Little Emotional Albert Hypothesizing Emotional Responses In the 1920s, researcher John B. Watson and graduate student Rosalie Rayner wanted to prove that the Freudian theory that behaviors and emotions form internally was wrong. Watson posed that if a stimulus that triggered an emotional response, such as fear, repeatedly presented with something else, the brain will eventually become conditioned to be afraid of that something else. This theory is what formed the basis of the notorious experiment involving the subject named Albert B.
Methods of One’s Madness Watson acquired “Little Albert B.” at only nine months old from a hospital where he raised as an orphan, and healthy in every aspect. To gain a perspective of neutral stimuli, Watson exposed Albert to various types of animals such as a rat, a rabbit, a dog, a monkey, as well as masks, in which Albert responded expectedly. He showed interest in the various objects and animals by reaching out to them and sometimes touching them
but showed no fear. The next part of the experiment involved determining a fear reaction — exposing Albert to a loud noise which involved a hammer striking a four-foot steel bar. The noise startled Albert and made him cry, and now Watson had determined the unconditioned stimulus for his experiment. During the actual experiments, the child, 11 months at the time, was presented a white rat, which Albert showed no fear of initially, and the researchers struck the steel bar behind Albert. This process proceeded for one week, seven pairings in total before presenting Albert the rat and the rat alone.
Watson’s hypothesis of conditioning a fear with an object was correct and Albert showed signs of extreme fear of the rat. Through Watson’s curiosity, he tested Albert further, not with an unconditioned stimulus, but by presenting other things like the rat. Watson presented Albert a white rabbit, a dog with white fur, a package of cotton, and
Watson’s head of gray hair, all of which resulted in similar signs of the conditioned response to the white rat.
Significance in Behavioral Psychology Watson’s findings presented the world of psychology with a way of explaining human behavior. Watson himself achieved his two goals during this study, which were to prove the Freudian conception wrong and to show that human behavior stems from learning and conditioning. His findings also helped create a significant school of thought – Behaviorism. Watson’s experiment also allows researchers to be able to explain behavior in straightforward ways compared to Freudian’s theory. Watson’s findings also lead to other discoveries such as extinction, which is the process in which people unlearn conditioned or unconditioned responses. These findings also are used in helping to treat people with phobias, as well as examining the psychological effects of advertisements in different media.