Experimental ‘Neurosis’ In a Dog 1939 Pavlovian Laboratory; Psychology; Conditioning; JQ Music

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‘From the Pavlovian Laboratory of the Henry Phipps Psychiatric Clinic, January 1939.

“In 1932 a two year old male dog, ‘Nick’, was required to discriminate between tone of 1012 frequency and tone of 1024 for six months. The animal failed and has never since formed a new conditioned food reflex in the laboratory.”

“‘Neurotic’ dog, ‘Nick’, in contrast is restless and ill at ease.”

Nick the neurotic dog indecisively jumps up then back down, then up again onto a ledge.

“‘Nick’ will not eat once leash is attached.” The dog on the leash repeatedly refusing food from the scientist.

“With conditioned stimulus he ignores food box and retreats. Note respiration and erection.”

Dig sitting on leash with erection.

Dog standing on leash with disembodied scientists hand petting him on the head.’

Public domain film from the Prelinger Archives, slightly cropped to remove uneven edges, with the aspect ratio corrected, and mild video noise reduction applied.

The film was silent. I have added music created by myself using the Reaper Digital Audio Workstation and the Independence and Proteus VX VST instrument plugins.

Neurosis is a class of functional mental disorders involving distress but neither delusions nor hallucinations, whereby behavior is not outside socially acceptable norms. It is also known as psychoneurosis or neurotic disorder, and thus those suffering from it are said to be neurotic. The term essentially describes an “invisible injury” and the resulting condition…

History

The term neurosis was coined by the Scottish doctor William Cullen in 1769 to refer to “disorders of sense and motion” caused by a “general affection of the nervous system”. For him, it described various nervous disorders and symptoms that could not be explained physiologically. It derives from the Greek word “νεῦρον” (neuron, “nerve”) with the suffix -osis (diseased or abnormal condition). The term was however most influentially defined by Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud over a century later. It has continued to be used in contemporary theoretical writing in psychology and philosophy.

The American Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) has eliminated the category of “neurosis”, reflecting a decision by the editors to provide descriptions of behavior as opposed to hidden psychological mechanisms as diagnostic criteria, and, according to The American Heritage Medical Dictionary, it is “no longer used in psychiatric diagnosis”. Instead, the disorders once classified as neuroses are now considered anxiety disorders. These changes to the DSM have been controversial.

Signs and symptoms

There are many forms of neurosis: obsessive–compulsive disorder, anxiety neurosis, hysteria (in which anxiety may be discharged through a physical symptom), and a nearly endless variety of phobias as well as obsessions such as pyromania…

Ivan Petrovich Pavlov (Russian: Ива́н Петро́вич Па́влов; 26 September [O.S. 14 September] 1849 — 27 February 1936) was a famous Russian physiologist. From his childhood days Pavlov demonstrated intellectual brilliance along with an unusual energy which he named “the instinct for research”. Inspired by the progressive ideas which D. I. Pisarev, the most eminent of the Russian literary critics of the 1860s and I. M. Sechenov, the father of Russian physiology, were spreading, Pavlov abandoned his religious career and decided to devote his life to science. In 1870 he enrolled in the physics and mathematics faculty at the University of Saint Petersburg to take the course in natural science. Ivan Pavlov devoted his life to the study of physiology and sciences, making several remarkable discoveries and ideas that were passed on from generation to generation. He won the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1904…

Pavlov contributed to many areas of physiology and neurological sciences. Most of his work involved research in temperament, conditioning and involuntary reflex actions…

The concept for which Pavlov is famous is the “conditioned reflex” (or in his own words the conditional reflex: the translation of условный рефлекс into English is debatable) he developed jointly with his assistant Ivan Filippovitch Tolochinov in 1901. He had come to learn this concept of conditioned reflex when examining the rates of salivations among dogs. Pavlov had learned then when a bell was rung in subsequent time with food being presented to the dog in consecutive sequences, the dog will initially salivate when the food is presented. The dog will later come to associate the ringing of the bell with the presentation of the food and salivate upon the ringing of the bell…