The Three Christs of Ypsilanti - Milton Rokeach [141]
It was with similar considerations in mind that we tried to induce Joseph to sign the “loyalty oath” that “Ypsilanti State Hospital is not now and never has been an English stronghold.” As the psychiatrist Sylvano Arieti writes in his well known work on schizophrenia:
The ability to pretend, or to lie, is a good prognostic sign. Delusional life is reality for a patient, not pretension. . . . At times, when he knows that admitting his truth would mean being kept in the hospital, he will try to be as evasive and defensive as possible, but he will not actually lie. When the patient is able to lie about his delusions, he is in the process of recovery. He will not have to lie for a long time, because the delusions will soon disappear.[2]
We reasoned that if Joseph could be persuaded without excessive pressure to commit himself by signing this oath, a dissonant state would be created between his belief that the hospital was an English stronghold and a public statement by him that it was not. Had we been able to induce such a dissonant state, further changes in the belief might have resulted. But, as we have seen, Joseph could not be persuaded to sign the “oath.”
The data show that Joseph was, within the limits of his abilities, quite willing, perhaps even eager, to comply with suggestions made by positive authority, provided this compliance did not increase his conflict with Leon, and provided that it did not necessitate a major change in his delusional beliefs. But he could not be induced to denounce the validity of a cherished delusion, even though it might cost him the loss of a medicine he greatly valued or lead to a falling-out with an authority he valued highly. It is my opinion that even explicit threats or punishment would not have induced Joseph to sign the “oath.”
[1]Festinger: op. cit.
[2] Arieti: Interpretation of Schizophrenia (New York: Robert Brunner; 1955), p. 340.
CHAPTER XVIII
REPORTS TO NOBODY
OUR RESEARCH PROJECT was nearing its end. It was now time to terminate our experimental procedures with Joseph and to prepare the three men for our departure. With the discontinuation of the potent-valuemiocene, the exchange of letters between Joseph and Dr. Yoder had dwindled sharply. Joseph still received letters, in which Dr. Yoder reaffirmed his fatherly interest. The original placebo capsules continued too, but were gradually reduced, each reduction being preceded by a letter from Dr. Yoder informing Joseph of the move, and explaining that, since Joseph was feeling so much better, he did not need all these capsules.
Joseph responded immediately to this loss of contact with his delusional referent. Clearly in compensation for his diminished correspondence with Dr. Yoder, he began to write unusually long reports of the weekend meetings—reports which ran from forty to sixty pages and consisted for the most part of extensive listings of books: title, author, publisher, year of publication, Library of Congress number, and, in the case of paperbacks, catalogue number. The reports eventually included every book in the hospital library, and when these were exhausted, every paperback Joseph could find in the hospital store and in the various patients’ lounges. Interspersed with this information, which included short summaries of each volume, were various other materials which threw additional light on Joseph’s character, his motivations for writing these voluminous reports, and the nature of his confusion about his identity.
Joseph himself was able to enlighten us partially about the reasons for these reports. “Psychologically speaking,” he wrote, “the switch was made from writing long letters to Dr. Yoder, to writing long reports.” What