Final answer:
Watson shifted from acknowledging instincts to championing radical environmentalism, emphasizing the environment's crucial role in shaping behavior. His ideas embody empiricism, opposing the nativist perspective that highlights the importance of innate qualities.
Step-by-step explanation:
John B. Watson's views on instincts evolved throughout his career. Initially, Watson believed in the concept of instincts to some degree, but as his work progressed, he shifted to a stance that downplayed the role of innate instincts and emphasized the importance of the environment and learning in shaping behavior.
This change in thinking was linked to his advocacy for behaviorism, a school of psychology that focuses strictly on observable behaviors, rather than internal mental states, and seeks to understand behavior through experimentation and the influence of the environment.
Watson's idea of radical environmentalism is the belief that the environment and experience play a decisive role in shaping an individual's behavior, abilities, and traits, effectively downplaying the role of genetics or inborn qualities. This viewpoint is a form of extreme empiricism, suggesting that all knowledge comes from experience and that humans are essentially malleable through their interactions with the environment.
The contrast between Watson's environmentalism and the concept of nativism, which emphasizes the influence of genetic factors and innate characteristics, underpins an ongoing debate in psychology known as empiricism vs. nativism. Radical environmentalism aligns with the side of empiricism, fully crediting the environment as the primary developer of individual differences, in opposition to nativist perspectives that credit innate biological factors.