiability” of theories).

23. Neo-behaviorism: A Prelude • Some logical positivists urge psychologists to use logical positivism in empirical psychology. • At the same time, physicists start using “operational definitions” – the act of defining a concept with the method of measurement. • Neo-behaviorists expanded on stimulus-response research to include operational definitions of the unobservable psychological activity – by using the standard of logical positivism (later defined as “falsifiability”).