About Irrational Fears - Island Currents

Introduction

When one is afraid of a specific object or situation without reason, despite knowing that it does not bring danger, they have what is considered an irrational fear. These fears include acrophobia, the fear of heights; claustrophobia, the fear of small spaces; and trypophobia, the fear of clustered small holes. While some, like trypophobia, could act as a natural instinct for humans to survive, others could be caused by experiences during infancy. This article will explore irrational fears caused by the latter and the famous Little Albert Experiment.

The Little Albert Experiment

In 1920, John Watson and Rosalie Rayner set out to prove that classical conditioning, a way of learning by repeatedly associating and pairing two stimuli, could be used to create phobias with the Little Albert Experiment. For this investigation, the experimenters wanted to choose a person without prior conditioned fears as a control variable. Eventually, Watson and Rayner encountered a child who was “on the whole stolid and unemotional”, and he became their test subject. They named him Little Albert .

(Figure 1, Little Albert © Wikipedia commons https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Little_Albert_experiment_(1920).webm)

Prior to the experiment, Watson and Rayner showed Little Albert neutral stimuli, such as a white rat, rabbit, and monkey in rapid succession. He showed no signs of fear. At the same time, they also established that little Albert had an unconditioned sensitive response to loud noises. In particular, when the experimenters struck a steel bar, Little Albert “broke into a sudden crying fit”, described as the first time “the laboratory [had] produced any fear or even crying in Albert”.

Later, Little Albert was shown the same white rat, and every time he touched it, Watson and Rayner stuck the steel bar with a hammer, creating a sudden loud noise. This time, Little Albert responded with signs of distress such as crying and trembling lips. Surprisingly, the next time Little Albert was exposed to the white rat or similar items such as fur coats and rabbits, he started crying and backing away. This is known as generalisation, through which one responds negatively not only to phenomena with negative associations but also to phenomena similar to it. It proves that irrational fears can be created through classical conditioning.

(Figure 2, The Experiment © Psychology Wizard, https://www.psychologywizard.net/watson–rayner-ao1-ao3.html)

Before the conditioning happens, a neutral stimulus (NS) leads to an unconditioned stimulus (UCS), producing an unconditioned response (UR) and giving a small dose of stress to the baby, activating its brain to an alert state. This allows babies to take in knowledge quickly and easily. Then, during the conditioning, the brain associates the NS with the UR, hence creating a conditioned stimulus (CS) and a conditioned response (CR) (Figure 2). In the Little Albert experiment, the white rat is a neutral stimulus while hitting a steel bar with a hammer is an unconditioned stimulus and fear is an unconditioned response. After the conditioning, however, fear becomes a conditioned response, to a white rat or other objects with similar attributes.

Here comes the question: how was it possible for Little Albert to make such associations in the short span of a few hours? According to Jean Piaget’s theory of child development, Little Albert was at his sensorimotor stage, which is from birth to 2 years old. In the sensorimotor stage, infants’ brains are exceptionally sensitive to surroundings and new objects so that they can take in knowledge and adapt to their surroundings quickly. In other words, babies’ brains are extremely flexible and malleable, allowing them to form neural connections easily.

The sensorimotor stage is sometimes called the “critical period” when the brain is most elastic. In fact, it is theorized that if children don’t start to learn languages at this point, they would probably never be able to speak a language fluently. Therefore, it is extremely likely that irrational fears could have been formed here

Ethics

This experiment could be considered widely unethical in modern society since the two psychologists created an abnormal fear for the child. During Little Albert’s time, psychology experimentation laws were incomplete, so many of the experiments from that period were unethical. Additionally, there are debates on whether Little Albert’s mother actually allowed him to enter the experiment and some sources say that she had been paid for him to join, and Albert himself wasn’t old enough to decide. Watson had originally planned to decondition Albert’s fear of rats, but he was removed from the experiment by his mother prior to deconditioning. Finally, it was reported that Little Albert was not “healthy from birth” as described in the experiment, and had suffered from a neurological problem since birth. He died at the early age of 6.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the Little Albert experiment showed how some of one’s irrational fears could be linked with classical conditioning. During the sensorimotor stage, brains are exceptionally ductile and malleable, and every single new experience causes the neurons to connect, and with a little repetition, infant brains could easily condition things together.

Author’s Commentary

I am specifically interested in psychology and the experiments within the subject because they explain how our complex brain works. Irrational fears and classical conditioning particularly play a crucial part in early development. They partially explain how the brain adapts in developmental stages and are extremely fascinating to learn about. This specific experiment was the first to apply classical conditioning to human behaviors. Last but not least, I would like to give thanks to Akshat Gupta who gave many useful comments and helped make this article better.

Definitions

Classical conditioning: Discovered by Pavlov, a Russian physiologist, it is a way of learning a response by repeatedly associating and pairing two stimuli.

Decondition:(psychiatry) to reverse a previously conditioned behavior, usually in the treatment of phobia and other disorders to bring fear under control

CR: Conditioned Response

CS: Conditioned Stimulus

UCS: Unconditioned Stimulus

UCR: Unconditioned Response

NS: Neutral stimulus

Full Bibliography:

(“List of Phobias A – Z: Most Common Fears, Types of Phobias & More”, 2022)

List of Phobias A – Z: Most Common Fears, Types of Phobias & More. (2022). Retrieved 21 February 2022, from https://www.therecoveryvillage.com/mental-health/phobias/related/list-of-phobias/

Little Albert Experiment

(“Classics in the History of Psychology — Watson & Rayner (1920)”, 2022)

Classics in the History of Psychology — Watson & Rayner (1920). (2022). Retrieved 21 February 2022, from https://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Watson/emotion.htm#:~:text=Watson%20and%20Rosalie%20Rayner

http://virtual-lecture-hall.com/KRA2605cssCHAPTER6/conditio.html