Opening Skinner's Box - A Review (Chapters 1-10)

Chapter 1: Opening Skinner’s Box

Lauren Slater opens her book Opening Skinner’s Box with a chapter with the same title. She takes an intimate look at B.F. Skinner. She starts by discussing how infamous he is. Personally, I had heard about his experiments before, and I do not think I would consider him “infamous.” I think I would prefer the term “eccentric.” His experiments reflect a very different train of thought compared his peers and even among many psychologists today. He looked at the state of psychology at the time and how it was based mostly on anecdotes or observations. He applied principles derived from the scientific method and applied it to this “soft” psychology. He revolutionized the world not just with his experiments but also with his methods.  He thought out of the box (pun intended). He was a very analytical person, but at the same time he was very philosophical—a perfect fit for behavioral psychology.

A significant part of this chapter is Slater’s discussion of Skinnerizing her daughter to stop crying and demanding to be held at night. This anecdote lets the reader see how the application of operant conditioning is still relevant in everyday life. Most people also realize that we employ operant conditioning in training domesticated animals. It is almost disturbing how easy it is to condition someone to do what you want them to. Finally, when Slater meets Julie, one of Skinner’s daughters, I cannot help but think that she has been conditioned to adore her father. When she speaks of him, tears of love and memory swell up in her eyes and voice. She is also very defensive of him whenever anyone starts to criticize any aspect of his work or personality. It would not be too far-fetched to think that Skinner used his operant conditioning techniques to, perhaps unintentionally, condition his children to love him and to abhor any negative comments about him.

Chapter 2: Obscura

Because we, as a class, already had the opportunity to read Stanley Milgram’s Obedience to Authority, we had very good background knowledge about Milgram’s experiments. Nonetheless, Slater allows us to get a different perspective on Milgram and his experiments—one that is a little more subjective and humanistic. Slater begins this chapter with a hypothetical personal experience about participating in the experiment as the subject. I would have to admit that most of those thoughts would have reflected by own. However, I am still convinced that I would not go all the way to the end. I know that I would have gone most of the way though—even with a basic knowledge of lethal levels of electrocution. When I think about how obedient I am to any authoritative figure, I try to pick out the little things that I do to defy authority. Overall though, I obey without questioning. That is disturbing.

Milgram himself seemed to have a strange curiosity about people’s behaviors. He seemed especially interested in the nonobvious. He wanted to point out the counter-intuitive things that people do. For example, he experimented with people looking up at the sky solely because someone else was doing so. I wonder if his acute awareness of his mortality was a contributing factor to this personality trait. Furthermore, I wonder if he knew beforehand about the impact that he would have on the subjects that he experimented on. Whether they obeyed until the end or disobeyed at 150 volts, many of these people still feel the effects of the experiment as if it happened yesterday, not fifty years ago. Perhaps the biggest impact of Milgram’s experiments does not come from the results themselves, but, as Slater alluded to, it is the questions that people ask about obedience to authority.

Chapter 3: On Being Sane in Insane Places

I have always had a slight disdain for psychiatry. Maybe it was the images of the horrible insane asylums. Maybe it was the possibility of me being slightly crazy. Maybe it was Rosenham’s little experiment. Nonetheless, I find it hard to feel confident about psychiatrists telling me what is wrong with me. Rosenham’s experiment, although not perfectly scientific, exposed a lot of the troubles with psychiatry in the 1970s. It was so easy to diagnose someone with schizophrenia and throw them into an asylum. One voice that said only “thud” and that’s it! When people like Spritzer retorted with everything they had and even challenged Rosenham, they were humiliated again. Rosenham said that he would send pseudopatients to psychiatrists. They were convinced that they found forty-one such patients. He didn’t send anyone. Slater’s modern day version of the experiment reflected a shift in psychiatry. Now the doctors were more humanistic to their patients, but they were very quick to write prescriptions for drugs. This practice is also seen in the medical sciences. They all seem to be following the motto “when in doubt, medicate.” That is just as concerning for me as being called crazy.

It is ridiculous how context shapes our expectations, especially in a field such as psychiatry or even the medical sciences. If your profession is diagnosing sick people, you are going to expect that everyone you see has some sort of illness. These diagnoses can affect people in the worst ways. These doctors are affecting peoples’ wellbeing. Even when the intention is to keep someone alive or improve their health, they may at the same time be putting these people closer to death. These kinds of professions should critically analyze what is happening as a whole to these individuals who are adversely affected by their practices.

Chapter 4: In the Unlikely Event of a Water Landing

I have heard of the concept of the diffusion of responsibility before in a sociology class that I took. I believe we also looked at the Catherine “Kitty” Genovese case. I still cannot believe what happened to that poor lady. It is the worst feeling, both physically and emotionally, to be stabbed repeatedly three separate times, know that people were around, but not getting any help. However, when I put myself in that situation, what would have I done? Would I have stood by listening to those screams? Would I have immediately called the police? I honestly think I would have done nothing. Darley and Latane’s experiments confirmed this. If you do not respond to an emergency within three minutes, you are ill-likely going to respond at all. There are multiple times when I could have helped someone who dropped their papers or was juggling books and a hurt appendage, but I did not. I thought to myself, “Someone else will probably help him.” No one else did.

We can make some connections from Darley and Latane’s experiments to Milgram’s experiments. When there’s an authority figure there, we rely on them to tell us what to do. When there is no authority figure, who is going to accept responsibility? Groupthink, peer pressure, and conformity also affect the outcomes of obedience and reaction to emergencies. Where is the independent thinking that Americans are so proud of? It seems to be there when the pressure is on you, the only person around. However, when there are other people involved, we appear apathetic and immoral. Maybe one day, everyone can understand these studies and experiments and be more conscious about their actions. The Kitty Genovese case should never happen again.

Chapter 5: Quieting the Mind

A staple in most psychology classes is cognitive dissonance, so its meaning is relatively well-known. Cognitive dissonance explains what happens when there is a conflict between one’s beliefs. Someone is more likely to modify their beliefs to fit the behavior rather than change their behavior to fit the belief. Essentially, this is the rationalization of incompatible beliefs and actions. Slater’s opening with the cult appears to be a clear-cut case of this. Arguably, religion in general contains many forms of cognitive dissonance. For example, there are religious texts that declare that women are lesser beings than men and those that dictate that people cannot eat meat. However, many of the people who follow these religious texts are feminists and/or love to eat meat. When people—especially the devout—are asked about these inconsistencies, they usually have some strange rationalization or perception about it that makes the belief and the behavior somehow compatible.

When I read about Linda and Audrey Santo’s story, it really made me sad. A young girl almost drowned to death, is now a vegetable, and has become, her mother claims, a direct line to God.  However, the different events that have occurred around Audrey are strange. How does one explain or rationalize the “hemorrhaging” oils? How does one explain the claims of being healed by these oils? Now Linda has breast cancer, and she refuses to be helped by her daughter. I wonder if this is a form of cognitive dissonance; Linda says that she refuses to be healed by her daughter because she does not want to make her suffer on her behalf. There is no way for us to know if she had tried already to be healed and just failed though.

Cognitive dissonance, like operant conditioning, does not explain everything about the individual person. It is only one piece of the extremely complex human being. It is impossible to claim that one theory explains everything about people and how they act. It is the intense mixing of all of these theories that piece together the human being. I think that Slater is not trying to make us focus on these different theories and people because she wants us to choose the one we like best. She wants us to understand the different pieces that make us whole.

Chapter 6: Monkey Love

Harry Harlow is a very interesting man. I do not think I would have been friends with him, but no one can deny the amount of contributions that he has made to our world. He was so obsessed with love that I could imagine him being a very clingy person. Slater also portrayed him as a very emotionally-dependent person. He looked for physical attention through affairs, he was always seeking to outdo himself to impress his colleagues, and his extreme focus on the mother and the child all reflect this desperation of outward emotional reconciliation.

Harlow’s experiments were merciless. Harlow did not care about the separation of the rhesus macaque monkeys from their mothers, nor did he seem to think about the implications his experiments would have on the monkeys once they were grown and ready to mate. I think we are starting to see some of the same disturbing results more and more with people these days. In a more highly technological world, there is an increasing need for quick and easy methods to raise children. Women are choosing to work after they give birth, whether by choice or by necessity. Culture also plays a large role in influencing parenting styles. I think there is a lack of touch, play, and motion—apparently the necessary ingredients for love—which are creating children who are increasingly antisocial. I wonder what implications this will have in future generations. Also, is this something that is happening solely to Americans? Or is this a worldwide phenomenon that we need to be concerned with?

Chapter 7: Rat Park

Television shows like Intervention and Dr. Drew highlight the tragedies that follow drug addiction. We see it glorified with celebrities’ constant visits to high-profile treatment centers. It does not affect just the user; it also hurts the user’s family and friends. It is not until that person is willing to get help that they can begin the process of recovery. These shows reflect the predominant belief that drugs “cause” addiction. It is something that cannot be avoided, no matter how disciplined a person is. Everyone argues that addiction is a disease, which needs to be clinically treated. Addicts go through programs in order to get themselves to heal themselves. But it does not always work.

Bruce Alexander argues that drugs do not cause addiction—it is a “life-style strategy.” He conducted the Seduction experiment and compared rats in the rat park, a luxurious environment, and rats in a typical lab setting, a miserable environment. Predictably, the rats in the dismal environment chose to become intoxicated by drinking morphine-laced water. However, the rats in the luxurious environment did not care for the sugary morphine water. This experiment is especially interesting because it is a stark contrast what popular belief about addiction dictates. I never really heard about Alexander’s experiments, but now that I have, I have a completely new take on drug addiction. I still cannot let go of my intense need for medical and scientific evidence of addiction. At the same time, though, I can now look at these arguments with a grain of salt. Alexander’s arguments help explain how I have no interest in getting intoxicated myself, even with access to intoxicants. I oftentimes do not even want to drink alcoholic beverages. To me, intoxication is not a “life-style strategy” for me.

Chapter 8: Lost in the Mall

I am very aware of Plato’s and Freud’s concepts of memory. I personally like to imagine that my memories are stuffed away in unorganized filing cabinets in my brain. These memories, like paper, become more fragile with time and can even fall completely apart. Also, there are some memories that I lock away so that no one, not even me, can ever see them again. Those are my “repressed” memories—memories that should not see the light of day ever again. Sometimes I get some of these files get really dusty so I have to brush them off to read its contents. This is the process of remembering. After reading this chapter, I wonder if these dusty files are really my own or counterfeits.

Elizabeth Loftus is an interesting person. Her curiosity about memories and her drive to protect those who are accused of terrible things based on the “repressed” memories of others is compounded by bravery. Who has the courage to fight against someone who claims was raped? Who has the courage to defend the person who is being accused of the rape? Loftus shows us how easy it is to implant a memory of being lost in a mall and how elaborate these fake memories can become. This work needs to be publicized more. People’s lives are being vastly affected by these “repressed memories,” which may or may not be fabricated. As Loftus says, we must have corroboration to be more certain that events occurred. The memories of one person are not reliable enough to depend on. That is the reason why people keep diaries, journals, and (of course) blogs—to keep record of what has occurred.

Chapter 9: Memory Inc.

The last two chapters of the book took an extremely close look at the physical brain. In this chapter, Slater analyzed memory.  Her first story was about a boy Henry, now only known as H.M., who had his hippocampus removed by Dr. Scoville to stop intense seizures. Scoville was successful in stopping H.M.’s seizures, but he also stopped H.M. from being able to create new memories. I wonder if the benefit was worth the cost. In his old age, H.M. is able to control his movements, but he cannot record events in memory. I wonder if he even realizes this. I cannot fathom what it would be like to live for as long as he had and not have fond memories of my life. Brenda Milner was able to record H.M. and observed that the hippocampus somehow converted short-term memory into long-term memory. Eric Kandel, who broke memory down to the few neurons of slugs, was able to discover cAMP-response element binding protein (CREB), which was what made short-term memory into long-term memory—in other words, memory glue. He also discovered its repressor, which would cause one to forget.

Slater spent a large part of the chapter analyzing the possible implications of Kandel’s company Memory Pharmaceuticals. They could produce pills that make one forget, or they could produce pills that make one remember everything. If these kinds of pills were made available to the general public, I think it would create controversy as intense as those of abortion or cloning. There would be fervent supporters and opponents who would be willing to fight over these pills. I personally would find some benefit in being able to select what I want to forget and what I want to remember, but I worry about the abuse of such pills.

Slater said that Elizabeth Loftus and Eric Kandel offered conflicting arguments. I think theirs are actually complimentary. Kandel looks at how short-term memory becomes long-term memory. Loftus looks at how fabricated stories can become short-term memory and, in turn, long-term memory. Repression itself is a different issue altogether. Like Loftus said, corroboration is probably the best way to verify an event actually occurred. However, there are even flaws with corroboration if memory is involved.

Chapter 10: Chipped

This chapter looks how physical modifications to the brain can help heal people. Antonio Egas Moniz, who won the Nobel Prize for 1949 for the discovery of psychosurgery, started this long, dangerous, and beneficial journey into psychosurgery. To this day, there are debates over the costs and benefits of psychosurgery. In the United States, Walter Freeman and James Watt promoted psychosurgery as the means to fix any mental illness. This is one of the reasons why psychosurgery has such a bad reputation. The early pioneers of psychosurgery were willing to work on anyone for any reason. I am still affected by this reputation. I get anxious at the thought of someone poking around in my brain. I would rather take pills no matter what.

Slater’s story about Charlie Newitz provides a present-day example of the role of psychosurgery. Lobotomies are only allowed as a last resort for patients. However, the surgery on Charlie shows how far psychosurgeries have come since the 1950s. At the end of the chapter, Charlie says that he would be willing to have another surgery in order to stop his depression. This begs the question of whether or not someone could get addicted to psychosurgeries. Another question that arises is whether psychosurgery is better than prescription pills or vice versa. We live in a culture where, if anything is “wrong” with you, you can fix it with a little chemical modification here or a little physical modification there. Everyone is striving to live a “normal” life or be a “better” person. Unfortunately, this is causing people to become overdependent on drugs and surgeries to fix everything. Where will this lead us in the future? As more is discovered about the brain, many people may want to remember everything that is good, forget everything that is bad, dissolve anxiety or depression, and improve productivity. Is this a good thing?