Sigmund Freud, Abraham Maslow, And John B. Watson's Views In The World Of Psychology

There are many famous psychologists that have changed the way psychology is viewed today. These psychologists developed everything from theories, perspectives, mechanisms, biological and environmental influences to behavior, treatments that have saved the mentally ill community and has given psychologically disturbed individuals a different view into the world of their disorders. Sigmund Freud, Abraham Maslow, and John B. Watson are three psychologists that have helped develop a science and have developed three different theories.

Sigismund Freud was born on May 6th, 1856 in Freiberg, Moravia, Austrian Empire or our now known Czech Republic. He later changed his name to Sigmund Freud and was also given the Jewish name of Schlomo. Sigmund

Watson was able to make his way with the behavioral approach of psychology. John B. Watson was born on January 9th, 1878 in South Carolina to a very poor and religious family. Having such strong religious beliefs thrown on him growing up, Watson opposed religion and had a troubled childhood and poor academics. By the age of 21, he turned around his look on academics and graduated Furman University in South Carolina with a masters. He then enrolled in the graduate program at the University of Chicago where he began studying and developing his behaviorist theories. While being enrolled at the University of Chicago, Watson was influenced by Ivan Pavlov, another behaviorist, to use experimental psychology to help him further develop his theories. Experimental psychology focuses on learning and perceiving the world (Feldman and Renner, 2013). In 1915, John B. Watson became the president of the American Psychological Association and later died in 1958 in New York. Watson was the developer of the behaviorist theory that focused on a human’s external behaviors and physical responses. He used his theories and applied them towards child development and the early stages of learning. He believed in experimental research and conducted an experiment called “the little Albert” experiment. This experiment involved making an infant have a negative and scared reaction to something the baby was not scared of in the first place using loud sound. In this case, a white rat was used (Gootherapy.org, 2015). This experiment received negative reactions and was perceived as unethical. In Watson’s novel Psychological Care of Infant and Child published in 1928, he stated how he believed that the behavior of affection toward a child can result in a dependent and needy personality from the child. He believed that the action of treating these children like adults was a better approach (Watson, 1928). Even though his novel did