Behaviorism In To Kill A Mockingbird

To Kill a Mockingbird is a book written by Harper Lee. Later adapted into a film of the same name, To Kill a Mockingbird follows our protagonist Jean “Scout” Finch and her small family, consisting of her father and her brother, as she grows up in a small town in Alabama during the 1930s. Using scenes from the film, I will be discussing Scouts personality, as showcased by her actions and through dialogue, and attempting to decipher and explain her personality traits using the behavioral/social learning approach. The behavioral/social learning approach begins with behaviorism. Behaviorism comes from John Watson’s idea that psychologists should only study overt, observable actions. Watson embraced ideas from other researchers who were studying …show more content…
The behavioral/social learning theory believes that such traits have developed because of childhood learning. Behaviorists, such as Thorndike, Watson, and Skinner, would state that these more masculine associated traits are exhibited by Scout because of operant conditioning, meaning she has been rewarded for them previously. We even see Scout being rewarded for these traits in the film, rewards coming most notably from her brother, who will only allow Scout to continue playing with him when she toughens up and acts braver, which are more traditionally masculine traits. Scout is obviously close with her brother by the beginning of the film, so it is fair to assume that she has taken on these “boyish” traits that her brother exemplifies in order to be given his approval and then be rewarded by being able to become close to him. The behaviorist approach gives a great explanation for why Scout has developed personality traits associated with agency, but approaches brought forth by social-cognitive theorists allow us to expand on this idea of reward and punishment effecting her personality (Burger, …show more content…
According to Burger (2015) observational learning is learning that comes from observing, reading about, or even just hearing about someone’s actions. Along with observing their actions, we also observe the rewards and punishments they receive. Looking at the idea of observational learning and relating it to Scout, we can see how and why her personality has developed the way it has. As stated previously, Scout’s has a brother and a father; with the social-cognitive theory, we can see that Scout may have observed their rewards and punishments for behavior and emulated behaviors that received rewards. For example, Scout’s father is a successful lawyer. We see throughout the film that he knows very clearly what his ideas and beliefs are. From this, we can conclude that he is a very independent, intelligent, and assertive person. Though we see him successfully compromise with others in the film, he always stays firm in his own beliefs. He is rewarded by having a steady job, a lovely family, and the respect of others. Seeing this growing up may be why Scout started to develop more agency/masculine related traits. But Scout is not a female, and developing these traits may have different outcomes because of