I was fascinated and surprised a couple years ago when at team of psychological historians"solved" the long-standing mystery of the identity of Little Albert. I loved the story of their research, their exhaustive and careful examination of all the evidence they could find, and their explanation of the reasoning behind their conclusion about his identity. Well, now I'm even more impressed: They didn't stop there! Some members of the original team kept digging into some details in the original story as told by Watson (including the detail that Little Albert was a "healthy, normal boy" when the researchers found he died a few years later of hydrocephalus.) The research team recently published their conclusion: Little Albert was likely suffering from neurological issues since birth, and that Watson purposefully misrepresented his condition when we wrote about the case.
A good example of researchers not quitting and eventually uncovering an ugly truth that casts further doubt on Watson's legacy.
photo credit: http://www2.macleans.ca/2012/02/22/bad-behaviour/
posted by Rob McEntarffer
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