Following the publication by Beck and colleagues, American Psychologist also featured two comments from authors questioning the initial claims of having found Little Albert. See:
http://psycnet.apa.org/index.cfm?fa=search.displayRecord&uid=2010-08987-015 and http://psycnet.apa.org/index.cfm?fa=search.displayRecord&uid=2010-08987-016 along with a rejoinder by Beck and colleagues: http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/amp/65/4/301/ ....Scott ________________________________________ From: sbl...@ubishops.ca [sbl...@ubishops.ca] Sent: Monday, September 05, 2011 9:33 PM To: Teaching in the Psychological Sciences (TIPS) Subject: Re: [tips] The Finding Little Albert activity On 5 Sep 2011 at 18:25, Joann Jelly wrote: > It had to happen. We all knew (watching "Law & Order" now and then) > that Little Albert would be found; yet there was something sort of > nostalgic to his lack of identification. > Killjoy that I am, I have to point out that not everyone is convinced that this is a closed case, as certain inconsistencies have been found in the identification of Little Albert with Douglas Merritte. Of course, this is the way historical research often works, and requiring absolute certainty is probably asking too much of such investigations. But perhaps we should cautiously qualify the claim that Little Albert was Douglas Merrite with the weasel-word "probably". Here's the abstract of a recent paper which questions the identification: Research notes: Little Albert, lost or found: Further difficulties with the Douglas Merritte hypothesis. Powell, Russell A. History of Psychology, Vol 14(1), Feb 2011, 106-107. doi: 10.1037/a0022471b Abstract In some intriguing detective work, Beck, Levinson, and Irons (see record 2009-18110-004) attempted to solve the mystery of what happened to Little Albert, the infant in whom Watson and Rayner (1920) claimed to have conditioned a rat phobia. They concluded that a child by the name of Douglas Merritte, the son of a wet nurse at Johns Hopkins Hospital, very likely was Albert (the published name, Albert B, apparently having been a pseudonym). Powell (see record 2010-08987-015) and Reese (see record 2010-08987-016) outlined certain difficulties with Beck et al.´s (2009) analysis, the foremost being a comment from Watson (1924/1925) that Albert was later adopted, whereas Douglas had remained with his mother (see Beck, 2010, for his rejoinder to Powell and Reese) (see record 2010-08987- 017). The present report presents an additional difficulty with the Douglas Merritte hypothesis which concerns the estimated timeline during which the baseline session (and first film session) of the Albert experiment likely took place. It is the congruence between Douglas´ age and the reported age of Albert during this estimated timeline on which the case for Douglas being Albert largely rests. Stephen -------------------------------------------- Stephen L. Black, Ph.D. Professor of Psychology, Emeritus Bishop's University Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada e-mail: sblack at ubishops.ca --------------------------------------------- --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: slil...@emory.edu. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13509.d0999cebc8f4ed4eb54d5317367e9b2f&n=T&l=tips&o=12464 or send a blank email to leave-12464-13509.d0999cebc8f4ed4eb54d5317367e9...@fsulist.frostburg.edu ________________________________ This e-mail message (including any attachments) is for the sole use of the intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this message (including any attachments) is strictly prohibited. If you have received this message in error, please contact the sender by reply e-mail message and destroy all copies of the original message (including attachments). --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: arch...@jab.org. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=12473 or send a blank email to leave-12473-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
