Little Albert and Classical Conditioning
Classical conditioning is a special form of learning, where conditioned stimulus (CS) signals occurrence of another stimulus, called unconditioned (US). US is often chosen in a form of stimulus that is significant from biological standpoint, because it can elicit response from the very beginning, which means that it is unconditioned response (UR). CS, in its turn, results in no special response from the beginning, but after conditioning takes place, this type of stimulus elicits conditioned type of response (CR).
One of the basic concepts in this form of learning is pairing – stimuli are usually paired to achieve the necessary outcome. The classical experiment conducted by Pavlov included dogs with ringing bells, which acted as a CS, which then was followed by food – US. As a result of food stimulus, salivation (UR) was elicited, and after bell-food pairing, salvation (CR) was also caused by the bell.
John B. Watson with partner Rayner conducted a case study with eight-month baby boy Albert, in which they checked classical conditioning in case of humans. In the course of the experiment loud sound (US) was introduced which results in fear (UR) – natural response. Then introduction of rat, which was neutral stimulus, was paired with a loud sound, which resulted in fear as well (UR). After this, introduction of rat also resulted in fear. Moreover, the event of generalization took place in this experiment – when Albert started to fear all furry animals and even masks that had furry elements in them. Generalization is extension of some concept to less-specific phenomena.
Still, the conditioning doesn’t last forever. When CS is repeatedly presented without US, extinction usually takes place. In this case, frequency of CR returns to the levels that were before training. But at the same time, there are cases of spontaneous recovery, which show that not all the effects are eliminated. In case of Albert it also happened in a month after experiments were terminated. According to the current ethical standards, experiment with Albert couldn’t have been conducted, as today it is necessary to receive fully informed consents from participants, which wasn’t done in the case study conducted at that time.
