Home > Encyclopedia of Psychology > John Broadus Watson

1878-1958
American psychologist and founder of behaviorism.

John Broadus Watson is best known as the founder of behaviorism, which he defined as an experimental branch of natural science aimed at the prediction and control of behavior. Its model was based on Ivan Pavlov's studies of conditioned reflex: every conduct is a response to a stimulus or to a complex set of stimulus situations. From birth, a few stimuli elicit definite reactions. But most behaviors are conditioned; they result from the association of unconditioned stimuli to other stimuli.

Watson was born in 1878 to a poor, rural South Carolina family. His mother was a pious Baptist; his father left the family in 1891....