The Psychology Book (19 page)

58 INTRODUCTION

Charles Darwin

John B. Watson

publishes
The Expression

publishes
Psychology As

Zing-Yang Kuo’s

of the Emotions in Men

The Behaviorist Views It
,

Ivan Pavlov

experiments with cats

and Animals
arguing

which becomes the

demonstrates
classical

and rats attempt to show

that behaviors are

unofficial
behaviorist

conditioning
in his

that
there is no such

evolutionary adaptations.

manifesto
.

experiments on dogs.

thing as instinct
.

1872

1913

1927

1930

1898

1920

1929

1930

Edward Thorndike’s

John B. Watson

Karl Lashley’s

B.F. Skinner

Law of Effect
states

experiments on “Little

experiments in brain

demonstrates the

that responses which

Albert,” teaching the

dissection show that
the

effects of
“operant

produce satisfying

baby a
conditioned

whole brain is involved

conditioning”
in

effects are more likely

emotional response
.

in learning
.

experiments on rats.

to be repeated.

B
y the 1890s, psychology the mind—behavior—under strictly physical processes, and it was a was accepted as a scientific

controlled laboratory conditions.

Russian physiologist, Ivan Pavlov,

subject separate from its

As John B. Watson put it,

who unwittingly provided a basis

philosophical origins. Laboratories

psychology is “that division of

for the emergent behaviorist

and university departments had

Natural Science which takes

psychology. In his now famous

been established in Europe and

human behavior—the doings

study of salivation in dogs, Pavlov

the US, and a second generation of

and sayings, both learned and

described how an animal responds

psychologists was emerging.

unlearned—as its subject matter.”

to a stimulus in the process of

In the US, psychologists anxious

Early “behaviorists,” including

conditioning, and gave psychologists

to put the new discipline on an

Edward Thorndike, Edward

the foundation on which to build

objective, scientific footing reacted

Tolman, and Edwin Guthrie,

the central idea of behaviorism. The

against the introspective,

designed experiments to observe

notion of conditioning, often

philosophical approach taken

the behavior of animals in carefully

referred to as “stimulus–response”

by William James and others.

devised situations, and from these

(S–R) psychology, shaped the form

Introspection, they felt, was by

tests inferred theories about how

behaviorism was to take.

definition subjective, and theories

humans interact with their

The behaviorist approach

based on it could be neither proved

environment, as well as about

concentrated on observing

nor disproved; if psychology was

learning, memory, and conditioning.

responses to external stimuli,

to be treated as a science, it would

ignoring inner mental states and

have to be based on observable

Conditioning responses

processes, which were thought

and measurable phenomena.

Behaviorist experiments were

to be impossible to examine

Their solution was to study the

influenced by similar experiments

scientifically and therefore could

manifestation of the workings of

devised by physiologists studying

not be included in any analysis of

BEHAVIORISM 59

Karl Lorenz discovers