Inside the World of Harry Harlow
Was he a tragic researcher determined to find a cure for depression or an unhinged scientist who had no care for his subjects?
If you have been educated to any degree in Psychology, you must have definitely heard the name of Harry Harlow. The influential scientist is best known for his work on mother-child attachment and the attachment styles that children have throughout their development, along with how it affects their lives through adulthood. You can read more about his experiments by clicking on this link.
But that was his work on love, it is learnt and taught to this day in psychology courses but there was another major research he did which is largely swept under the rug. I am talking about Harlow’s work in Depression and his attempts to cure it.
A Wounded Researcher
Carl Jung believed that it was only a wounded healer who could truly understand the pain of his patients. While Harlow may not have been a healer, his traumas definitely had a huge influence on his life and his research work. For him, depression and love were two sides of the same coin and if he could offer such insight into the experience of love through his research, depression should not have been any tougher.
Harlow had had his own experiences with depression. His handwritten notes reveal that he often fought through bouts of depression even when he was at the top of his academic career. In fact, the worst bout of depression came when he had just been awarded the National Award for Science in 1967 which was presented to him by the then President of the United States. In 1967, his wife was also diagnosed with breast cancer. The prognosis was not promising. Moreover, he had been preparing a presentation on ‘Depression in subhuman (term used for primates then) animals’ while going through all these tribulations in his personal life.
Understandably, it got too much for him. In 1968, he admitted himself into the Mayo Clinic for treatment of depression and alcohol dependence, which had developed as a coping strategy for the depression.
Harlow stayed at the clinic for almost 2 months.
He hated every moment of it.
At the time, antidepressants were just developing and it wasn’t known how effective they would be. Aaron Beck had not proposed the idea of CBT yet and REBT was a far-off idea still.
The only viable options for treatment were group therapy or Electro-Convulsive Therapy. Harlow had always been against ECT (vocally), skeptical of its efficacy and he didn’t find group therapy helpful. Regardless, he underwent ECT as a last resort and showed improvement.
When he returned from the clinic, he only had one objective for his research,
Finding a cure for depression, no matter what it took.
The Pit of Despair
Harlow decided to go back to his favorite research subject, the one that had gotten him all the fame he had, monkeys.
But there was a problem. Monkeys were not depressed by their nature. Depression had to be induced in them. How do we do that?
Harlow proposed that the monkeys should be completely isolated, devoid of any social contact and kept in solitary confinement to induce depression in them. To achieve this, he created what can only be described as a torture device in the modern world.
Harlow had always heard (and experienced) depression being described as being stuck in a well of hopelessness and despair. He took it a little too seriously and created a small pit of despair to create depression in his monekys.
New-born monkeys were separated from their mothers and immediately placed in a dark pit, with a supply of only food and water. The isolation could last for as long as one year (!!) before these babies were introduced to the society of monkeys again. Naturally, the babies found it tough to find their own place in these new surroundings.
Depression had successfully been induced by brute torture.
Now Harry’s task was to cure this depression.
He reintroduced these monkeys to others older than them and found that if healthy social relationships could be developed, these depressed monkeys would be completely rehabilitated within a period of 6 months or one year. The results were promising. He had shown that social relations could play a huge role in curing depression but the cost had been too huge.
Harlow faced constant criticism from animal’s rights groups for the mistreatment of the mute animals but he constantly defended his methods.
According to him, if the suffering of one monkey could save millions of children from suffering the same fate, it is a small price to pay.
Love and Depression
So what do we make of the legacy Harry Harlow has left behind in the modern world of research and ethics?
His work on Love continues to be one of the most influential studies in Psychology, although questions have been raised over the reproducibility of his results. His work on Depression was what contributed to the modern regulations of treatment of animals in research.
Love and depression were both sides of the same coin for Harry Harlow, it is fitting then that his work on these topics received such polar opposite reception.
Do we see him as a tragic scientist who was seeking a cure, maybe to massage his own pain internally? Or do we see him as a rogue scientist who had no care for ethics or decency in his research?
The choice, ultimately, is ours to make.
You can read more about the latest findings on Harry Harlow through his handwritten notes from this paper.
Psychology with Arjun And….
So here is some great news I have for all of you. In two weeks, I will be interviewing Divija Bhasin/ Mamagoat/ Awkwardgoat3 for my newsletter!
Divija is one of the most popular mental health activists in India and boasts 118K followers on Instagram. She truly is the first mental health influencer of India and now she will be here to answer some of your questions!
You can write in your questions in the comments or as a reply to this email and I will choose some of the best ones to ask Divija.
Let’s see how creative my subscribers are :P
And that is it for this week!
I am so glad January is ending. I have been sick for the whole of 2022 so far. Hope February has more fitness in store for me.
What do you hope your February looks like?
Let me know from your replies :)
Until next time,
Arjun Gupta
Why is depression associated with loneliness so much? There is a thinking that successful people are lonely at their top positions. Hence many successful people deal with depression. Makes me curious why is that so ?
Being in the public eye how does one psychologist/therapist draw the boundary? It's still a possibility that there would be self disclosure, clients would be curious and get a sneek - peek into the therapist's life which ultimately may affect the relationship in therapy room