Psychological Experiments |
LIttle Albert Experiment
Background
The Little Albert Experiment was created by John Broadus Watson and was conducted in 1920. Watson wanted to prove that the majority of human behaviour is learned and conditioned, not in-born. He also wanted to disprove the Freudian conception of psychology that stated human behaviour stemmed from subconscious processes.
Subject and Stimulus Selection
The subject, Albert B., was selected at nine months of age to participate in the experiment. No one objected to his selection, because there was no one there to object: little Albert was an orphan. He was, however, in very good health both physically and emotionally prior the experiment.
The neutral stimulus was chosen through a process of showing little Albert different animals. He was shown: a white rate, a rabbit, a monkey, a dog, masks with -and without - hair, and white cotton wool. He showed no inborn fear of these objects, but rather a natural affinity for them.
The unconditioned stimulus that was selected was a loud noise. A steel bar would be struck, creating a noisy bang sound, and causing little Albert to cry. This type of response is called an unconditioned response because it takes no type of learning to be fear inducing; it is an inborn response natural to all humans.
The neutral stimulus was chosen through a process of showing little Albert different animals. He was shown: a white rate, a rabbit, a monkey, a dog, masks with -and without - hair, and white cotton wool. He showed no inborn fear of these objects, but rather a natural affinity for them.
The unconditioned stimulus that was selected was a loud noise. A steel bar would be struck, creating a noisy bang sound, and causing little Albert to cry. This type of response is called an unconditioned response because it takes no type of learning to be fear inducing; it is an inborn response natural to all humans.
The Experiment
On the first day of the experiment, little Albert was shown a white rat, while at the same time a steel bar was struck. He showed affinity for the creature at first and even tried to touch it, again inducing another strike on the steel bar. This process was repeated three times.
One week later, the process that had previously been performed was repeated, but this time for a total of seven times. Then, little Albert was shown the rat without the steel bar being stuck. His reaction was drastically different from the previous times he had been showed the rat: he began to cry, to turn away, and even attempt to crawl away; the fear of the rat had been programmed into him.
One week later, the process that had previously been performed was repeated, but this time for a total of seven times. Then, little Albert was shown the rat without the steel bar being stuck. His reaction was drastically different from the previous times he had been showed the rat: he began to cry, to turn away, and even attempt to crawl away; the fear of the rat had been programmed into him.
The next step in the process was to see if this fear of the rat was generalized which means that it would carry over to other similar items. So, two weeks after the fear had been conditioned into little Albert, little Albert was tested once again. He was shown a white rabbit and reacted very similarly to how he reacted the rat: he leaned away, whimpered, and even burst into tears. When the white rabbit was touched to Albert, he immediately crawled away and cried, showing that, in fact, generalization had occurred. This process was repeated with a dog, a white fur coat, white cotton, Watson's head of grey hair, and even a Santa Claus mask (which is one of the key things that made this experiment famous), all to which little Albert showed extreme fear.
Nineteen days into experimentation, little Albert was again tested. He began by playing with blocks, and showed normalcy. Then he was shown the rat, and fearful withdrawal, but no shed no tears. The rat was shown to him a second time, but this time accompanied by the banging of the steel bar, and unsurprisingly, little Albert showed intense fear and cried. He was shown the rat a third time, and the reaction that had previously been induced occurred once again. Next, he was shown the white rabbit, to which he had previously shown extreme fear of, but now showed a less intense form of fear and reaction overall. Little Albert was then given blocks to play with, and he toyed with the blocks as any child would. Again though, he was show the rabbit twice more, and twice more did he have the same reaction of panic and fear. After, he was shown a dog to see if generalization was still occurring; he did not cry, but tried to avoid the creature because of fear. A steel bar was once struck again, and again little Albert showed intense fear.
Later, Albert was again tested with the same series of stimuli that were tested on day 19 but in a different testing environment. Researchers wanted to know if a change in environment affected the conditioned response. He still showed fear to this series of stimuli, but the fear was much less intense than it had previously been.
Testing was then discontinued for 31 days, and when it resumed after those 31 days, little Albert still showed the extreme fear of the rat and other objects like it.
Later, Albert was again tested with the same series of stimuli that were tested on day 19 but in a different testing environment. Researchers wanted to know if a change in environment affected the conditioned response. He still showed fear to this series of stimuli, but the fear was much less intense than it had previously been.
Testing was then discontinued for 31 days, and when it resumed after those 31 days, little Albert still showed the extreme fear of the rat and other objects like it.
Conclusions
As a result of the experiment, four conclusions were made. The fist was that emotional behavior could be conditioned through simple stimulus response techniques like the one practiced in the experiment; this first conclusion essentially began the area of psychology known as behaviorism. Next, emotions other than fear could be learned using the stimulus response technique exhibited in the experiment; this lead to the conclusion that specific emotions are felt when particular events occur because the brain associates that event (which acts as a stimulus) to a certain emotion through emotional conditioning. The third conclusion that researchers drew from the experiment was that phobias, fetishes, or other similar, extreme responses develop in the same manner that the conditioned fear did; however, the process of these extreme responses if far more complex. The last conclusion proved that Watson was correct about Freudian thinking; Watson proved that emotional disturbances exhibited in adulthood are not always due to sexual traumas that occurred in childhood, rather than what was previously thought. Also, actions such as sucking one's thumb was thought to be for pleasure, however little Albert sucked his thumb when he was afraid, showing that it was actually a coping device.
Relation to WWII and Nazi Germany
Fear conditioning was a major part for as to why the Nazis were able to do what they did. Humans are not born with the fear of other humans. However, through fear conditioning, people learned to fear others. This fear conditioning played a large role in why many people did not take a stand against the Nazi regime; people were afraid they would be murdered. Also, human beings are not born with the fear of being a part of a certain social sector (in this case Jews). However, once people began to disappear, and others found out what had happened to them, people grew fearful of being Jewish and of the Nazis.