Download Baby Albert Question Sheet

Baby Albert’s Conditioning
Definitions:

Unconditioned stimulus (ucs): agent that leads to a response without training

Unconditioned response (ucr): automatic response to a ucs

Neutral stimulus (ns): agent that initially has no effect

Conditioned stimulus (cs): a former ns that comes to elicit a given response
after pairing with a ucs

Conditioned response (cr): a learned response to a cs

Generalized stimulus (gs): production of a similar response to similar stimuli

Extinction: gradual disappearance of a conditioned response because the cs is
repeatedly presented without the ucs
Directions:
Once you have read “Whatever Happened to Baby Albert,” use the above
definitions to answer the questions that follow.
1. Identify the UCS, UCR, NS, CS, CR, GS in Watson’s experiment.
2. How did this experiment go a step beyond Pavlov’s original classical conditioning
of his dog’s?
3. How would you have “deconditioned” (extinquished) Albert’s fear of white fury
things?
4. Do you think that Albert’s life experience would have extinguished his fear
naturally?
5. Take a guess at what career Watson took after being fired from his university.
6. Do you think that Watson’s experiment with Baby Albert was justified by what he
discovered about how people learn?