Behavioral Psychology (1860-Present)

Immanuel Kant was a philosopher that argued psychology based science was mental and could not be an actual science due to the presumed subject matter.

Darwin was known for his work on the evolution and the origin of species by way of natural selection. At this time, structuralism did not include the evolutionary perspective of Darwin’s. Structuralism did not incorporate data from non humans or adopt a developmental approach for dealing with an individual organism.

von Helmholtz was a German physician and physicist. He paved the way with experimental studies on the relationship between psychics and psychology to develop psychophysical laws.

Wundt was a German philosopher, physician, physiologist, and finally psychologist and called the founder of experimental psychology by virtue of establishing the first psychological laboratory at the university in Leipzig, Germany in 1879. He incorporated reaction time experiments as well as introspection. He referred to his branch of psychology as an experimental “physiological psychology”.

Romanes was a devoted disciple of Darwin given to anthropomorphism and the “anecdotal method”. He was also a notable figure in the animal psychology movement.

Ivan Pavlov was a Russian physiologist known for his work with classical conditioning. Pavlov’s work with the organism as a whole influenced others, such as B.F. Skinner to look at lawful relations and at the relationship between the environment and its behavior.

German-born biologist who focused on tropism (the movement of the whole body of an organism to fields of physical force in the environment). From his perspective, reflexology suggested physical and chemical processes discovered in the study of reflexes could be systematically applied to explain behavior in its entirety, without appeal to consciousness and other mental processes.

A student of Loeb, he was closely related to the first phase of the behavioral movement. He is credited as the first to use terms such as behaviorism and behaviorist.

B.F. Skinner began his career when classical behaviorism was coming to a close and neobehaviorism was arising. He was responsible for the conceptual framework of the science of behavior and addressed concerns with variability and the S- R model. His work in radical behaviorism focuses on the scientific analysis of behavior, the assessment of behavior and subject matter, verbal behavior and knowledge, and the nature of intellectual activity underlying the science its application. The era for radical behaviorism is not yet over.

Journal of Experimental Analysis of Behavior (1958) was created to publish relevant experiments to behavior with individual organisms but also included review literature and theoretical papers.
The Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis (1968) reported on applications of socially significant behavioral principles.
Association of Behavior Analysis- International (1974) was formed by basic and applied researchers and service providers. Conventions are held statewide, nationally, and internationally present day.