BEHAVIOURIST Evidence - Watson & Raynor Flashcards
What is the aim and context?
Babies according to Watson, they only show three behaviours fear, rage and love
How do babies learn these complex behaviours or emotions?
The early home life of the child acts as a laboratory in which the child is exposed to a wide range of stimuli that can condition emotional reactions
Behaviorists say we are born blank and is learned from the environment
Watson & Rayner wanted to see if they could use classical conditioning to condition to a healthy baby boy to fear a neutral stimulus by manipulating the environment
By choosing a neutral stimulus that the infant showed no innate fear of, if he developed a fear, they would to state that it was because of the environment and not due to a biological predisposition
Investigating classical conditioning only
What is the participant?
There was only one participant
Albert B
He was reared almost from birth in a hospital environment & healthy
Chosen as he was not particularly sensitive, well developed, young & watson had access to him (worked at the hospital)
Subsequent investigation showed that Albert suffered from a number of health problems
What is the research method?
Controlled observation
Artificial controlled environment and the child’s behaviour is observed
What are the overall conclusions?
Albert had given a conditioned fear response
Study demonstrated “emotional transfer”
“Persistence of early conditioned responses will found only in persons who are constitutionally inferior”
Only weak willed people will develop phobias in this way
What does it show about removal of Conditioned Responses?
Conditioned fear response in Albert would “persist indefinitely, unless an accidental method for removing them is hit upon
Constantly expose the child to feared stimuli
Replace fear with another emotional response
Feared stimuli would be presented and stimulation of the erogenous zones would be paired
Pairing feared stimuli with pleasant food (sweets)
Building up constructive activities around the feared stimuli
Does it relate to Freud?
Claimed that his findings didn’t have any significant points of conflict with Freudian theory
He did take issue with freudian idea that it is sex that is the principal force that shapes personality that fear itself arises from sexual feelings
Fear was important factor as sex, and that fear exists in its own right, separate and not reliant on sex
Alberts constant thumb sucking is a compensation device used to block out fear
Hypothetical situation in which adult Albert seeks counselling of fluffy things
Recital of a dream that Albert at three years of attempted to play with the pubic hair of the mother and was scolded violently for it
Unconscious memory of a sexual event concerning his mother, his memory is being transferred to all things furry
Evaluation of methodology and procedures
High level of control
Meaning that extraneous variables could be controlled for
Baseline test done
Study was filmed
Visual record
Strong reliability
Lacks ecological validity
X One participant
X Watson claimed that Albert had developed a phobia of fluffy things through his fear of the rat
However, maybe Albert developed a fear of the situation he was in, the researchers or even Watson
X To get the desired fear Albert had to have his thumb forcibly removed from his mouth
Was his “fear response” frustration?
Evaluation of the sample
X Albert was raised in a hospital
He showed no fear towards any of the stimuli before the study
Children his age may have shown fear towards dogs etc
Mother said that he rarely cried
X Limits the useful and generalisability of the findings
X If Albert was Douglas Merritte, he died at a young age from hydrocephalus
Suggests that the baby may have had brain damage from birth and challenges the whole foundation of the study
Alternative Evidence
Watson had to refresh Albert’s fear response as it began to weaken.
Issue for the theory of classical conditioning
If phobias were learned from a negative experience with a particular stimuli, then this study suggests that an absence of further negative experiences would lead to the phobia eventually fading
O H Mowrer (1947) proposed that operant conditioning could explain the maintenance of phobias that have been formed by classical conditioning
Two Process theory
Biological preparedness could explain the findings
Loud noise - predisposed to jump
Rats - scary looking, diseases
Predisposed to be scared of them
Ost (1987) claimed that it is possible that all phobias do stem from a traumatic incident, but that sometimes the incident has been forgotten
Ethical issues of the research
Scientific benefits of this study - shows that phobias can be learnt through the process of classical conditioning
Incorporated into treatment
Albert experienced a great deal of distress and psychological harm
Ethical guidelines state that a participant should leave an experiment in the same state in which they arrived and experience no more stress than they would come across in their day to day lives
Both guidelines breached - Albert left with a phobia
Lack of consent
Alberts mother may have given consent - Could have been pressured (loss of job)?
Lack of right to withdraw
Confidentiality was maintained to an extent but people could easily find out who the mother is
