watson & Rayner

• What was the aim of the study?

  To test the belief that fear can be acquired through classical conditioning
• In session 1 what did the experimenter do once LA reached for the white rat?

  They stuck a steel bar with a hammer behind his head

  -causing a fear response to be conditioned and meant that LA would cry once seeing a rat again after these sessions
• What type of methodology was used?


  a case study
• what child was used for this study?

  -little Albert
• what was albert described as?

  solid emotionally with good health
• how old was Albert at the start and end of the study?

  9 months

  12 months
• Where was little Albert raised


  in a controlled hospital
• describe the controlled observation

  Albert was placed in a well lit 'dark room' on a mattress on top of a table
• what was the session 1 in the procedure?

  They established an emotional response by representing lots of stimuli

  they used a metal & hammer to create fear x2
• Why were emotional tests used?


  To see what he was afraid of (a neutral stimulus)
• what was session 2?

  Testing the conditioned emotional response

  -repeated "joint stimulation"

  x5
• What was session 3 ?

  Generalisation

  fear responses on the objects and used blocks as a distractor
• What conclusion was made from session 3 ?


  -once presented with animals of similar characteristics to the rat such as a fluffy rabbit and Dog LA also showed a fear response
• what is session 4?

  change in the enviroment

  -11 months "joint stimulation"

  -changed to a lecture hall with natural light
• what is session 5?

  the effect of time

  -12 months,joint stimulation

  -well being tests
• Little Albert was a good fit because ....


  -He was solid emotionally and never showed any signs of fear or rage

  -Albert practically never cried

  -W&R felt that due to his principles this experiment would cause him tittle harm
• How much was Alberts mother payed?

  $1
• Why did they also show LA blocks?

  They were used as a distractor to get him to an emotional baseline
• What stimulus was noise and what did it create?

  unconditioned stimulus which created an unconditioned response of fear
• What happened to the NS of the rat after conditioning?

  Now became a conditioned stimulus producing a conditioned response
• EVAL: validity


  -only used 1 baby not 10 (cannot generalise)

  -doesn't take place in a real word setting

  -cannot generalise to the whole pop as there is no comparison baby to make conclusions from

  -some suggest LA showed signs of brain damage as his behaviour is unusual for a baby of that age
• What did W&R do to heighten LAs response to the fear

  they removed his thumb from his mouth which stopped him from being able to calm himself down
• How could W&R have minimised the lasting effects of the study?

  undergone unconditioning

  -should have fully explained the experiment to LA's mum so that she could have anticipated the consequences to help reduce the effects.