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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 B. Watson (1919)

• What claim is Watson making about human nature?
• Which approach to psychology do you think Watson
  represents?

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Todays session
You will learn how to... You will learn about...
Describe the assumptions of psychological approaches Describe and apply psychological approaches theories Behaviourism Classical conditioning The work of Ivan Pavlov and John Watson
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Behaviourist assumptions

• People are products of their environment. All
  complex behaviours have been learned.
• Learning and consequently behaviour is under
  the control of the environment.
• Doing psychology means understanding what people
  have learned and how.
• Only observable behaviour should be studied,
  speculation about mental processes should be
  eliminated

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Behaviourism SR Units (reflexes)
S
R
Stimulus is detected by an organism
Organism emits a response
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What are the responses?
S
R
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Classical conditioning

• A theory about how humans (and other animals)
  learn.
• A process for creating new SR units from existing
  ones

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Pavlovs (1901) Study
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Classical Conditioning
Food
Salivation
Salivation
Food
Bell

A new SR unit
Bell
Salivation
S
R
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Classical Conditioning
An existing SR unit
UCS
NS
A new SR unit
CS
S
R
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Little Albert
UCR
UCS
UCR
UCS
NS

CS
CR
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Classical conditioning

• Stimulus generalisation
• Stimulus discrimination
• Extinction