Chapter 3

Behaviorism

At any one time, a science is simply what its researches yield, and the
researches are nothing more than those problems for which effective
methods have been found and for which the times are ready. Each step
in scientific progress depends on the previous one, and the process iS
not much hurried by wishing. (Boring, 1950)

J ohn Dewey's functional psychology

established a practical applied discipline with a variety of interests. The
tolerance for a range of views prevented the development of a sterile
discipline. However, the movement lacked organization and focus; this
diffuseness proved its undoing.
Psychology, with aspirations of becoming a precise science like phys-
ics and chemistry, had yet to find a research method. Into that breach
came behaviorism, championed by its founder, John R. Watson. From
the 1920s until the 1950s, behaviorism was the dominant movement in
psychology, and with it, the study of learning.

EARLY BEHAVIORIST THEORIES

The research method that initiated behaviorism was reflex or classical

conditioning. Discovered by two Russian physiologists in independent
experiments and adapted by John Watson, classical conditioning seemed
to be the precise methodology sought by psychologists. The other ap-
proach implemented in the early 20th century was Edward Thorndike's
connection ism.

32
 Chapter 3 Behaviorism 33

A Rationale for Behaviorism

The inability of structuralism and functionalism to establish well-defined
research methods and a clearly defined subject matter established the
climate for change. In that context, John Watson launched the move-
ment to study behavior rather than mental processes or states.
In the 1913 article "Psychology as the Behaviorist Views It," Watson
made a case for the study of behavior. In some 50-odd years, said Watson,
psychology had failed to establish itself as a natural science. The focus on
consciousness and mental processes had led psychology into a dead end
where the topics are "threadbare from much handling" (Watson, 1913,
p. 174). Furthermore, when human consciousness is the reference point
for research. the behaviorist is forced to ignore all data that do not relate
to human mental processes. Other sciences, such as physics and chem-
istry, he noted, do not restrict their definitions of the subject matter to
the extent that information must be discarded.
The starting point for psychology, therefore, should be the fact that
all organisms adjust to the environment through responses (Watson,
1913). Since certain responses follow certain stimuli, psychologists
should be able to predict the response from the stimulus, and vice versa.
When this goal is achieved, according to Watson, psychology will then
become an objective, experimental science. In addition, the discipline
also would provide useful knowledge for the educator, physician, busi -
ness leader. and others.
After the appeal to study behavior, Watson discovered the motor-
reflex research of V. M. Bekheterev, a Russian physiologist. His work was
important because he had successfully manipulated simple behavioral
reactions in the laboratory. On reading the research, Watson was con-
vinced that behavioral control in the real world was within reach. His
prediction was wrong, but his views were a major force in the use of
precise methods of research and measurement by psychologists (Kra-
tochwill & Bijou, 1987).

Reflex or Classical Conditioning

The experiments conducted by Bekheterev "trained" reflexes such as
finger retraction to respond to a variety of sights and sounds associated
with an electric shock stimulus (Murphy, 1949). The best-known exper-
iments, however, were conducted by Ivan Pavlov, for which he received
the 1904 Nobel Prize.

Pavlov's Experiment
Pavlov, also a physiologist, was researching digestive processes in dogs. His
experiments involved the presentation of meat powder to dogs to measure
salivation. However, Pavlov noticed that after a time the experimental
animal began salivating before seeing or smelling the meat powder.
 ■

oPnoiglpower r'h raretrol:

34 Part 11 Foundations of Contemporary Psychology

The sound of the laboratory assistant's footsteps triggered (elicited)
salivation reaction.
Experimenting systematically with this situation, Pavlov soutnhdaetditunn
ing fork moments before presentation oldie meat powder. After sevemi such
P the tuning fork alone elicited the salivation reaction.
The research was important for two reasons. First, the
it is a spontaneous reaction ...._,ur.
response is a reflex. That is,
automatically at the sight or smell of food. To alter the "natural' rela:
,

tionship between a stimulus and a response was viewed as a major bre ak ..n
reactio

through in the study of behavior. To manipulate even a simple r .

held out the promise that the causes of complex behaviors also might b e
discovered. Second, the research demonstrated the potential o tf o

tory studies to discover new knowledge.

triggTerherepsproocnessessbbyetcwahmicehknnoe:,neavesnrtsefloexr
ostrimclualsisaiccaqluciroendthitie
the classical conditioning methodology, the naturally occurring stimul us
and the reflex response are unconditioned. That is, they occur
without training and are referred to as the unconditioned stim ul us
(UCS) and unconditioned response (UCR). The UCS is said to elicit the
UCR; for example, a foreign object in the eye elicits an eye blink.
After training, the new stimulus that elicits the reflex response is
referred to as the conditioned stimulus (CS). The reflex, formerly un -
conditioned. is known as a conditioned response (CR) after training
(Table 3.1).
The development of classical conditioning introduced a number
variables and new relationships that could be researched and pre
measured in the laboratory setting. Included are the amount or strength
of the response (referred to as amplitude), the length of time
between
the stimulus and the response (latency), and the tendency of similar
stimuli to elicit the reflex (stimulus generalization). For example, studies
indicated that a reflex conditioned to a sound pitch of 256 also is con-
ditioned to sound pitches of 255 and 257 (Murphy, 1949).
Two other relationships introduced in classical conditioning include
resistance to extinction and inhibition. Resistance to extinction is the
tendency of a response. to persist after the supporting conditions are
withdrawn. Inhibition refers to the reduction in a response caused by the
introduction of extraneous stimuli.

John Watson's Behaviorism

Watson's contribution to psychology is that he organized the findings of
current research into a new perspective and persuaded other psycholo -
gists of the importance of his views. Behaviorism, as Watson viewed it,
should apply the techniques of animal research (i.e., conditioning) to the
study of human beings. He therefore redefined mental concepts (which
he considered to be unnecessary) as behavioral responses. Thinking, for
example, was identified as subvocal speech, and feeling was defined as a
glandular reaction (Watson, 1925).
 TABLE 3.i
Examples of classical conditioning

Postexperimental (Conditioned)
Preexperimental ("Natural") Relationship Experimental Trials Relationship

UNCONDITIONED ASSOCIATED REFLEX CONDITIONED CONDITIONED

(.... (ELICITING) STIMULUS RESPONSE PAIRED REFLEX STIMULUS REFLEX
vt (UCS) (UCR) STIMULI RESPONSES (CS) (CR)

Meat powder Salivation Meat powder Salivation Tuning fork Salivation

Tuning fork
Air puff Eye blink Air puff Eye blink Bright light Eye blink
Bright light
Electric shock Finger retraction Electric shock Finger retraction Buzzer Finger retraction
Buzzer

I
 36 Part II Foundations of Contemporary Psychology

Watson also believed that the human personality developed thro ugh
the conditioning of various reflexes. He maintained that the hum an
infant at birth possesses only three emotional responses (Watson, 1928 ).
They are fear, rage, and love. The fear response, for example, begi ns
with the jumping or starting of the body and an interruption in breath..
ing. Then, depending on the infant's age, crying, falling, a n d crawling or i
running away follow. The fear response was observed i n the natural
i
environment after a loud noise or loss of support for the infant. Accord..
ing to Watson (1928), an adult's complex emotional life is the result of
the conditioning of the three basic responses to a variety of situations.
Conditioning Experiments with Infants. While at Johns Hopkins Uni -
versity', Watson and his graduate assistant, Rosalie Rayner, conducted a
controversial experiment with an 11-month-old child named Albert
(Watson & Rayner, 1920). This experiment, unethical by today's stan -
dards, conditioned Albert's fear reaction to several soft furry objects.
Albert was tested first to confirm that live animals and objects (such
as a human mask and cotton) did not elicit his fear response. Then, for
several trials a white rat was presented to Albert, and a laboratory assis -
tant behind Albert struck a steel bar with a hammer. On the first pairing
of the two stimuli, the infant jumped violently; on the second trial, he
began to cry. On the eighth trial, the white rat alone elicited crying and
crawling away (Watson & Rayner, 1920).
Five days later, the fear reaction also appeared in response to a white
rabbit. Nonfurry objects, such as the child's blocks, did not elicit the fear
response, but mild fear reactions occurred in response to a dog and a
sealskin fur coat. The child's emotional response had transferred to furry
animals and objects, and it persisted for longer than a month.
In recent years, questions have been raised about the experiment
because the classical conditioning model was not strictly followed. The
loud noise was not paired with the presentation of the rat; instead, the
noise occurred as Albert reached out his hand to touch the animal.
However, the experiment demonstrated that emotions could be studied
by controlled research methods, and it promoted research on condition ing
(Kratochwill & Bijou, 1987).
A related topic, the elimination or "unconditioning" of children's
fear reactions, was pioneered by Mary Cover Jones. She found that ef -
forts to talk the child out of the fear or relying on extinction to eliminate
the fear were ineffective (Jones, 1924). Instead, a planned program was
required. The two successful strategies were (a) the child's observation of
other children's acceptance of the feared object, and (b) the gradual
presentation of the feared object during a favorite activity, such as eating.
Watson's Predictions. Watson concluded from his experiment that be -
haviorism was the mechanism that could provide a foundation for living.
In his usual persuasive style, Watson (1925) made the followin claims
f o r c o n d i t i o n i n g : g
 Chapter 3 Beha% vorism 37

Give me a dozen healthy infants, well formed, and my own specified

world to bring them up in, and guarantee to take any one at random
and train him to become any type of specialist I might select—doctor, law-
ver, artist, merchant-chief—regardless of his talents, penchants, tenden-
cies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors. (p. 65)

Needless to say, behaviorism became immediately popular. The sim-

plicity of the method for conditioning responses and the novelty of the pro-
cedure led to a multitude of applications and experiments. In the 1920s,
almost every psychologist seemed to be a behaviorist, and none appeared to
agree with any other (Boring, 1950). The term behaviorism became attached
to several developments, including a particular research method, objective
data in general, a materialistic view of psychology, and others.
Watson also believed that behaviorism would place psychology in the
ranks of the "true" sciences, along with zoology, physiology, physical
chemistry, and others. These same views on the potential of behaviorism
Ivere to be reiterated in the 1950s by B. F. Skinner.
In fact, conditioned responses were not shown to add up to complex
voluntary behavior. However, it was believed that they would, very likely
because the resulting conception of psychology responded to the general
scientism of the times (Baars, 1986, p. 53).

Conditioned Emotional Reactions

Through paired association, positive and negative reactions may be con-
ditioned to a variety of objects and events. For example, a whiff of the
paste used to fasten labels to bottles brought back painful memories of a
miserable childhood for the well-known author Charles Dickens (Acker-
man, 1990). The bankruptcy of Dicken's father had driven hirn'to aban-
don the young Charles to a workhouse where such bottles were made.
Emotional reactions may, in certain situations, be conditioned in a
single pairing of stimuli. An example is the automobile driver who nar-
rowly misses a fatal accident with a large truck on a particular S-shaped
curve. He experiences a rapid pulse, sweating palms, and increased
blood pressure. A few days later, on approaching the same S-shaped
curve, he experiences the same physiological reaction.
However, "pure" examples of classical conditioning to aversive stim-
uli are difficult to find in the natural setting. Typically, individuals are
not "trapped" by emotion-producing stimuli. They may engage instead
in escape behaviors chat may, in some situations, produce satisfying out-
comes. For example, Albert's fear responses of crying and whining (con-
ditioned response) to the furry object (conditioned stimulus) was followed
by crawling away (escape behavior). In the natural setting, the baby's
mother would likely pick him up and comfort him, perhaps even rock him
a few minutes. Thus, a selected response, the escape behavior of crawling
away, is followed by receiving the mother's attention and comfort.
A positive example of classical conditioning is the nostalgic reaction
(response) to a song (conditioned stimulus) that was a hit during a
former love affair. The song has acquired the power to elicit some of the
 38 Part II Foundations of Contemporary Psychology

same feelings originally associated with the person in the former rela..
tionship. Such emotional reactions often occur without the awareness of
the individual; thus, their origin may be difficult to identify.
Television commercials and magazine advertisements also make use
of paired association in efforts to elicit positive emotional reactions to a
product. One advertisement, for example, shows a soft teddy bear hu g..
ging a blanket (conditioned stimulus) and sitting beside the product, a
plastic bottle of fabric softener (unconditioned stimulus).

Classical Conditioning in the Classroom

An essential step in developing the appreciation of literature, art, sci -
ence, and other subjects is that of associating students' early experiences
with positive reactions (Estes, 1989). However, the problem is that neg -
ative emotional reactions may become attached to the same situation s
and lead to the passive escape behaviors of apathy and "tuning out."
One strategy is to make use of already-established relationships that
elicit positive reactions. For example, sustained reading is an important
activity in learning to appreciate literature. Carpeting one corner of the
room and furnishing it with large sofa cushions to create an area for
sustained reading may, over time, elicit positive reactions to the free-time
reading included in the daily schedule.
Such strategies are particularly important in situations in which a
particular setting or activity is expected to elicit a negative reaction. For
example, the anxiety of children on the first day of school may become
associated with certain subjects, particularly if a difficult activity is intro-
duced the first day. Positive strategies observed in some elementary school
classes included greeting the children warmly as they arrived and starting
the day with drawing or coloring activities (Emmer, Evertson, & Ander -
son, 1980). In addition, no difficult activities were introduced the first
week while the children were becoming accustomed to classroom rou-
tines. The potential for anxiety is reduced by repeatedly pairing the un -
familiar setting with warm greetings and enjoyable activities (Figure 3.1).

Edward Thorndike's Connectionism

Like Pavlov's classical conditioning, Thorndike's research also required a
behavioral reaction from the subjects in the experiments. However, a
major difference is that the behavior researched by Thorndike was not
that of reflexes; it was voluntary behavior. Animals were confined in
cages or food was placed in a latched box. The task for the hungry
animal was to open the box or cage and get to the food. Thorndike
referred to his experiments as instrumental conditioning to reflect this
difference. The theory also is known as connectionism because connec-
tions were established between particular stimuli and voluntary behaviors.
The research was designed to determine whether animals "solved" a
problem through reasoning or by a more basic process. Research was
 Chapter 3 Behaviorism 39

Established Relationships New Association

(a)
New, unfamiliar __________Anxiety First day Anxiety
situations reaction of school reaction

1
Difficult
mathematics
exercise

(b)
Activities such Feelings of Coloring or Feelings of
as coloring or pleasantness pleasantness
drawing activities
drawing and relaxation and relaxation
and procedures
for easing the
children into the
new situation

First day
of school

FIGURE 3.1
Applying classical conditioning in the classroom.

needed, according to Thorndike, because objective data were lacking.

"Dogs get lost hundreds of times and no one ever notices it or sends an
account of it to a scientific magazine. But let one find his way from
Brooklyn to Yonkers and the fact immediately becomes a circulating
anecdote" (Thorndike, 1911, p. 24).

Experimental Procedure
Thorndike experimented with baby chicks, dogs, fish, cats, and monkeys.
Hots ever, while he was a student at Harvard, his landlady forbid him to
continue hatching chicks in his room. William James offered the base-
ment of his home for Thorndike's research, to the dismay of Mrs. James
and the excitement of the children.
The typical experimental procedure required each animal to escape
from a confined space in order to reach food. A puzzle box was used that
required the tripping of a latch or some other mechanism in order to
effect escape (Figure 3.2).
When confined, the animal often engaged in a variety of behaviors,
including scratching, biting, clawing, and rubbing against the sides of the
box. Sooner or later the animal tripped the latch and escaped to the food.
Repeated confinements were characterized by a decrease in the behav-
iors unrelated to escape and, of course, a shorter escape time. The most
dramatic change was observed with monkeys. In one experiment, a box
containing a banana was placed inside the cage. The monkey took 36
minutes to pull out the nail that held the wire fastener closed. On the
 40 Part II Foundations of Contemporary Psychology

FIGURE 3.2
Puzzle cage used in some of Thorndike's experiments.

second trial, the monkey successfully released the fastener in only 2

minutes 20 seconds (Thorndike, 1911).
The experim ental data from a series of trials were recorded as a
learning curve illustrating the faster escape times. Thorndike concluded
from this data that the escape response gradually , became associated with
the stimulus situation in trial-and-error learning. For this reason, his
theory is referred to as an association theory.

The Laws of Learning

During the series of trials in the experiment, the correct response was
gradually "stamped in" or strengthened. Incorrect responses were weak -
ened or "stamped out." In other words, problem solving involves estab -
lishing associations or connections between the stimulus (the problem)
and appropriate responses.
Thorndike originally identified three major laws of learning to ex -
plain this process. They are the law of effect, the law of exercise, and the
law of readiness. The law of effect states that a satisfying state of affairs
following the response strengthens the connection between the stimulus
and the behavior, whereas an annoying state weakens the connection.
Thorndike later revised the law so that punishment was not equal to
reward in its influence on learning.
The law of exercise describes the conditions implied in the adage
"Practice makes perfect." Repetition of the experience, in other words,
increases the probability of a correct response. However, repetition of a
 Chapter 3 Behaviorism 41

k, such as drawing lines blindfolded, does not enhance learning in the absence of a
tas
satisfying state of affairs (Thorndike, 1913b, p. 20).
The law of readiness describes the conditions that govern the states referred to as
"satisfying" or "annoying" (Thorndike, 1913a). Briefly summarized, the execution of an
action in response to a strong impulse is satisfying,
whereas the blocking of that action or forcing it under other conditions
isannoying.

Applications to School Learning

In the laboratory, Thorndike researched the relationship between physical stimuli and
physical actions, and his interpretations of learning were based on these behavioral studies.
However, his theory also includes references to mental events. It thus occupied a middle
ground between the concerns of functionalism and the "pure" behaviorism of other
researchers.
Thorndike described human mental life as composed of both mental states and
movements with connections between each type (Thorndike, 9p. 12). In his view,
connections between ideas accounted for the l0,major
portion of "knowledge" in its popular sense (Thorndike, 1913b, p. 19). The
process of learning, in other words, is simply that of connecting: "The mind is man's
connection system" (Thorndike, 1913b, p 122). 9 122x5
,

). Examples include numerical problems and their answers, such

a
= 45; events and dates, such as Columbus and 1492; and persons and
characteristics, such as John and blue eyes.
Of particular interest to the educator is Thorndike's description of his five minor
laws in relation to school learning. As the first efforts to account for the complexity of
human learning, these laws were believed to interact with the laws of effect and exercise.
These subsidiary laws and their applications are summarized in Table 3.2.
Of major importance to education, is Thorndike's research on transfer of learning. A
series of studies conducted by Thorndike and Woodworth (1901) found that tra ining in
particular tasks facilitated the later learning only of similar tasks, not dissimilar ones.
In summary, the two dominant approaches to the study of behavior in the first half of
the 20th century were classical conditioning and Thorndike's connectionism. Watson
attempted to make applications of classical conditioning to the emotional life of human
beings. Thorndike applied his theory to the analysis of school subjects and the design of
curriculum.

THE RETREAT TO THE LABORATORY (1930-1950)

Edward Thorndike cautioned his fellow psychologists that the proper laboratory for
research was the classroom and the appropriate experimental subject was the student
(Shulman, 1970). For the most part, however, the theorists from 1930 to 1950
ignored Thorndike's advice.