0.16 Learning theory and personality development  (Page 19/24)

As an additional example of the importance of social learning, Dollard and Miller once again turned to the anthropological literature. The Semang people of the Malay Peninsula are quite different than the Ashanti described above. The Semang are known as excessively shy and timid people. When faced with hostility they never respond in kind. Instead, they just retreat farther into the jungle. Dollard and Miller questioned whether this behavior was due to some personality trait or to learning. The Semang often dealt with the more powerful Malay tribe. The Malay often cheated the Semang, stole their land, and enslaved some of their people. When the Semang resisted, they were severely punished by the Malay. As a result, escape behavior among the Semang was rewarded, whereas aggression was severely punished. As this became engrained within the culture of the Semang, it was no longer necessary for each generation to re-learn these contingencies, withdrawal and escape became the cultural norm for the Semang people (Dollard&Miller, 1941). To put it in the terms used above, there is a drive for survival. In the presence of aggressive Malays (a cue), escape (the response) is rewarded with safety (drive → cue → response → reward).

In perhaps their most influential book, Personality and Psychotherapy , Dollard and Miller (1950) advocated an eclectic approach to psychology. They believed that the “ultimate goal is to combine the vitality of psychoanalysis, the rigor of the natural-science laboratory, and the facts of culture” (Dollard&Miller, 1950). They also felt it was important for all psychologists, even experimental psychologists, to understand psychotherapy, since it provides a window to higher mental life. They proposed that psychiatric clinics are full of patients showing three common signs: misery, stupidity (in some ways), and neurotic symptoms. Basically, Dollard and Miller believed that conflict produces the misery, that repression produces the stupidity (perhaps we should say “unconsciousness” or “unaware”), and that neurotic symptoms reduce conflict. However, neurotic symptoms do not solve conflicts, they only mitigate the conflict. In order to better understand these conflicts, Dollard and Miller presented a detailed analysis of conflict, which became the best-known portion of their final book together (Dollard&Miller, 1950).

Psychotherapy may take place in a therapist’s office, but misery and conflict can only be relieved in real life. Dollard and Miller give credit to Freud for making this observation, but there is a distinct difference between how Freud viewed conflict, as something primarily intrapsychic (between the id, ego, and superego), and how Dollard and Miller viewed conflict, as a choice between opposing options. Conflict arises when we must make a choice. Some stimuli are rewarding, some are punishing, and some can be both. We tend to approach a rewarding stimulus, and that tendency grows stronger as we get closer to it. Likewise, we tend to move away from a punishing stimulus, and our tendency to move away is stronger if we are close to it. Two other important differences, according to Dollard and Miller (1950), are that the strength of avoidance increases more rapidly as we get closer to punishing stimuli than does the strength of approaching a rewarding stimulus, and the strength of both varies with their associated drives. These relationships are easier to understand when viewed graphically.