Why one of the most famous psychology studies is pretty much a sham

Pretty much every psychology course in the world covers Watson and Rayner's (1920) "Little Albert" study, where a small child was classically conditioned into producing a fear response to something he'd never feared.

Aside from no regard to ethical standards (proceeding to distress a small child with a loud noise until he cried and crawled away at the sight of something present at the time of the noise), this study pretty much blows. And I'll tell you why.

Watson claims that the child was a healthy young boy, and thus representative of any child. Wrong. Not only are case studies not the most reliable or generalizable of studies, but the little boy wasn't your typical child anyway. He'd had a list of health problems that Watson is thought to have known about, but tried to hide, including hydrocephalus, and meningitis, both of which influence emotional and cognitive development. If you're trying to show that you can condition emotional responses, there would have been thousands of better participants out there.

Next, imagine this. You're Little Albert. You're taken to a room with strange people in who keep coming at you with various things, such as dogs being thrust towards you, and really creepy masks. Then, a strange man gives you a rat. Cool, you can play with it. Then, he starts whacking a metal bar behind your head. It's scary, and loud. He keeps doing it, and you notice the rat is appearing at the same time. Next time the rat comes, you cry. Watson argues that it's because of a conditioned fear of the rat. A much more logical explanation is that yes, you've associated the two, but you're only crying because you're scared the strange man will start making that horrid noise again. Funny thing, interpretation. Oh, and when he starts getting up real close to your face with a super creepy mask on, or throwing that dog at you, he claims that it's because you're really afraid of everything hairy now. Or, John, maybe you just upset the kid?

What's more, is that this was such an unscientific study. No control group, no other participants, no stats, no objectivity, and it's difficult to falsify his theory. He worked with a graduate assistant he was having an affair with too, both of them supporters of behaviourism. There were no observers or independent raters of fear response. It was totally subjective.

So, my verdict. Classic study? Of course. But a good study? Only for an example of how not to conduct yourself in a psychology experiment.