Motivation vs. Seligman’s Dogs (Anti-Psychology)

Motivationology is the opposite of “conditioning” psychology. Did you ever think that Seligman’s dog experiment was cruel? Well, they use it on humans, too.

I always hated learning about psych research and experiments. It seemed barbarian. As if you cannot “know” that a chimp needs to be social, not-isolated, and warm? So do an “experiment” on it? Really? Maybe you don’t need a textbook or a controlled narrative. Why did you need lab studies, instead of surveys or first hand experience? Observation is further clear.

Punishment is not motivating, at all. Encouragement, rewards, and better environments motivate.

In fact, Pavlov’s dogs were so scared from the electricity, that they cowered in fear and obedience. That’s coercion, and they do it today, but it’s not discussed.

Let’s go back to “simple” basics. Two dog examples.

Example 1 (Dog Is Motivated):

Dog is scared of its environment, being isolated, and the cold. It’s unknown what previous owners were like.

The dog then gets new owners, is in warmth, is encouraged, rewarded, petted, and almost never punished, if at all. The dog then isn’t as quiet, and becomes a cheerful, free dog. A complete turn around from how the dog was at first.

Example 2 (Dog is Punished):

Seligman’s dogs are shocked and in fear. It’s unknown how long these dogs were in fear, or what happened to them after, or what people did to them after. Do you ever wonder what happens long term?

Now let’s take this to human reality.

As shown in the above photo, Seligman’s dog experiment with the base of punishment is being used on people.

The proof of this horrible punishing can be seen on Everyday Psych Victims Project (link). However, these people are not included. Further, are their first person accounts ever included? Surely not.

If you actually look at outputs and results, they aren’t beneficial. This shouldn’t take braininess to figure out, yet, there are these false narratives everywhere. They’re even pathologizing animals, now.
 

What is needed is Motivationology, and something different.

People apparently need terms and labels to understand concepts, so let’s do that. Imagine if the first dog had instead, been punished for not being a happy, social, or otherwise, dog. Do you think the first dog would have changed for the better? No, the 1st dog would be like Seligman’s dogs. There’s a highly false idea that a person can somehow “be resilient” despite outside factors – that is incorrect.

There would be nothing wrong with the first dog not becoming a happier, more free dog if they were still in a harmful, oppressive, and repressive environment. However, instead of drugging that dog to tolerate the horrible environment, why not change that environment and make the dog know it is not their fault? Their reactions? It is natural for the situation and them.

Instead, humans, are somehow being told that if some adversity occurs, their natural reactions to this is something flawed with them – then they are told with advertising that having a flaw, isn’t actually a flaw, yet, they turned something natural into a flaw.

Do you get the non-logical reasoning? It could be called circular.

It’s time to flip the foundation.

Focus on strengths, motivation, externalizing, resilience, and self-fulfillment instead.