The Little Albert Experiment

John B.Waston research he wonder about the fact fearful response of children to loud noise. John B. Waston and his graduate student Rosalie Rayner carried out the experiment. The purpose was to put a phobia into a emotionally stable child. The participant in the experiment was a child that John Waston and Rosalie Rayner named Albert B, who later became little albert.

Baby Albert Experiment 1920: The baby Albert experiment was in 1920 where a psychologist named John B. Watson tested the idea of whether fear was

2. Watson’s Classical Fear Conditioning experiment with Little Albert today, is considered unethical. According to ethical guidelines of psychology, when performing an experiment, the experimenter should always protect the participant and should always perserve their welfare and dignity. In Watson’s experiment, Little Albert and the animals were both exposed to danger, as one of the sole purposes of the experiment was to create fear, Little Albert was put through distress. Little Albert developed a conditioned fear that being the conditioned stimulus the rat. Today psychologists are obligated to obtain the participants consent before proceeding with their research. However, in Little Albert’s case little is known about his voluntary participation, after all he was a child. Thus, Watson’s experiment will not be allowed today as it

Fears vs Phobias Research Question: What is the difference between fears and phobias, and when does a fear become a phobia. Introduction: Almost everyone has an irrational fear or two—of mice, for example, or your annual dental checkup. For most people, these fears are minor. But when fears become so severe that

Inspired by the work of Ivan Pavlov, Watson conducted his own experiment, with the help of his assistant Rosalie Rayner, to show classical conditioning in humans. Watson and Rayner wanted to show that the principles of classical conditioning could be applied to emotions, such as fear. Watson believed that when children reacted to loud noises, it was because of fear, and that this fear was an unconditioned reflex.

In an experiment called "Little Albert" by psychologist John B. Watson, an infant named Albert was conditioned to fear white rats. He was repeatedly exposed to white rats and was taught fear response to these furry animals which wouldn’t otherwise occur naturally. Although this wouldn’t have been what Albert wanted to perceive as part of his reality, he became extremely distressed whenever he saw a white rat and it was out of his control to

How were Watson and Rayner able to condition Albert to react to different stimuli such as masks, other animals, and a fur coat?

In the following essay I will be looking into the study conducted by Watson and Rayner (1920) on a small child known as ‘Little Albert’. The experiment was an adaptation of earlier studies on classical conditioning of stimulus response, one most common by Ivan Pavlov, depicting the conditioning of stimulus response in dogs. Watson and Rayner aimed to teach Albert to become fearful of a placid white rat, via the use of stimulus associations, testing Pavlov’s earlier theory of classical conditioning.

In the Stanley Milgram experiment different people were chosen to do an experiment where they had a man under cover and asked him questions. If he got the answer wrong he was

Spearheaded by John Watson, who led the field of behaviorism, psychologists across the world began horrendous experiments for a time period they deemed themselves to be so “advanced” and “great.” Watson himself focused on children, due to them being so-called “blank slates”; but that does not mean adults were tested on. One of the most notable psychological experiments ever was the Little Albert Experiment. Watson intended to terrify the poor baby to fear anything with fur- rats, dogs, beards, so on and so forth. Today we recognize this as unethical, but back then, regulation of the psychological community was very poor. Prior to the experiments, Albert was unphased by much. When Watson showed him a laboratory rat, Albert instantly took to it. Watson, while Albert would be petting the rat, struck a steel bar with a hammer, instantly causing Albert to cry. This went on and on, until Albert was practically broken. Any sight of the rat would cause him to burst out in tears. The worst part of the experiment was that Albert was never desensitized. Up until his death 87 years later, Little Albert was terrified of anything with fur, and suffered massive anxiety. Other experiments occurred, less publicized, of course, because the experiments that took place were some of the worst humanity could bring

The study that John Watson is best known for was that of Little Albert. In this study, Watson and his assistant placed an infant, baby Albert, in a room along with a white rat. At first, Albert attempted to reach out toward the rat as it moved around him however soon after Watson slammed together two steel pipes creating a noise loud enough to scare Albert. After this initial scare, the pipes were hit together each time Albert would reach for the rat eventually resulting in his complete fear of the rat and anything that resembled it (Watson & Rayner, 1920). It was in this study that Watson was using a strategy of conditioning that would pair Albert with an unconditioned stimulus and then conditioning him to become fearful of this stimulus. Do to his research in the field, Watson became known as the founder of behaviorism.

The little Albert experiment would not be accepted in modern day as an acceptable research experiment. The modern day codes of conduct in the Psychology world would not allow this type of experiment to take place. The psychological effects produced by the research in the little Albert experiment could have negative implications on a person for the rest of their lives. Creating a phobia at such a young age could program a brain to fear something that should not be feared according to Mother Nature. We naturally fear the things that can hurt us or even threaten our lives but learn to accept and expand our knowledge on the things that are not a threat. We learn this at a young age by experiencing with different things throughout our lives.

Food was the unconditioned stimulus, the bell was the conditioned stimulus, and salivation was the conditioned response. Pavlov’s work showed that the conditioned response could be reduced or eliminated by presenting the conditioned stimulus without the unconditioned stimulus. Generally this required several pairings or a pairing for an extended period of time to be successful. This process is called extinction. John Watson, in his famous Little Albert experiment, was able to build on Pavlov’s work when he conditioned a young child to fear a white rat using a loud noise. Joseph Wolpe studied Watson’s work. Wolpe was able to reduce fear in cats by feeding them in various feeding situations (Abramowitz, Deacon, & Whiteside, 2010). He created a hierarchy of feared situations for the cats. He began by feeding the cats in the least threatening situation and gradually was able to move to the most threatening situation (Abramowitz, Deacon, & Whiteside, 2010). He noticed that the cats became

Classical Conditioning. Due to Pavlov’s success, Watson was inclined to do his own experimentation. His most famous, yet controversial, being on “Little Albert.” “Albert” was a child conditioned by Watson to be afraid of rats. Essentially, Watson would create a loud, banging noise. This would eventually lead to the fear of not just rats, but all fuzzy animals (John Watson - Little Albert, 2008).

For the second stage, a white rat was used as Watson’s CS, the CS must be a neutral stimulus that initially has no effect on the UR. Little Albert showed no phobia towards the rat before conditioning occurred. By pairing the US with the CS, the infant learned to associate the loud noise of the hammer and metal bar with the white rat. After strengthening the association between the US and the CS by repetition, Little Albert eventually became fearful and upset when only presented with the once neutral stimulus, the white rat. This response was the CR which marked the completion of step three. Little Albert was now afraid of the white rat because it triggered his fear of the loud noise. Classical conditioning can be used to prove many forms of behavior between subjects when looking at the the right unconditioned/ conditioned stimuli and unconditioned/ conditioned responses. The theory of classical conditioning can be used to explain the development of distrust and trust issues in the relationships between people.