Classical Conditioning and Behaviorism

John B. Watson is considered the founder of behaviorism, a school of thought that emerged in the early 20th century. Drawing heavily from Pavlov’s work, Watson argued that psychology should focus on observable behavior, not mental processes.

In contrast to Freud—who emphasized unconscious motives—Watson believed that behavior could be understood entirely through stimulus–response learning.

Watson insisted that for psychology to become a rigorous science, it must rely on measurable events. Because thoughts and feelings cannot be directly observed, he believed they should not be the subject of scientific inquiry. Instead, he proposed that human behavior develops through conditioning, just like animal behavior.

Watson famously (and dramatically) claimed that with enough control of a child’s environment, he could train any infant to become anything—from a doctor to a thief—regardless of inborn traits. Although this quote is often repeated, his strict approach to childrearing has since been widely criticized and is not supported by modern developmental science.

Extending Conditioning to Human Emotion: The Little Albert Experiment

In 1920, Watson met a young hospital worker, Arvilla Merritte, whose infant son Douglas (“Little Albert”) became part of Watson’s conditioning study (DeAngelis, 2010). Watson reportedly paid her one dollar for participation—a reflection of the very different ethical standards of the era.

In 1920, Watson was the chair of the psychology department at Johns Hopkins University. Through his position at the university, he came to meet Little Albert’s mother, Arvilla Merritte, who worked at a campus hospital (DeAngelis, 2010). Watson offered her a dollar to allow her son to be the subject of his experiments in classical conditioning. Through these experiments, Little Albert was exposed to and conditioned to fear certain things.

Initially, Albert was presented with various neutral stimuli, including a rabbit, a dog, a monkey, masks, cotton wool, and a white rat. He was not afraid of any of these things. Then Watson, with the help of Rayner, conditioned Little Albert to associate these stimuli with an emotion—fear.

For example, Watson handed Little Albert the white rat, and Little Albert enjoyed playing with it. Then Watson made a loud sound, by striking a hammer against a metal bar hanging behind Little Albert’s head, each time Little Albert touched the rat. Little Albert was frightened by the sound—demonstrating a reflexive fear of sudden loud noises—and began to cry. Watson repeatedly paired the loud sound with the white rat. Soon, Little Albert became frightened by the white rat alone.

Days later, Little Albert demonstrated stimulus generalization—he became afraid of other furry things: a rabbit, a furry coat, and even a Santa Claus mask (Figure 3). W

atson had succeeded in conditioning a fear response in Little Albert, thus demonstrating that emotions could become conditioned responses. It had been Watson’s intention to produce a phobia—a persistent, excessive fear of a specific object or situation—through conditioning alone, thus countering Freud’s view that phobias are caused by deep, hidden conflicts in the mind. However, there is no evidence that Little Albert experienced phobias in later years, though no desensitization or follow-up care was ever provided.

Little Albert’s mother moved away, ending the experiment, and “Little Albert” (whose real name was Douglas Merritte) died a few years later of unrelated causes. While Watson’s research provided new insight into conditioning, it would be considered unethical by today’s standards.