Unbounded

[For the lack of a better journal entry, I'd chosen to put up a copy of my paper on Watson. This also serves as a backup in case I lost it, heh]

Michael Glenn A. Kho
10689818

Conditioned Emotional Reactions
John B. Watson and Rosalie Rayner (1920). First published in Journal of Experimental Psychology, 3(1), 1-14.


1.0 Summary

One of the most controversial experiments in Psychology was performed by John Watson and his associate (and in turn, mistress) Rosalie Raymer. This particular journal is the actual account and first publication of the behavioral modification experiment, involving an eleven month old infant named Little Albert.

In a manner similar to Ivan Pavlov’s initial classical conditioning experiment regarding conditioned responses in dogs on salivation and food anticipation, conditioned reactions were established as well on little Albert, but particular observations on emotion, namely fear, was achieved. Thus, the research objective of Watson was to experimentally condition Little Albert to associate white rats (and on further associations, with anything white and furry), with to the loud clanging sound of metal, on which he was terribly afraid of.

1.1 Neutral Stimulus

As recorded by Watson, Little Albert was initially presented with a white rat where he elicited no response of fear. Watson was even keen on reporting that Little Albert leaned forward to it, as a behavioral cue for interest, and proceeds on playing with it. On a different testing session, the loud clanging sound of metal was suddenly presented to Little Albert. He was violently startled by it and naturally cried. Sessions were repeated to establish neutral stimuli.

1.2 Conditioning

Watson then proceeds by associating the loud clanging sound with the white rat. Intermittent sessions where the rat was presented alone, the clanging metal sound was presented alone, and the paired presentation was done until Little Albert elicited the expected fear response of crying when the white rat was presented alone. This lone presentation was repeated a further number of times for reliability purposes.

1.3 Transformation, et. al.

Finally, Watson extended Little Albert’s fear of white rats to other objects by association. He presented various objects, some for the purpose of neutral stimuli (e.g. Blocks), and other, of the intended association (e.g. White rabbit, white wool, and later on, a Santa Claus mask). Little Albert associated anything white and furry with the white rat, and of course, of the loud startling clanging of metals. With all these conditioned stimuli, Watson noted that Little Albert’s response varied from whimpering, avoidance, to crying. Despite the variation, it was certain that all these elicited responses were responses of fear.

2.0 Reaction

With the general public’s ethical clamor and criticism at Watson’s time on his prior experiments on rats over his experiment with Little Albert is unfathomable. He received greater criticism by animal rights group on his particular 1907 study regarding the kinesthetic and organic reactions of white rats on mazes.

2.1 Neutral Stimulus

Watson found it necessary that no extraneous variables (unnecessary associations) be confounded to the white rat and loud sound stimuli. Isolation of the said stimuli and specific responses to each of them can only be achieved in a controlled environment.

Applying a little developmental psychology to the matter, an infant of eleven months still do not have the mental development and thus cognition, to naturally fear a white rat. He innocently sees it as a neutral stimulus, an object for exploration, a plaything.

Similarly, any loud violent sound will naturally elicit a startling response to an infant. And an infant, who still cannot articulate these stimuli, would naturally regress into crying, a manifestation of fear over something unknown.

2.2 Conditioning

Through following the principles of classical conditioning by the Russian Physiologist Ivan Pavlov, John Watson and Rosalie Raymer were able to condition a child to fear another distinctive stimulus which normally would not be feared by a child.

Care must be considered in endeavoring over behavioral experiments involving humans. It could border on unethical human research. And on Watson’s Little Albert Experiments, clearly, American ethical standards on human rights were not firm then.

Despite the controversy, it was still necessary, at least from a historical perspective that a research such as this is done, because it elevated the discipline of psychology to a hard science, and paved way for new inquiries about how the human mind works.

2.3 Transformation, et. al.

Undoubtedly, this has to be radical behaviorism at its finest. An eleven month old infant, whom many people would agree to it being a blank slate, was unethically conditioned to be afraid of white rats, and anything white and furry - a solid proof on the influence of nurture in one’s behavior.

3.0 Impact

Patterned after the hard sciences (biology, chemistry, physics, etc.), Behaviorism’s ally was observation, experimentation, and ultimately, empiricism. This was a particular thrust by psychologists at their time to delineate psychology from philosophy, and to elevate its status from a soft science, to a hard one.

Studying behavior is such a deep, complicated, yet interesting field. An experimental research was done by Kho, et. al. (2004), on the colonial mentality on food preference among Filipino highschool students.

The participants were asked to sample varieties of food, consisting of two types per item, a local and an imported brand of the same category of food, i.e. corned beef, crackers, cookies. One group received the food samples bearing its real local and imported brand names, while the other group, received the food samples with switched brand name presented as: local product with imported brand name, and imported product with local brand name. Results showed Filipino adolescents indeed tend to prefer imported over local brands on the basis of brand names.

From the results of this research, it could be hypothesized that Filipino adolescents are conditioned to prefer imported brands because of the association of quality, prestige, and social status attachments of imported products particularly that of American branded foods.

So, with empiricism to back behaviorism, it further established this second force into a major discipline in Psychology for the years to come.