Little Albert (Watson and Rayner (1920)

Little Albert (Watson and Rayner (1920)

1. Aim: to investigate whether an emotional response such as fear could be conditioned in a human being

2. Method: a white rat was presented to Albert. When he reached for it a loud noise would be made by striking a bar with a hammer. This happened for several weeks.

3. Results: when the rat was presented alone to Albert he became frightened and tried to move away from it

4. Conclusion: behaviour is learned and a phobia of rats can be conditioned in a baby

5. Evaluation

   • Ethical implications in deliberately causing a phobia
     • Even after 5 days there was still evidence of a phobia, although it had reduced after 1 month
   • Cannot generalise from one case study to explain how we acquire phobias

6. Phobia transferred to other fluffy white objects, e.g. white rabbits, cotton wool and Santa Claus' beard