Talk:John B. Watson

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The quote really makes it sound like Watson would side with "nurture" rather than "nature." Is "nature" really correct?

[edit] Views on childrearing

QUOTE: "The importance of learning in humans, Watson believed, was an evolutionary adaptation due to natural selection. For this reason, Watson stated that parents must train their children to instill good habits."

I don't believe J.B. Watson ever indicated that parents must instill good habits for this reason. No reference is given. I don't believe it would be possible to find a relevant a quote from J.B. Watson's writings. However, I've seen plenty of quotes which indicate that he considered inherited characteristics to be of little importance.

This paragraph appears to be a case of rewriting the history of psychology to introduce a misleading appearance of harmony between past and present orthodoxies.

[edit] Sentence on Masturbation totally wrong..

Every source that I have read stated that Watson believed completely the opposite of what that sentence stated. He even went so far as to denounce tree climbing as an activity because it might lead to masturbation. I am going to delete this unless someone posts a source. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 132.177.21.245 (talk) 19:04, 14 October 2007 (UTC)