http://psychology.about.com/od/behavioralpsychology/f/behaviorism.htm
What Is Behaviorism?
Behaviorism refers to the school of psychology founded by John B. Watson based on the belief that behaviors can be measured, trained, and changed. Behaviorism was established with the publication of Watson's classic paper "Psychology as the Behaviorist Views It" (1913).
Behaviorism can perhaps be best summed up by the following quote from the famous psychologist John B. Watson. Watson is often considered the "father" of behaviorism:
"Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, 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."
--John Watson, Behaviorism, 1930
What exactly did Watson mean?
Simply put, strict behaviorists believed that all behaviors were the result of conditioning. Any person, regardless of his or her background, could be trained to act in a particular manner given the right conditioning.
From about 1920 through the mid-1950s, behaviors grew to become the dominant force in psychology. Why did behaviorism become such a powerful force in psychology for so much of the early twentieth-century?
"Behaviorism was the soil nourishing early American social science," explained author John A. Mills in his 1998 book Control: A History of Behavioral Psychology. "It is also clear that the research practices and theorizing of American behaviorists until the mid-1950s were driven by the intellectual imperative to create theories that could be used to make socially useful predictions," he also suggested.
The Basics of Behaviorism
So what exactly is behaviorism? What do behavioral theories entail? Behaviorism, also known as behavioral psychology, is a theory of learning based upon the idea that all behaviors are acquired through conditioning. Conditioning occurs through interaction with the environment.
Behaviorists believe that our responses to environmental stimuli shape our actions.
According to this school of thought, behavior can be studied in a systematic and observable manner with no consideration of internal mental states. It suggests that only observable behaviors should be considered since internal states such as cognitions, emotions, and moods are too subjective.
As Watson's above quote suggests, strict behaviorists believe that any person could potentially be trained to perform any task, regardless of things like genetic background, personality traits, and internal thoughts (within the limits of their physical capabilities). All it takes is the right conditioning.
Types of Behavioral Conditioning
There are two major types of conditioning:
- Classical conditioning is a technique used in behavioral training in which a naturally occurring stimulus is paired with a response. Next, a previously neutral stimulus is paired with the naturally occurring stimulus. Eventually, the previously neutral stimulus comes to evoke the response without the presence of the naturally occurring stimulus. The two elements are then known as the conditioned stimulus and the conditioned response.
- Operant conditioning (sometimes referred to as instrumental conditioning) is a method of learning that occurs through reinforcements and punishments for behavior. Through operant conditioning, an association is made between a behavior and a consequence for that behavior. When a desirable result follows an action, the behavior becomes more likely to occur again in the future. Responses followed by adverse outcomes, on the other hand, become less likely to happen again in the future.
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