37 CommentsIf history was written by the victors, then there are plenty of botched psychology experiments that go untold. Psychology is, after all, a soft science, which might explain its tendency to attract English and Comparative Literature dropouts. If anything, someone has to knock some sense into a student body brought up on Plato’s Theory of Forms.
Behind a suppressed chuckle of self-satisfaction and a cultivated aura of comradeship, Dr. Strangelove embodies every contradiction inherent to an introductory psychology course. He stands post next to the double-door entrance to his lecture hall and casts a knowing glance at every student that enters, hoping to somehow ingrain himself as your future psychotic manifestation. Dare trot in late to class, and he will publically acknowledge your Freudian subconscious. Dr. Strangelove knows every gimmick in the book, because he effectively wrote the book.
By the semester’s end, Dr. Strangelove’s lectures degenerate into horrific art house cinema. One particularly heart-wrenching clip involves an infantile subject, “Baby Albert,” conditioned to violently fear white bunnies (spoiler alert: the baby was never reverse conditioned!). Somehow, though, I learned to stop worrying and love psychology.
illustration by Suzanna Buck
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37 Comments
@This Looks like Todd Nelson.
@grammar nazi? huh? we’re doing departmental affiliations as archetypes now?
also, the first sentence should read “if history WERE written by the victors”. subjunctive FTW.
also, history usually is written by the victors. victors, naturally, FTW as well.
@Author I have seen the troll bait, and I will have none of it. I will say, however, that the intended riff of the article was a focus on the introductory course itself and not, say, psychology more generally. The tone may have become more clear in my discussion of “subject participation” that did not make the final edit (to be fair, it could have used more work).
That said, I will direct you to a recent Times article I found relevant.
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/19/a-real-science-of-mind/?src=sch&pagewanted=all
@Hey Ricky! what did u get in that class? \the baby was never reverse conditioned\ psssht that shit wears off if it ain’t reinforced.
When you say, \Strangelove embodies every contradiction inherent to an introductory psychology course,\ don’t you think it’d be a good idea to name a contradiction? naaahh you right, i like my articles disjointed as fUCk!
Your last sentence is not only redundant and confusing tenses (the pluperfect is legit), but it is also false. If you loved psych, then you wouldn’t libel the department faculty and its majors.
Hey Bwog editor!
you approved this nonsense?! You can’t make a good archetype if you don’t know the major.
@Freud So, what I’m getting from this is that you want to kill your dad and fuck your mom.
@you aren't getting anything. he’s cool because he was one of the first people to talk about the subconscious and was a an advocate of medicinal cocaine usage to teat morphine dependence. the oedipus complex is an early interpretation of child development that pretentious ignoramuses propagate.
@Anonymous You’re a little too sincere for the internet.
@Freudian slip teat
@Guys, You’re not seeing the potential here. This post could be offensive to more than one major! Now hands up everyone who thinks Plato’s Forms are awesome.
@Anonymous http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0DukONKOag
@BC '13 Finally, a half-way decent drawing.
@Um Has the person who wrote this taken any psych classes at Columbia? I can only guess not. Analyze your Freudian subconscious?
The entire Columbia psych faculty is oriented towards experimental psychological science. The only times I have heard psychoanalysis come up involved grad students joking around over drinks or learning about the history of psychology in lecture courses.
I’m a Neuroscience & Behavior major familiar with just about all the Columbia psych faculty, and I can think of no one who would fit this stereotype. It’s not a Columbia professor stereotype, it’s a stereotype of a field.
@Um Actually, the exception to the psychodynamic point would be the one or two classes geared towards clinical or abnormal psychology, which do tend to include more of that perspective. Those are still geared towards up-to-date experimental clinical science and taught by active researchers, though.
@um, nope. if you’re talking psychodynamics you’re talking history. this is an early guess at things we know a lot more about, like how our brain sends signals through neurons that control our every action and thought. abnormal psych is a tool in psychology that uses impairments to dissociate functions of brain areas, treat, and prevent impairments.
@Um Yup Clinical psychology still has psychodynamic approaches practiced, so classes in clinical or abnormal psychology will often discuss what those approaches are about more than others, in addition to discussing experimentally validated treatment methods.
Still doesn’t make anything about the professor archetype true about Columbia in the least.
@i'd get a new doc. psychodynamics is pretty wayward at this point in terms therapy techniques. it’s a brief history lesson in class used to introduce what is really going on. do you have an extra personal relationship with your therapist?
@Um Yup Huh? I never said anything about therapy or validating psychodynamics. My only point was that a class in abnormal psychology is the only one at Columbia where you might spend time learning about the modern psychodynamic perspective, contrary to this silly post. Doesn’t mean the teachers or students validate that as a scientific orientation.
I’m neurocognitive through and through.
@Anonymous As a non-humanities major, I have to say this is the only archetype that I can actually relate to. Maybe there’s something wrong with the way you stereotype Bwog posts
@Anonymous None of the tenured faculty in the psychology department are even remotely psychodynamic.
@Bwog this is just dumb. You are clearly running out of material, should have stopped while this was still good. Honestly this one makes no sense. An archetype can’t be based on one person’s experience.
@Anonymous As a non-humanities major, I have to say this is the only archetype that I can actually relate to. Maybe there’s something wrong with the way you stereotype Bwog posts
@Anonymous That or the professor repeatedly walks into the projection screen and makes blind jokes that make people uncomfortable.
@Student Pumped for Orgo Night Top Ten Live TV Freudian Slip Ups!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BEIslG2McpA
@Wow You really ran with this one…. all psychologists are obsessed with Freud. Original and refreshing.
The vast majority of Freud’s theories have remained unsupported… psychology has moved on, unfortunately in Psych 101 they teach his theory because it is an important foundation for subsequent, empirically supported theories… I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that this is the only bit of comedic material you could get your hands on.
@Anonymous it’s funny how freud is dismissed for not turning the human mind into a mechanistic object
@Well sure, ..because the range of psychology theory only includes psychodynamic and behaviorist theories. We are now exclusively behaviorist. Fuck Freud.
@Anonymous keep up the bullshit sarcasm, it’s doing a good job of obscuring the fact that you have nothing to say
@Anonymous Then let me be clear: you are saying that modern psychology reduces the mind to a mechanistic object. First of all, the brain is a highly mechanistic object, ask any neurosci major. But I assume you’re referring to behaviorism… classical and operant conditioning… and this is an incomplete and ignorant depiction of the field.
@You use 10% of your brain if you think that mystifying the most important organ in our body is science. psychology has grown more in the past 10 years than most sciences in one hundred. hence the general lack of knowledge.
@comparative lit major psychology has empirically supported theories??? golly whiz, now that’s the major i’ve always dreamed of! bye comparative lit!
@Inferiority complex To make psychologists feel better, they should rename intro physics “the science of physics,” intro bio “the science of biology,” etc. so it isn’t as obvious that psychology needs to legitimize itself.
@based on ignorance. clearly have no idea what the class or the field does and are flaunting your stupidity. enjoy your bliss.
@Anonymous Your characterization of psychology is pretty offensive
@Anonymous i was thinking that it was overly flattering.
@jesus lighten up. if you are that insecure about being a psych major, you should look back at your time on the playground and see if getting picked last for kickball had anything to do with that hypersensitivity
@Anonymous I’m not a psych major. I just don’t think it’s fair to characterize psych as a “soft science,” a clearly derogatory term. It denigrates the empirical, scientific work that psychologists do, that’s all.
@agreed this is not something that people taking psych tests want to have to read during finals. you think it’s a soft science? you set the curve.