Watson And Raynor Flashcards
What were the aims of the Watson and raynor study?
-Condition fear of an animal by simultaneously presenting the animal and striking a steel bar to make a loud noise
-Fear would be generalised to other animals
-effect of time on conditioned response
- see how possible it is to remove fear
Procedure → what was little Albert like before the study?
He was a months old , 21 pounds, healthy emotionally stable, stoic
What happened at 11 months 3 days?
- White rat put infront of Albert, as his hand touched the rat the bar was struck
- Watson was behind a curtains, a control
- the infant jumped but did not cry
- as the bar struck again the infant cried and no further tests were given for a week
Procedure -What happened at 11 months and 10 days?
- With no sound the child was reluctant to touch the rat, when the rat touched him he instantly removed his hand -
-he played with the blocks and hit them together,he was not scared of them (control) - the rat was presented alone and the baby began to cry and crawled away, completely conditioned response.
How many days was there joint stimulation of the rat and the sound?
7 days
Procedure-what happened at 11 months and 15 days?
- Played with blocks usually, when the rat was presented alone he whimpered and crawled away
- when the rabbit was presented alone negative responses began, the same happened with a dog, fur coat, cotton wool and a Santa Claus mask
What happened at 11 months and 20 days?
- Concluded that conditioned emotional reactions lasted longer than one month but did become weaker
- researchers could not remove conditioned emotional response so they felt that the response would last a life time
Results-what were the results of Watson and raynor?
- Little Albert was able to be classically conditioned to have a phobia
- the fear was generalised to other animals and furry objects
Conclusion-what did Watson and raynor conclude?
- Phobias, fears can be classically conditioned
- stimulus generalisation to similar stimuli
How were extraneous variables controlled?
- by ensuring Watson and raynor were not in the room during study as it could lead to Albert being conditioned to fear Watson and raynor
-ensured the room was lab like and only had a mattress in it - controlled demand characteristics as the participant is too young to understand and act unnaturally
What were the UCR, NS etc?
-UCR → playing with the rat
-NS→ white rat
-UCS → striking a steel bar
-CS → white rat
CR → fear
Is the generalisability high or low?
- high-humans used
- low - as not representative of older humans and different genders
Is the study reliable?
- High - easily repeatable to test for consistency, but this shouldn’t be done as unethical
- high - study repeated multiple times-standardised procedure
- low - Watson and raynor did it with a different child and got different results, the findings are not consistent and can’t be replicated due to inconsistencies in data
Is the study valid?
-Low - due to qualitative data, researcher bias, what responses symbolise fear
- low - cannot be sure the conditioning caused the fear, cannot infer cause and effect
- low - ecological validity - done in a lab, unnatural environment
-high - internal validity- extraneous variables controlled, can infer cause (noise) and effect (phobia)
Is the study ethical ?
- Unethical - lifelong psychological effects on Albert and will effect him later in life
- unethical- Watson and raynor never knew if the deconditioning would’ve actually worked, reduces the reputation of the psychologists
