When Little Alberts fear to the white rat was established it also transferred or was applied to similar looking objects This is known as?

WATSON & RAYNER'S STUDYAPRC

Aim

To find out if

Classical Conditioningworks on humans. Specifically, to find out if a fear response can be conditioned into a 9 month old baby boy. Also, to see if the fear response will be generalised to other animals and objects and how long the conditioning lasts

IV

(

1) before-conditioning compared to after-conditioning; (2) being presented with the white rat compared to being presented with other white, fluffy animals or objects.

This is a

Repeated Measures design, since (1) studies Baby Albert before and after his conditioning, and also since (2) studies Albert with the rat and with other stimuli. Albert experiences every condition.

The

number of fearful behaviours Albert shows when presented with the stimuli.

NB "Fearful behaviours" is an important phrase in this study. Watson observes behaviour - not fear itself, which is an emotion and not observable

Sample

One baby boy,

Albert B, aged 9 months at the start of the study and 11 months when the conditioning began. Albert’s mother was a wet nurse at the hospital and Albert was chosen because he seemed healthy and quite fearless (he “practically never cried” according to Watson). Albert's mother was paid $1 for participating. This was an opportunity sample.

[Albert] was on the whole stolid and unemotional. His stability was one of the principal reasons for using him as a subject in this test - John B. Watson

Artist Matteo Farinella's beautiful "Neurocomic" celebrates Watson's research into fear

Procedure

At 9 months, Albert was tested with a white rat, a rabbit, cotton wool and other stimuli to see if he had a fear reaction. He didn’t; this shows these were

Neutral Stimuli (NS).

The researchers also checked his fear response by banging an iron bar. Albert cried at the loud noise; this shows the noise was an

Unconditioned Stimulus (UCS)and the crying was an Unconditioned Response (UCR).

At 11 months, Albert was

conditioned. He was shown the white rat three times. Each time the rat was paired with striking the iron bar. Albert started to whimper. A week later, Albert was conditioned again. The rat was presented 3 times, paired with the noise.

Results

When the rat was later presented alone, Albert whimpered. The rat was paired with the noise again 2 more times. When the rat was presented alone another time, Albert cried. This suggests that the NS is now a

Conditioned Stimulus (CS) and Albert’s crying is a Conditioned Response (CR).

The instant the rat was shown the baby began to cry. Almost instantly he turned sharply to the left, fell over on left side, raised himself on all fours and began to crawl away - John B. Watson

Over the next 10 days, Watson & Rayner tested Albert’s reaction to the rat and to other white, furry animals and objects like a rabbit, a dog and Watson wearing a Santa mask. Albert showed fear responses to the rat like whimpering and crawling away; he showed similar reactions to the rabbit (cried) and Santa mask and a lesser reaction to the dog (crawled away, cried when it approached). This is generalisation of response.

Watson & Rayner also moved Albert to a lecture theatre with 4 other people. Albert’s reactions to the rat and the rabbit were the same. This is

transferral of response to other settings.

They tested Albert again a

month later and found the same reactions, though slightly weaker. Watson & Rayner intended to use Classical Conditioning to remove the conditioned responses from Albert, but his mother moved away and took Albert with her so the experiment ended.

Slightly unfair on Watson? He would have removed the conditioning if Albert's mother hadn't moved away...

Conclusions

Watson & Rayner concluded that they had successfully conditioned Albert to fear the white rat and that his fear response

generalised to other white, furry things (with a stronger response the more closely they resembled the rat) and transferred to other situations.

The conditioning lasted over a month and Watson proposed that the conditioned fear responses Albert was left with would last a lifetime.

It is probable that many of the phobias in psychopathology are true conditioned emotional reactions - John B. Watson

It seems that a conditioned emotional response can occur in a human after only a few pairings of the stimuli.

Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I'll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select – doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief and, yes, even beggar-man and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors – John B. Watson

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY ALBERT?

Albert’s real identity was discovered by researcher Hall Beck. After a 7 year investigation, Beck revealed Albert's identity in 2009: he was Douglas Meritte and he died at age 6 from water on the brain (hydrocephalus). No one could confirm whether or not he kept his phobia of white rats throughout his short life.

Revealing Albert's identity like this might seem to go against the confidentiality that researchers are supposed to give participants. However, Douglas Meritte had been dead for over 80 years when Hall Beck identified him and the identification was done with the help and consent of Douglas Meritte's only living relative, his nephew Gary Irons.

Cathy Faye

have become unwitting protagonists whose stories are told over and over again in psychology textbooks. So people become very curious: Who were they, and how did they feel about the experiment? - Cathy Faye

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE OTHER BABY ALBERT?

Baby Albert's story doesn't end there. Some critics are unconvinced by Beck's research. If Douglas Meritte was the baby, why did Watson call him Albert B. and not Douglas M.?

Nancy Digdon & Russel Powell (2014) did their own research and came up with a different baby, born at the same place and time, whom they believe better fits the description of Baby Albert: William Albert Barger, called "Albert" by his family. Albert Barger died in 2007, aged 87 - the researchers just missed the opportunity to find and interview him. However, his niece recalled Albert had a lifelong dislike of small dogs!

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO JOHN B. WATSON?

Watson, a married man, was having an affair with Rosalie Rayner, his graduate student and research partner. His colleagues were shocked and Watson was sacked and never worked again as a psychologist. He did use his knowledge of learned behaviour to get a new job – in advertising! He married Rosalie Rayner. It’s ironic that Watson, who tried to prove that emotion is a learned response, had his life turned upside down by an uncontrollable emotion: love.