加载中…儿童发展心理学之约翰华生的行为主义理论
(2017-01-05 23:12:02) | 分类： 教育笔记学习 |
John Watson （USA）
行为主义理论
心理学性质和对象
华生反对传统意识心理学把意识作为心理学的研究对象，把内省法作为心理学的研究方法，而主张心理学用自然科学的客观方法研究行为，并在此基础上构建了他的行为主义心理理论体系。他认为行为主义的理论目标是对行为的预测和控制。为了实现这一目的，他贯彻经验实证原则，继承机能主义的传统，认为心理学是纯粹自然科学的一个客观实验分支。由此，华生认为凡是不可经验的对象都不能作为心理学的对象，主张放弃内省法，放弃所有与意识有关的范畴，如感觉、情绪、思维等等。
华生认为，行为是有机体适应环境的全部活动。为了便于对行为进行客观的实验研究，他把行为和引起行为的环境影响分析为两个简单的要素，即刺激（S）和反应（R）。刺激是指引起有机体行为的外部或内部的变化；而反应则是构成行为最基本成分的肌肉收缩和腺体分泌。这样，全部行为，包括身体活动，也包括通常所说的心理活动，都不外乎是一些物理变化引起的另一些物理变化而已。
华生承认“反应”一次是借用自生理学，但是在心理学中的反应更复杂，简单的肌肉骨髓动作相互联结而成为行为的方式。华生把反应分为四类：（一）外显的习惯反应，如开门锁、打网球、拉小提琴、与人交往等；（二）内隐的习惯反应，包括条件反射所引起的腺体分泌、无声言语（即思维）、身体的定向或态度；（三）外显的遗传反应，包括人的各种可以观察的本能和情绪反应，如抓握、打喷嚏、眨眼等；（四）内隐的遗传反应，包括生理觉察所研究的内分泌系统和循环系统的各种变化。
华生进而强调，反应是有特定的刺激引起的。这些刺激可以是简单的，比如投在视网膜上的光波，可以是是复杂的，比如社会生活中的一组复杂的刺激。华生认为，心理学研究的目的就在于确定刺激和反应之间的规律，以便人们在已知刺激后，能预测将会发生怎样的反应，或者已知反应后，能够指出有效刺激的性质，从而建立起了著名的S-R公式。
In 1913, Watson published the article
"Psychology as the Behaviorist Views It"sometimes called "The
Behaviorist Manifesto". In this article, Watson outlined the major
features of his new philosophy of psychology, called "behaviorism".
The first paragraph of the article concisely described Watson's
behaviorist position: "Psychology as the behaviorist views it is a
purely objective experimental branch of natural science. Its
theoretical goal is the prediction and control of behavior.
Introspection forms no essential part of its methods, nor is the
scientific value of its data dependent upon the readiness with
which they lend themselves to interpretation in terms of
consciousness. The behaviorist, in his efforts to get a unitary
scheme of animal response, recognizes no dividing line between man
and brute. The behavior of man, with all of its refinement and
complexity, forms only a part of the behaviorist's total scheme of
investigation."
In 1913, Watson viewed Ivan Pavlov's
conditioned reflex as primarily a physiological mechanism
controlling glandular secretions. He had already rejected Edward L.
Thorndike's "Law of Effect" (a precursor to B. F.. Skinner's
principle of reinforcement) due to what Watson believed were
unnecessary subjective elements. It was not until 1916 that Watson
would recognize the more general significance of Pavlov's
formulation and make it the subject of his presidential address to
the American Psychological Association. The article is also notable
for its strong defense of the objective scientific status of
applied psychology, which at the time was considered to be much
inferior to the established structuralist experimental
psychology.
With his "behaviorism", Watson put the
emphasis on external behavior of people and their reactions on
given situations, rather than the internal, mental state of those
people. In his opinion, the analysis of behaviors and reactions was
the only objective method to get insight in the human actions. This
outlook, combined with the complementary ideas of determinism,
evolutionary continuism, and empiricism has contributed to what is
now called radical behaviorism. It was this new outlook that Watson
claimed would lead psychology into a new era. He claimed that
before Wundt there was no psychology, and that after Wundt there
was only confusion and anarchy. It was Watson's new behaviorism
that would pave the way for further advancements in
psychology.
Watson's behaviorism rejected the studying of
consciousness. He was convinced that it could not be studied, and
that past attempts to do so have only been hindering the
advancement of psychological theories. He felt that introspection
was faulty at best and awarded researchers nothing but more issues.
He pushed for psychology to no longer be considered the science of
the "mind". Instead, he stated that psychology should focus on the
"behavior" of the individual, not their consciousness.
Meanwhile, Watson served as the President of
the Southern Society for Philosophy and Psychology in
1915.
Language, speech, and memory
Watson said that any existence of a mental
life is false. Thus, he argued that mental activity could be
observed. In his book, Behaviorism, Watson proved this by
discussing his thoughts on what language really is, which leads to
a discussion of what words really are, and finally to an
explanation of what memory is. They are all manual devices used by
humans that result in thinking. By using anecdotes that illustrate
the behaviors and activities of mammals, Watson outlines his
behaviorist views on these topics.
Watson called language a "manipulative
habit." He called it this because when we speak language, the sound
originates in our larynx, which is a body instrument that we
manipulate every time we talk in order to hear our "voice." As we
change our throat shape and tongue position, different sounds are
made. Watson says when a baby first cries, or first says "da" or
"ma," that it is learning language. Watson also uses an experiment
that he and his wife conducted, where they conditioned a baby to
say "da-da" when he wanted his bottle. Although the baby was
conditioned and was a success for a short while, the conditioning
was eventually lost. Watson does say, however, that as the child
got older, he would imitate Watson as a result of Watson imitating
him. By three years old, the child needed no help developing his
vocabulary because he was learning from others. Thus, language is
imitative.
Watson goes on to claim that, "words are but
substitutes for objects and situations". In his earlier baby
experiment, the baby learned to say "da" when he wanted a bottle,
or "mama" when he wanted his mom, or "shoe-da" when he pointed to
his father’s shoe. Watson then argues that "we watch our chances
and build upon these", meaning human babies have to form their
language by applying sounds they have already formed. This, Watson
says, is why babies point to an object but call it a different
word. Lastly, Watson explains how a child learns to read words: a
mom points at each word and reads in a patterned manner, and
eventually, because the child recognizes the word with the sound,
he or she learns to read it back.
This, according to Watson, is the start of
memory. All of the ideas previously mentioned are what Watson says
make up our memory, and that we carry the memory we develop
throughout our lives. Watson tells the tale of Mr. Addison Sims and
his friend in order to illustrate these ideas. A friend of Mr.
Sims' sees Mr. Sims on a street sidewalk and exclaims: "Upon my
life! Addison Sims of Seattle! I haven’t seen you since the World’s
Fair in Chicago. Do you remember the gay parties we used to have in
the old Windermere Hotel?...".[19] Even after all of this, Mr. Sims
cannot remember the man's name, although they were old friends who
used to encounter many of the same people, places, and experiences
together. Watson argued that if the two men were to do some of
their old shared activities and go to some of the old same places
(the stimuli), then the response (or memory) would
occur.
Study of emotions
Watson was interested in the conditioning of
emotions. Of course behaviorism putting an emphasis on people's
external behaviors, emotions were considered as mere physical
responses. Watson thought that, at birth, there are three unlearned
emotional reactions: Fear, rage and love.
Fear: According to Watson, there are only two
stimuli evoking fear that are unconditioned: A sudden noise and the
loss of support (physical support). But because older children are
afraid of many things (Different animals, strange people etc...) it
must be that those fear provoking stimuli are learned. Watson
stated that fear can be observed by the following reaction with
infants: Crying, breathing rapidly, closing their eyes or jumping
suddenly.
Rage: Rage is an innate response to the body
movement of the child being constrained. If a very young child is
held in a way that she cannot move at all then she will begin to
scream and stiffen her body. Later this reaction is applied to
different situations. Children get angry when they are forced to
take a bath or clean their room. These situations provoke rage
because they are associated with physical restraint.
Love: Watson said that love was an automatic
response from infants when they were stroked lightly, tickled or
patted. The infant then responds with smiles and laughs and other
affectionate responses. According to Watson, infants do not love
specific people but they are conditioned to do so. Because the
mother's face is progressively associated with the patting and
stroking it becomes the conditioned stimulus eliciting the
affection towards her. Affectionate feelings for other people later
generate the same response because they are somehow associated with
the mother.
"Twelve infants" quotation
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. I am going beyond my facts and I admit it, but so have
the advocates of the contrary and they have been doing it for many
thousands of years. [p. 82]
The quotation often appears without context
and with the last sentence omitted, making Watson's position appear
more radical than it actually was. In Watson's book Behaviorism,
the sentence is provided in the context of an extended argument
against eugenics. That Watson did not hold a radical
environmentalist position may be seen in his earlier writing in
which his "starting point" for a science of behavior was "...the
observable fact that organisms, man and animal alike, do adjust
themselves to their environment by means of hereditary and habit
equipments." Nevertheless, Watson recognized the
importance of nurture in the nature versus nurture discussion which
was often neglected by his eugenic contemporaries.
Psychological Care of Infant and Child and
criticism of it
The 20th century marked the formation of
qualitative distinctions between children and adults. Watson wrote
the book Psychological Care of Infant and Child in 1928, with help
from his mistress, turned wife, Rosalie Rayner. Critics then
determined that the ideas mainly stemmed from Watson’s beliefs
because Rosalie later entitled a self-penned article I am a Mother
of Behaviorist Sons. In the book, Watson explained that
behaviorists were starting to believe psychological care and
analysis was required for infants and children. All of Watson’s
exclamations were due to his belief that children should be treated
as a young adult. In his book, he warns against the inevitable
dangers of a mother providing too much love and affection. Watson
explains that love, along with everything else as the behaviorist
saw the world, is conditioned. Watson supports his warnings by
mentioning invalidism, saying that society does not overly comfort
children as they become young adults in the real world, so parents
should not set up these unrealistic expectations. Writer Suzanne
Houk, Psychological Care of Infant and Child: A Reflection of its
Author and his Times, critiques Watson’s views, analyzing his hope
for a businesslike and casual relationship between a mother and her
child. Watson disapproved of thumb sucking, masturbation,
homosexuality, and encouraged parents to be honest with their
children about sex. Watson's reasoning for this was that, "all of
the weaknesses, reserves, fears, cautions, and inferiorities of our
parents are stamped into us with sledge hammer blows". Watson
inferred that emotional disabilities were a result of personal
treatment, not inherited.
He deemed his slogan to be not more babies
but better brought up babies. Watson argued for the nurture side of
the nature-nurture debate, claiming that the world would benefit
from extinguishing pregnancies for twenty years while enough data
was gathered to ensure an efficient child-rearing process. Further
emphasizing nurture, Watson said that nothing is instinctual;
rather everything is built into a child through the interaction
with their environment. Parents therefore hold complete
responsibility since they choose what environment to allow their
child to develop in. Laura E. Berk, author of Infants and Children:
Prenatal Through Middle Childhood, examined the roots of the
beliefs Watson came to honor. Berk says that the experiment with
Little Albert inspired Watson’s emphasis on environmental factors.
Little Albert did not fear the rat and white rabbit until he was
conditioned to do so. From this experiment, Watson concluded that
parents can shape a child’s behavior and development simply by a
scheming control of all stimulus-response
associations.
Although he wrote extensively on
child-rearing in many popular magazines and in a book,
Psychological Care of Infant and Child (1928), Watson later
regretted having written in the area, saying that "he did not know
enough" to do a good job. Watson's advice to treat children with
respect, but with relative emotional detachment, has been strongly
criticized. J.M. O’Donnell wrote The Origins of Behaviorism, where
he deemed Watson’s views as radical calculations. O’Donnell’s
discontent stemmed partly from Watsons’ description of a happy
child, including that the child only cry when in physical pain, can
occupy himself through his problem-solving abilities, and that the
child stray from asking questions. Behavior analysis of child
development as a field is largely thought to have begun with the
writings of Watson.
Other critics were more wary of Watson’s new
interest and success in child psychology. R. Dale Nance worried
that Watson’s personal indiscretions and difficult upbringings
could have affected his views in his book. He was raised on a poor
farm in South Carolina and had various family troubles, including
abandonment by his father.Suzanne Houk shared similar concerns. She
mentions in her article that Watson only shifted his focus to
child-rearing when he was fired from Johns Hopkins University due
to his affair with Rosalie Rayner.
Watson researched many topics in his career,
but child-rearing became his most prized interest. His book was
extremely popular and many critics were surprised to see his
contemporaries come to accept his views. The book sold 100,000
copies after just a few months of release.
Watson’s emphasis on child development was
becoming a new phenomenon and influenced some of his successors,
but there were psychologists before him that delved into the field
as well. G. Stanley Hall became very well known for his 1904 book
Adolescence. G. Stanley Hall’s beliefs differed from behaviorist
Watson, believing that heredity and genetically predetermined
factors shaped most of one’s behavior, especially during childhood.
His most famous concept, Storm and Stress Theory, normalized
adolescents’ tendency to act out with conflicting mood swings.
Whether Watson’s views were controversially radical or not, they
garnered a lot of attention and were accepted as valuable in his
time.
How much
Rosalie Rayner agreed with her husband's child rearing ideas is an
interesting question which is the subject of an article that
discusses an essay that she wrote about the future of the
family.
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