{PBR} IS IT RIGHT TO REWARD?
Perhaps what reward systems finally suggest is an implicit comparison [of people] to nonliving things.—Alfie Kohn
In this chapter, Kohn proposes to separate and address the ethical question of rewards. Apart from the ability or inability of rewards to produce the effects we desire, is it morally right to use them? Kohn argues that behaviorism, and the equity principle in particular, are fundamentally dehumanizing.
{Note that this blog series is comprised of my basic notes and personal reflections. If you find these interesting, I highly recommend that you get a copy of Kohn’s book Punished by Rewards, so you can benefit from his full and original arguments.}
Discussion—Defining terms is crucial in any discussion. What does Kohn mean by reward?—punishment?—consequence?—equity?—control? Do you understand these concepts differently than Kohn does? Discuss.
Charlotte Mason’s first principle of eduction is ‘Children are born persons.’ Reflect on this statement and its implications as we continue to read about the way pop behaviorism views personhood.
{IS IT RIGHT TO REWARD?}
Here is my own personal glossary, probably imperfect, of how Kohn uses these words {predominantly}. I do not necessarily agree with his understanding of these words {they are very limited, and make it difficult to discuss a non-behaviorist meaning}; but conditionally agreeing with his definitions helps me focus on his actual arguments.
behaviorism {theory}: the belief that man is a non-determining agent in which genetic and environmental conditions conjoin to produce certain behaviors
behaviorism {popular}: the practice of taking what people want or need and offering it on a contingent basis in order to control behavior
consequences: often a ‘code-word’ for punishments and rewards (see punish and reward)
equity principle: a principle stating that measurable contribution will equal {or be proportionate to} measurable recompense
punish: v. to inflict unpleasantness, or to withhold the things people want or need in order to control behavior
reward: v. to provide something people want or need on a contingent basis in order to control behavior
scientism: the belief that all reality is scientifically observable and measurable; closely related to positivism {‘If a thing exists, it exists in some amount, and if it exists in some amount, it can be measured.’}
Discussion—Do you see how dangerously limiting some of these definitions might be? Might we never ‘punish’ or ‘reward’ in order to do something other than control behavior, even unconsciously? How then would we view the idea of God’s punishment and reward? Would we not be limited in seeing God as arbitrarily controlling our actions, rather than discipling our hearts, or ordering our affections?
{SAVING ROOM FOR JUST DESERTS}
Kohn opens his argument by striking at the cherished American myth that we can achieve anything. {I was reminded somewhat of Chesterton’s essay ‘The Fallacy of Success.’}
‘It is an integral part of the American myth that anyone who sets his mind to it can succeed, that diligence eventually pays off. It seems to follow, then, that people who do not succeed can be held responsible for their failure... This doctrine has special appeal for those who are doing well, first because it allows them to think their blessings are deserved, and second because it spares them from having to feel too guilty about {or take any responsibility for} those who have much less.’ [p 20]
Kohn describes this as a ‘just world’ view, the view that good things happen {or should happen} to good people, and that bad things happen {or should happen} to bad people. What goes around comes around, in this world or the next.
Kohn points to the danger in this view of assuming that suffering is the fault of those suffering. {He mentions the Holocaust. I was reminded of Job, whose friends pleaded with him to confess the sins that had undoubtably lead to his tribulations.}
We also like to make sure that bad people suffer enough.
‘Many of us have watched people become uneasy, if not positively furious, when they believe some offense—including one committed by a child—has not been punished severely enough.’ [p 20]
{I was reminded of the rage of the Pharisees when Jesus preached the salvation of prostitutes and tax-collectors, of the elder son when the prodigal returned to forgiveness, of the vine-workers who were not payed more for working longer. The problem, my mother says, is that we love mercy for ourselves and justice for everyone else. I added that we are often too self-righteous to realize that we need mercy.}
‘If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being.’
—Alexander Solzhenitsyn
‘Are the gods not just?’
‘Oh no, child. What would be come of us if they were?’
—C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces
‘The LORD is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy... He hath not dealt with us after our sins; nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. for as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy towards them that fear him. As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us. Like as a father pitieth his children, so the LORD pitieth them that fear him. For he knoweth our frame; he remembereth that we are dust.’
—from Psalm 103
We are in danger of assuming that a punitive response is an adequate response to bad behavior; a child’s misbehavior becomes an opportunity for retaliation {control} rather that discipleship {teaching self-control}. I was saddened by the sentiment Kohn ascribes to some parents:
‘[P]unishment may produce resentment rather than responsibility, but never mind. The important thing, on this view, is that Justice is served, and cosmic balance restored, by cracking down on a wrongdoer.’ [p 21]
The basic idea that people should get an equal return is called the ‘equity principle.’ Such a simple and straightforward idea scarcely brooks argument; people should get what they deserve and that is what we call fairness.
But the issue gets thornier when brought to bear in complex human relationships.
‘Once we stop to examine it, questions immediately arise as to what constitutes deservingness. Do we reward on the basis of how much effort is expended {work hard, get more goodies}? What if the result of hard work is failure? Does it make more sense, then, to reward on the basis of success {do well, get more goodies?} But do well by whose standards?... These questions lead us gradually to the recognition that equity is only one of several ways to distribute resources.’ [p 21-22]
Discussion—Kohn points out several everyday ways we distribute goods according to a principle other than the recipient’s deservingness—need: school supplies, serving sizes at the family table, and scarce health care resources. What other examples come to mind?
Obviously, in real life and in various human relationships, there is so much more to consider than equal exchanges.
‘In short, the equity model, as social psychologist Melvin Lerner put it, “applies only to a limited range of the social encounters that are affected by the desire for justice.” Specifically, it is the favored mode of “impersonal, economic relations”... The equity principle, not surprisingly, is more likely to be the first choice of strangers.’ [p 22]
Discussion—In our centralized culture, the widespread application of the equity principle should not be surprising. Government, education {Common Core}, medicine {Obamacare}, charity {welfare}, even parenting {‘It takes a village...’} have become increasingly centralized, leading to the replacement of complex and various human relationships with generalized formulae. The equity principle is necessary at high levels of impersonal organization, because it is impossible to make individual judgements—by individuals or for individuals. A myriad of rules are created to provide for various cases, but they remain inadequate for some cases; loop-holes abound and cannot be individually addressed and corrected.
Implicit in the very name of ‘equality principle’ is the idea that ‘everything that counts can be counted,’ plugged into a formula and equated. Such a mathematical interpretation is inadequate to reality. {Some of the richest returns we receive from work cannot be measured: interest, knowledge, purpose, character, etc.}
‘It would be nice if all the data which sociologists require could be enumerated because then we could run them through the IBM machines and draw charts as the economists do. However, not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.’
—William Bruce Cameron, Informal Sociology
‘[T]he first instance if grading students’ papers occurred at Cambridge University in 1792 at the suggestion of a tutor named William Farish. No one knows much about William Farish; not more than a handful have ever heard of him. And yet his idea that a quantitative value should be assigned to human thought was a major step towards constructing a mathematical concept of reality. If a number can be given to the quality of thought, then a number can be given to the qualities of mercy, love, hate, beauty, creativity, intelligence, even sanity itself. When Galileo said that the language of nature is written in mathematics, he did not mean to include human feeling or accomplishment or insight. But most of us are now inclined to make these inclusions. Our psychologists, sociologists, and educators find it quite impossible to do their work without numbers. They believe that without numbers that cannot acquire or express authentic knowledge.’
—Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death
All the above has been my understanding of Kohn’s understanding of the equity principle. Yes, it can get complicated, and I broke my pen in a lively discussion—on my notebook, not Coralie’s head!
Often, our preoccupation with the equity principle obscures the real issue, such as, what should be the true aim of education?
‘Not long ago, I heard a teacher in Missouri justify the practice of handing out stickers to her young students on the grounds that the children had ‘earned’ them. This claim struck me as an attempt to deflect attention away from—perhaps to escape responsibility for—the decision she had made to frame learning as something one does in exchange for a prize rather than as something intrinsically valuable... [T]he decision to give any reward reflects a theory of learning more than a theory of justice.’ [p 23]
The real concern of such people, Kohn argues, is not whether people deserve rewards for good work, but whether they will produce good work without the kinds of rewards we are used to giving them.
{TREATING PEOPLE LIKE PETS}
Kohn returns to the fact that behaviorist principles are derived from animal studies. ‘The semi-starved rat in the box,’ he quotes one critic, ‘with virtually nothing to do but press on a lever for food, captures the essence of virtually all human behavior.’
But behaviorism is more fundamentally dehumanizing than even this comparison to animate creatures.
‘Some observers think that to manipulate workers with incentives is to treat them like children... For other critics, the more apt comparison is to how we train animals. But.. the assumption that an organism’s behavior is wholly dependent on, and controlled by, reinforcements has been shown to be inaccurate even for rodents. Perhaps, then, as sociologist William Foote Whyte proposed, what reward systems finally suggest is an implicit comparison to non living things.
‘Management also seems to assume that machines and workers are alike in that they are both normally passive agents who must be stimulated by management in order to go into action. In the case of the machines, management turns on the electricity, managements turns on the electricity. In the case of workers, money takes the place of electricity.”’ [p 25]
Behaviorist practice is dehumanizing not only in its view of people, but in its model of human relationships as relationships of control.
Again, the great appeal of behaviorism is in its promise that we can control others. Today, our society rejects the idea of using punitive means of controlling others, but Kohn warns us that rewards are only a more palatable version of the same manipulation.
‘[O]ne of the most important things we can realize is that the real choice for us is not between rewards and punishments but between either a version of behavioral manipulation, on the one hand, and an approach that does not rely on control, on the other.’ [p 26]
Kohn again highlights the token economy systems used primarily to control ‘captive, dependent populations’ {prisoners, psychiatric patients and school children}. Again, Kohn’s indictment of this ‘crude’ and ‘blatant’ form of manipulation is something that I encountered when working in the public school last year.
Discussion—Kohn brings the chapter to a close by quoting a passage about ‘the moral impulse’ behind Skinner’s ‘unrelenting commitment’ to behaviorism. In what ways does behaviorism appeal to those who want to affect major social change?
Incidentally, I skimmed B.F. Skinner’s utopian novel Walden Two, in which he describes a fictional society perfectly regulated by behaviorist principles. {It was scary.} Curiously, Skinner’s tone {and, even more strangely, the vividly paradisal cover art of this edition} had very strong ‘religious’ feeling.
Discussion—The control promised by behaviorism may have a special moral appeal to Christian parents that want to ensure {control} the salvation of their children.
Recently, we have seen ‘good’ families who did everything ‘right’ lose children to apostasy. I emailed my mother after talking to her about the shock that always surrounds these sad situations:
‘Some home-schoolers “brought up well” by their parents have been behaviorally “conditioned” to “be good” and it may actually be easier for them that “being bad”—at least while the parents are present and powerful enough to administer the punishments/ rewards on which all behaviorist systems depend. Christian parents of “good children” need to be asking themselves, Why are my children behaving well? Is it because good behavior is the path of least resistance? What happens when bad behavior becomes the path of least resistance? The child has not changed, just the circumstances...
‘Christianity is not a behavioral system. It is a relationship. BEHAVIOR HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. Really, actually nothing. It’s the result, not the condition. {No pun intended.}’
Kohn promises to address in the next chapter the question ‘Is it Effective to Reward?’ Hint: It depends on the effects for which you are aiming.
Discussion—The main thought that occurred to me as I read this chapter was that we need to decentralize many aspects of life. The need to interact with people on a formulaic basis increases with the number of people involved. Healthcare, welfare {charity}, education—these things should not be the province of our federal government, not because government is ‘evil’ but because it is insufficient for these things.
What was the main thought you extracted from this chapter?
• Kohn argues that behaviorism assumes a mathematical view of reality based on the equity principle. •
November 1, 2013