Fear Conditioning

Photo courtesy Office of NIH History

The circuitry of the fear response may have been honed by evolution, but there is also another side to fear: conditioning. Conditioning is why some people fear dogs as if they were fire-breathing monsters, while others consider them part of the family.

In the 1920s, in what is probably not one of psychology's finest moments, American psychologist John Watson taught an infant to fear white rats. "Little Albert" had no fear of the laboratory's test animals. He showed joy at the sight of the white rats especially and always reached out for them. Watson and his assistant taught Albert to be terrified of white rats. They used Pavlovian (classical) conditioning, pairing a neutral stimulus (the rat) with a negative effect. Whenever Albert reached for one of the rats, they created a terrifyingly loud noise right behind the 11-month-old child. Not only did Albert very quickly learn to fear the white rats, crying and moving away whenever he saw one, but he also started to cry in the presence of other furry animals and a Santa Claus mask with a white beard.

Like Little Albert's fear of white rats, a person's fear of dogs is most likely a conditioned response. Perhaps he was bitten by a dog when he was three years old. Twenty years later, the person's brain (the amygdala in particular) still associates the sight of a dog with the pain of a bite. We'll take a closer look at some common fears in the next section.

Fear and Excitement If you enjoy horror movies, you know that fear can be exciting. Many people enjoy being afraid -- the arousal that comes with the fight-or-flight response can be pleasurable and can even mimic sexual arousal. It's no wonder so many people go to see scary movies and ride roller coasters on dates. There is actual scientific evidence that supports the fear-attraction connection. Psychologist Arthur Aron conducted a study using the very common fear of heights. Aron had one group of men walk across a 450-foot-long, unstable-feeling bridge suspended over a 230-foot drop; he had another group of men walk across a perfectly stable-feeling bridge over the same height. At the end of each bridge, the men met Aron's very beautiful female assistant. She asked each subject a set of questions related to an imaginary study and then gave him her phone number in case he wanted more information. Of the 33 men who'd walked across the stable bridge, two called the assistant. Of the 33 who'd walked across the swaying bridge, nine called. Aron concluded that the state of fear encourages sexual attraction.