Important+Researchers

= __** Ivan Pavlov **__ =




 * Born on September 14, 1849.
 * A Russian scientist who studied biology and medicine; which lead him to be a physiologist, psychologist, and physician.
 * He began his higher education as a student at the Ryazan Ecclesiastical Seminary, but then dropped out and enrolled in the University of Saint Petersburg. There he studied natural sciences and became a physiologist, receiving his doctrine in 1879. Pavlov was highly regarded by the Soviet government, unlike most scientists at the time. He won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1904. His laboratory in Saint Petersburg is now a museum (Nobel Lectures, 1967).
 * He was the first to suggest and describe classical conditioning. Pavlov was studying the digestive system of dogs and became intrigued with his observation that dogs deprived of food began to salivate when one of his assistants walked into the room. He began to investigate this phenomenon and established the laws of classical conditioning (Earthly Touch).

= __** John B. Watson **__ =




 * Born on January 9, 1878.
 * The absence of his father took its toll on John. He rebelled against his mother and teachers and turned to violence. John was able to turn his life back around with the help of his teacher, Gordon Moore, at Furman University. With Moore's help, John was able to succeed and moved on to the University of Chicago. It was there that he became interest in the field of comparative psychology and studying animals. He wrote his dissertation about the relation between behavior in the white rat and the growth of the nervous system. In 1903 he received his doctorate and later became an associate professor of psychology at Johns Hopkins University (Watson, 1999).
 * John Watson said that Pavlov’s classical conditioning observations lead to an explanation about human psychology.
 * He proposed the idea of an objective psychology of behavior called "behaviorism." He saw psychology as the study of people's actions with the ability to predict and control those actions.