The Bells of Behaviorism and the Power of Associations

 The Bells of Behaviorism and the Power of Associations

Note: While the experiences and perspectives are my own, I used AI to help draft and refine this article.

It was a crisp New York day, and I was on a Big Apple bus tour, soaking in the sights. Our guide was the kind of person who made every story feel like a personal anecdote, weaving humor and charm into every fact he shared. At some point, I asked him what he did before becoming a guide. “I used to work in advertising,” he replied.

That answer triggered a thought. As someone who’s read a lot about psychology, I immediately thought of John Broadus Watson, the father of behaviorism, who famously transitioned from academia to advertising. Without thinking, I asked, “Did you ever meet Watson?”

The guide laughed and said, “I didn’t meet him, but my aunt worked with him.” He called Watson “weird” and moved on to his next story.

My wife wasn’t convinced. “Why would he know about some random psychologist who worked in advertising?” she whispered, rolling her eyes. To her, it was just a ploy to sound interesting and earn a tip. But for me, the mention of Watson opened up a flood of thoughts about psychology, behavior, and the strange ways we’re shaped by the world around us.

Watson, Pavlov, and the Science of Conditioning

John Broadus Watson’s work fundamentally changed how we understand human behavior. Inspired by Ivan Pavlov’s experiments with dogs, Watson believed that our emotions—fear, love, and even desire—could be conditioned.

Pavlov had shown that dogs could be trained to salivate at the sound of a bell if it was consistently paired with food. Watson extended this concept to humans, conducting his famous Little Albert experiment. By pairing a white rat with loud, frightening noises, Watson conditioned a baby to fear the rat, demonstrating how easily fears could be learned.

But Watson’s career took a dramatic turn when he fell in love with his assistant, Rosalie Rayner. Their affair cost him his position at Johns Hopkins University, forcing him to leave academia and reinvent himself in the world of advertising.

The Ethical Questions

Thinking about Watson and Pavlov always brings up ethical dilemmas. Pavlov’s experiments involved cutting into dogs to measure their salivation—necessary for the science, perhaps, but undeniably cruel. Watson’s work wasn’t much better. Did Little Albert’s conditioned fear ever go away? Did anyone care about the psychological impact on the child?

And yet, their work also opened doors to profound questions about human behavior:

• How do triggers shape our emotions?

• Can we change our responses to these triggers?

• How much of our behavior is conditioned without us even realizing it?

These questions lingered in my mind, especially as I thought about the bells in our own lives—the sounds, smells, and memories that evoke emotions we often can’t control.

Reclaiming the Bells

The guide’s mention of Watson got me thinking about how much of our emotional landscape is shaped by these “bells.” A song on the radio, the scent of pine at Christmas, the creak of a wooden floor—any of these can transport us to a moment in the past, for better or worse.

But just as Pavlov and Watson showed how these associations are formed, they also gave us the tools to reshape them. We don’t have to be at the mercy of our triggers. We can reclaim them, link them to positive experiences, and use them to evoke joy, confidence, and love instead of fear or sadness.

The ABCs of Isms

This idea ties into something I like to call the “ABCs of Isms”—Antecedent Behavior Conditioning. It’s the same principle Pavlov and Watson used, but with a twist: taking a trigger and deliberately associating it with something uplifting.

For example, let’s say a particular Christmas song brings back a painful memory. Instead of avoiding it, we could try pairing that song with a new, positive experience—spending time with loved ones, sharing a laugh, or enjoying a quiet moment of gratitude. Over time, the song might lose its sting and take on a new, happier meaning.

A Personal Connection

This approach is deeply personal for me. I grew up in Waukesha, Wisconsin, a place recently associated with tragedy after a red pickup truck plowed into a Christmas parade. For some, that memory might overshadow the joy of the season.

But I think about a local band from Waukesha that sings, “No, no, no, don’t pass me over. See, I can see good things for you and I.” That lyric feels like a call to action—a reminder that even in the face of pain, we can choose to focus on the good things and rewrite our associations.

Watson’s Legacy

Ultimately, Watson’s work wasn’t just about understanding behavior—it was about showing how much control we have over it. His fall from academia and reinvention in advertising reflect the dual nature of knowledge: it can be used to manipulate or to heal, to exploit or to empower.

Whether or not my tour guide’s story about his aunt was true didn’t matter in the end. What mattered was the reminder of how much power we have to shape our own emotional responses. Watson and Pavlov’s work may have started with salivating dogs and frightened children, but it’s left us with a profound understanding of how we can reclaim our triggers and reshape our lives.

Ringing a New Bell

So, let’s ring a new bell. Let’s make a list of good things and build positive associations that lift us up. After all, as Watson’s story shows, love and connection drive us all forward. And if my wife is right and the guide was just telling a story for a tip? Well, it was a story worth hearing, one that reminded me of the power we have to turn even our most difficult memories into sources of strength.