B. F. Skinner (1904 –1990) was an American psychologist, philosopher, inventor and poet.
Profile
- Birth Name: Burrhus Frederic Skinner
- Nickname: Fred
- Date of Birth: March 20, 1904
- Place of Birth: Susquehanna, Pennsylvania, USA
- Zodiac Sign: Pisces
- Date of Death: August 18, 1990
- Cause of Death: Leukemia
- Place of Death: Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA
- Place of Burial: Mount Auburn Cemetery, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA
- Ethnicity: White
- Nationality: American
- Father: William Arthur Skinner (1875- 1950)
- Mother: Grace Madge Burrhus (1878- 1960)
- Siblings: Edward Skinner (1907- 1923)
- Spouse: Yvonne (Eve) Blue Skinner (b.1911- d.1997; m. 1936-1990, i.e. until Skinner’s death)
- Children:
- Daughter - Julie S. Vargas née Skinner (b. 1938)
- Daughter- Deborah Buzan née Skinner
- Alma Mater: Hamilton College, Harvard University
- B. F. Skinner is known for: inventing the operant condition chamber and for his own experimental analysis of behaviour, the philosophy of that science he called radical behaviourism.
- B. F. Skinner is criticized for: for attempting to apply findings based largely on animal experiments to human behaviour in real-life settings
- B. F. Skinner was influenced by: Charles Darwin, Ivan Pavlov, Ernst Mach, Jacques Loeb, Edward Thorndike, William James, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Henry David Thoreau
- B. F. Skinner’s works inspired: NA
Quotes
“The only geniuses produced by the chaos of society are those who do something about it. Chaos breeds geniuses. It offers a man something to be a genius about.” ― B.F. Skinner, Walden TwoMajor Works
- The Behavior of Organisms (1938)
- Walden Two (1948)
- Science and human behavior (1951)
- Schedules of Reinforcement (1957)
- Verbal Behavior (1957)
- Cumulative Record (1959)
- The Analysis of Behavior: A Program for Self-Instruction (1961)
- The Technology of Teaching (1968)
- Contingencies of Reinforcement: A Theoretical Analysis (1969)
- Beyond Freedom and Dignity (1971)
- About Behaviorism (1974)
- Particulars of My Life (1976)
- Reflections on Behaviorism and Society (1978)
- The Shaping of a Behaviorist: Part Two of an Autobiography (1979)
- Notebooks (1980) (edited by R. Epstein)
- Skinner for the Classroom (1982) (edited by R. Epstein)
Did You Know?
- Skinner was the eldest of the two sons born to a lawyer and a housewife.
- His brother Edward died at the age of sixteen of a cerebral hemorrhage.
- In early life Skinner became an atheist after the demise of his brother, and after his grandmother's teachings on hell.
- In 1926 he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in literature from Harvard University where he later received a PhD in 1931.
- After graduation, he attempted in vain to become a novelist, but was unsuccessful despite encouragement from renowned authors like Robert Frost.
- B.F. Skinner was a prominent researcher in Harvard University till 1936.
- In 1945, he became Chair of the Psychology Department at the University of Indiana.
- John B. Watson's Behaviourism inspired him into graduate study in psychology and to the development of his own version of behaviourism.
- Ten days before his death, he was conferred the lifetime achievement award by the American Psychological Association.
- During his Master’s course Skinner in association with Fred Keller invented the "Operant Conditioning" or "Skinner Box” which helped him to envision a field of science based on understanding human behaviour.
- He published the results of his Operant Conditioning experiments in The Behavior of Organisms (1938).
- He died at the age of 86 of leukemia on August 18, 1990.