John Locke's Influence on Psychology

Introduction

From time immemorial, individuals have made significant contributions to humanity through ideas that make the world a better place to live in. Most of these ideas were related to various fields thus broadening people’s understanding of the world and contributing to the vast wisdom and knowledge that currently exists in the society. Over the years, many philosophers have contributed to the development of the field of psychology by presenting various theories and ideas that continue to be useful today. This essay seeks to explore the contribution of John Locke to the development of psychology as a discipline concerning his various influenced to the filed through philosophy and experimental science. Furthermore, the essay will explore the nature of modern psychology by evaluating the contribution of behaviorism to the development of psychology as a discipline.

John Locke’s contribution to psychology

Locke developed various philosophical ideas that still have a significant influence on modern-day psychology. However, due to their diversity, richness and vastness, only a few of those ideas will be explored in this essay. In totality, most of his early day’s ideas were summarized in his “Essay Concerning Human Understanding” manuscript, which was highly prestigious and an influential source of knowledge. His three main ideas concerning man’s behavior included the ‘blank slate’, empiricism and nature versus nurture were considered key historical backgrounds of modern psychology (Williams, 2005).

Interestingly, according to Henley & Hergenhahn (2013), Locke spent at 17 years writing the book and even after its publication, he continued to make several amendments on it. The books covered various topics on psychology within four main parts and majorly demonstrated hist efforts to understand humans and the environment they lived in; as well as the origin of knowledge. Briefly, Locke was born in England, just a decade before the civil war (Griffith, 1997). It was later speculated that living in the civil war environment influenced his and his friend’s interest in politics (Henley & Hergenhahn 2013). His political interest formed the basis of many of his theoretical contributions and ideas on other fields such as education, government, and education (Bell, Henry, & Wray, 2004). He challenged the ideas of other people and was constantly at odds with numerous philosophers who came before him including Rene Descartes. Being an empiricist, Locke did not believe in any form of innate behavior. In his first book An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Locke explores various perspectives on understanding humans. In doing so, he criticized nativism and argued that people had to experience a phenomenon to develop knowledge or understand it. During Locke’s time in the 17th Century, many people believed in the church and were influenced by Aristotle’s ideas. For instance, there was a common belief that ideas that people had in their minds existed from the time they are were born – also known as innate ideas (Robinson, 1995). However, Locke opposed the notion of innate ideas and argued that if this were true, then all the mental content and information that a person had or would eventually come to understand would be the same, having an equal effect on everyone and thus applicable to everybody (Piccirillo, 2010). Instead, Locke argues that information is gained through an experience whose nature he would explain in his next piece of work. But Locke’s opposition of innate ideas has been criticized, some claiming that he somehow contradicts himself. For example, he claims that ideas come from experience i.e. the mind is furnished with sensible ideas by external objects. But he also claims that it is the mind that furnishes understanding (Griffith, 1997). Furthermore, Locke argues that children may have pre-existing ideas and experiences of hunger, diseases and wants but these experiences differ from innate principles. Hence, it is controversial to think that those ideas are not knowledge and that people may be born with ideas and not knowledge (Robinson, 1995). Nonetheless, Locke’s first book explained his ideas against nativism and his thoughts on how people’s ideas were shaped by their own experiences (i.e. empiricism). In his second book, he builds on the first book to explain the kinds of experiences and ideas he had earlier pointed out.

In his second book, Locke explains that all the ideas that people have are based on two main concepts namely reflection and sensation (Leary, 1994). In this regard, Locke explained that people come up with ideas when their different sensory organs are stimulated and depending on how they perceive objects in the external environment (Leahey, 1987). These senses may include what they might hear, see, touch or smell. Thus, according to Locke’s proposition, the concept of sensation is explained by the human experiences and how humans make sense of the physical environment they live in (Marshall,1994). On the other hand, according to Locke, reflection refers to what goes on in one’s mind or within their mental components. Because people perceive the world in different ways, reflection helps human understand how the physical world and their mental world interact and relate to each other (Locke,1794). According to Locke, it is only when these two come together that a person can understand what is going on in the world around them; and further make informed decisions (Locke, 1824). In his third book, Locke also mentions an important concept termed as ‘the association of ideas’. According to Locke (1824), Locke intended to explain the mechanism of how one can think of an idea and later link it to another idea. In this regard, Locke argues that the ideas do not even have to a common variable or factor in them and that there could be a possibility that they were linked together in one’s mind before, thus associating the two ideas together.

Through making sense of ideas, experience and their senses, humans try to interpret and have a clearer understanding of the world around them. This notion has formed the basis of many psychological theories that are used to help people. Whether it is behavioral psychology, industrial psychology or health psychology, psychology relies on people’s experiences, how they make sense of ideas and their senses to help people find solutions and prevent problematic human behavior. Through understanding the history, background, philosophical and theoretical ideas proposed by Locke in the 17th Century, Locke made a significant contribution to the field of modern psychology and will always be honored by prominent philosophers of his time who used relied on hist theories to better the lives of humanity.

Contribution of behaviorism to modern psychology

For the past several years, scientists have used behaviorism as a theory of learning, which states that people learn behaviors based on their interaction with the environment in a process known as conditioning (Roberts & Potrac, 2014). Therefore, believers in the behaviorist theory argue that people’s behavior is simply a response to a stimulus. Behaviourists began presenting their arguments in 1913 by John Watson’s ‘psychology as the behaviourists view it’ article whose main objective was to set out specific assumptions regarding behavioral analysis and methodologies.

The Learning Theory

The first basic assumption was that humans learn all their behaviors from the environment. Based on this assumption, behaviorists believe that a person’s environment plays an important role in influencing one’s behavior to an extent that inherited or innate factors do not have an influence at all (Mackenzie, 1972). This implies that individuals learn through operant or classical conditioning (i.e. the learning theory) and that humans are born with a ‘blank slate’ mind (Keehn, 1964). The learning theory has made a significant contribution to the practice of psychology. For instance, psychologists use the learning theory to understand how people learn by imitating others (i.e. social learning). Bandura (1971) argued that social learning occurs in four staged namely attention -where the learner understands and recognizes the significant elements of the model’s behavior, retention – where the learner memorized the learned behavior, motoric production – where the learner repeats what they have learned and reinforcement – where motivation is used to increase the likeliness that the learned behavior is repeated (Baum, 1985). The modern psychologist also applies the social learning theory in developing a behavioral intervention known as ‘social modelling’ used in treating mental disorders and addressing criminal behaviors (Hunter, 1977).

Psychology as a Science

Behaviorism has also contributed to the view of psychology as a science. Based on one of Watson’s (1913) assumptions, behaviorists viewed psychology as “a purely objective experimental branch of natural science” (p.158) whose primary goals is to predict and control the relationship between various variables in human’s life. Consequently, based on this behaviorist assumption, psychologists endeavour to keep the components of psychological theories as simple as possible through the operational definition of variables i.e. defining variables in measurable and observable events (Schwartz, 1977).

Comparative Psychology

One of the most significant assumptions of behaviorists is that both humans and animals both have the same process of learning (Smith, Couchman, & Beran, 2014). According to believers in the behaviorism theory, there is no fundamental difference between animal and human behavior and therefore psychological research can be carried out on humans as well as animals (Wynne & McLean, 1999). It is based on this assumption that comparative psychology emerged, paving way for the use of rats and pigeons as primary sources of data as behaviorists can control most of their environments. It is based on this assumption that Pavlov used dogs to study classical conditioning while Skinner used rats to study operant conditioning (Agrillo & Beran, 2013). Thus, through comparative psychology, rats and dogs have been used to provide an understanding of human behavior – giving rise to the practice of classical and operand conditioning. In this regard, there are claims that Skinner and Pavlov’s experiments have been used as a key reason for the reorganization of how children are taught in school (Papini, 2003). Behaviorists also believe that all behaviors, regardless of its complexity, is as a result of a stimulus-response (Papini, 2003). It is based on this assumption that psychology has gained its general purpose of predicting human’s reaction to various stimulus in their environments (MacLean, et al., 2012). Indeed, Watson (1930) argued that the main purpose of psychology is to predict the reaction that will take place as a result of an existing stimulus and to predict the situation of the stimulus that has caused the reaction. This led to the development of various insights into classical and operant conditioning.

Classical Conditioning

Classical conditioning is the process through which involuntary response such as fear is created by associating tow stimuli (Stockhorst, 2005). Between the two stimuli, one is used to achieve the targeted response before conditioning (i.e. unconditional stimulus) whole the other is not (conditioned stimulus) (Bouton & Moody, 2004). In modern psychology, Pavlov’s results on classical conditioning have been used by psychologists to deliver aversion therapy, which involves the elimination of unwanted behavior by associating it with an unpleasant experience (Clark, 2004). In aversion therapy, for example, the patient is given a nauseating drug together with the addictive substance or in some cases, covert sensitization (e.g. showing smoking addicts aversive images of the effects of tobacco on the body).

Operant Conditioning

On the other hand, through comparative psychology, Skinner’s discoveries on operand conditioning are used by contemporary psychologists to deliver shaping therapy, which entails the use of reinforcement and step-by-step leading to help an individual form the desired behavior (Staddon & Niv, 2008). This entails the use of various types of consequences including positive reinforcement (i.e. rewarding a behavior with a pleasant stimulus), negative reinforcement (rewarding a behavior by eliminating a discomfort), and punishment (Goldiamond, 1970). However, critics of behaviorism claim that it is a one-sided approach to understanding human behavior and that it fails to account for human internal influences on behavior such as feelings, moods, thoughts and free will (Bouton & Moody, 2004). This makes it appear to be more superficial and only tends to consider measurable and observable aspects of behavior while ignoring other unseen aspects of individuals that influence their personality and behavior.

This essay has evaluated the origins of modern psychology by contextualizing and evaluating the contribution of early psychologists and theories to modern psychology. For instance, using current psychological research, the essay has evaluated John Locke’s contribution to modern psychology by ‘blank slate’, empiricism and nature versus nurture. Locke’s theories have enabled modern psychologists to understand human experiences and how they make sense of the physical environment they live in. Apart from exploring Locke’s contribution to modern psychology, the essay has evaluated the contribution of behaviorism to modern psychology. Here, it is apparent that behaviorism forms the foundation of modern psychological methods and applications such as classical and operant conditioning. Furthermore, the work of early behaviorists such as Pavlov and Skinner have contributed to modern-day psychotherapy by developing the fundamental research upon which psychological methods such as aversion theory.

Bibliography

Hergenhahn, B. R., & Henley, T. (2013). An introduction to the history of psychology. Cengage Learning.

Locke, J. (1824). The works of John Locke: in nine volumes (Vol. 7). C. and J. Rivington.

Locke, J. (1794). The Works of John Locke (Vol. 6). T. Longman, B. Law.

Leahey, T. H. (1987). A history of psychology: Main currents in psychological thought. Prentice-Hall, Inc.

Leary, D. E. (Ed.). (1994). Metaphors in the history of psychology. Cambridge University Press.

Marshall, J. (1994). John Locke: resistance, religion and responsibility. Cambridge University Press.

Newman, L. (Ed.). (2007). The Cambridge Companion to Locke's' Essay Concerning Human Understanding'. Cambridge University Press.

Robinson, D. N. (1995). An intellectual history of psychology. Univ of Wisconsin Press.