Watson and Rayner - Little Albert - Classic Study Flashcards
what type of conditioning did they use on little albert?
classical conditioning
behaviourism
the idea that all behaviour is learned
aims
to demonstrate that classical conditioning could be used to create a fear response in a child to an innocuous stimulus
that human behaviour could be accounted for by the process of classical conditioning
innocuous stimulus
a stimulus which we would not normally expect to frighten someone
what were the 3 main research questions?
to find out if a fear response can be conditioned into a 9 month old baby
to see if the fear response will be generalised to other animals and objects
how long the conditioning lasts
what type of experimental design was used
repeated measures
how old was albert when the experiment started
9 months
where had albert lived for most of his life?
a hospital
what was albert assessed on before conditioning
his responses to a number of objects
e.g. rabbit, burning newspaper, monkey, white rat
he never showed fear in any of the situations
how did the conditioning occur?
when albert was shown the rat again and as he reached for it a loud noise was created by a steel bar being struck
when this was done for a second time, albert started to cry (fear response induced)
what was his fear response like 2 weeks after conditioning?
it was weakening
how many times was the procedure repeated
7 times in total
5 times a week later
2 times more 17 days later
was alberts fear generalised?
tested using different stimuli
e.g. rabbits,, fur coat, santa mask
Albert was scared of these items
what other item was albert given to play with
wooden blocks
why was albert given wooden blocks to play with
to see whether the fear had been transferred to the room
to ensure that it was the rat that had elicited the fear response
