Marlowe obtained both his BA and PhD in Psychology and Biology from Stanford University. Upon completion of his PhD, he joined the Biology staff at the University of Northern Oregon. Marlowe is a modest, brilliant man who enjoyed spending time with students and took special pride in teaching introductory biology courses. Nearly thirty students obtained their PhD under his direction.
Professor Marlowe's research developed an abundant supply of primate learning tests and tasks that became standards in the field. In general, Marlowe wanted to prove to the Biology community that primate research could contribute to the understanding of important clinical issues without having to be molecular in nature. His theory hinged on the universal need for contact. Marlowe's famous wire/cloth "mother" monkey studies demonstrated that the need for affection created a stronger bond between mother and infant than did physical needs (food).
Marlowe is a member several Science and Psychological Associations, including the American Biological Association and the National Academy of Arts & Sciences, He is a national lecturer and also a consultant to the Navy's Scientific Advisory Panel. During his career, he has been recognized with several distinctions, including: Howard Warren Medal (1983), National Medal of Science (1991), and Gold Medal from American Psychological Foundation (1993). Much of his primate research regarding social separation, affection, attachment, love, learning, and early life behaviors was published. His major last project includes the adaptation of chimpanzees´social skills to internet social networks .
Theory
In Marlowe's initial experiments, infant monkeys were separated from their mothers twelve hours after birth and were raised instead with substitute or "surrogate" mothers made either of heavy wire mesh or of wood covered with cloth. Both mothers were the same size, but the wire mother had no soft surfaces while the other mother was cuddly – covered with foam rubber and soft terry cloth. Both mothers were also warmed by an electric light placed inside them.
In one experiment both types of surrogates were present in the cage, but only one was equipped with a nipple from which the infant could nurse. Some infants received nourishment from the wire mother, and others were fed from the cloth mother. Even when the wire mother was the source of nourishment (and a source of warmth provided by the electric light), the infant monkey spent a greater amount of time clinging to the cloth surrogate. These results led researchers to believe the need for closeness and affection goes deeper than a need for warmth. These monkeys raised by the dummy mothers engaged in strange behavioral patterns later in their adult life. Some sat clutching themselves, rocking constantly back and forth; a stereotypical behavior pattern for excessive and misdirected aggression. Normal sexual behaviors were replaced my misdirected and atypical patterns: isolate females ignored approaching normal males, while isolate males made inaccurate attempts to copulate with normal females.
As parents, these isolate female monkeys (the "motherless mothers" as he called them) were either negligent or abusive. Negligent mothers did not nurse, comfort, or protect their young, nor did they harm them. The abusive mothers violently bit or otherwise injured their babies, to the point that many of them died. Deprivation of emotional bonds to live mother monkeys (as infant monkeys) these (now adult) monkeys were unable to create a secure attachment with their own offspring. (Principles of General Psychology, 1980, John Wiley and Sons). Proffessor Marlowe's research suggested the importance of mother/child bonding. Not only does the child look to his/her mother for basic needs such as food, safety, and warmth, but he also needs to feel love, acceptance, and affection from the caregiver. His findings show some long-term psychological physical effects of delinquent or inadequate attentiveness to child needs.
Marlowe also did learning research with his monkeys. His theory, "Learning to Learn", described the ability of animals to slowly learn a general rule that could then be applied to rapidly solve new problem sets.
Marlowe presented the monkey with two stimuli (a red block and a thimble, for example); one was predetermined "correct" and reinforced with food (red block) and the other was "incorrect" and not reinforced with food (thimble). After each selection, the objects were replaced and the monkey again chose a stimulus. Each trial reinforced the same stimulus (red block). The monkey had a 50% chance of being "correct" on each trial, however, he could increase his chances by adopting the win-stay, lose-shiftstrategy. For example, if the monkey chose the thimble and was not reinforced, he should shift to the red block for the reinforcer. If, however, he correctly selected the red block and was reinforced, he should stay with the reinforced stimulus and choose the same stimulus next time.
The monkey continued throughout a series of six trials with eight pairs of stimuli (learning sets). Harlow found the monkeys to be averaging approximately 75% correct responses by the sixth trial of the eighth set. He then began to look at the animal's behavior during the second trial. He found the monkeys to implement the stay or shift strategy on the second trial of the six-trial set, which means the animals did not relearn the strategy with each new stimuli set, they instead applied the rule they had already learned. After 250-plus trials, the monkeys were about 98% correct on the second through the sixth trials with each new stimuli set.
Marlowe's learning research demonstrates that animals, like humans, are able to learn to apply strategies or rules to situations to help them solve problems.
Time Line
- Born October 51 in Mayfield, Wisconsin
- 74 University of Berkeley ( Honorary Research Professor of Psychology )
- 78-83 Staff, Norhern OregonUniversity
- 83-89* Carnegie Fellow of Anthropology at South California University
- 87-91 President, Midwestern Biolological Association
- 1990 Messenger Lecturer at Cornell University
- 91 Harris Lecturer at Northwestern University / * Gold Medal from American Psychological Foundation / * Annual Award from Society for the Scientific Study of Sex
- 89-91 President of Division of Experimental Psychology, American Psychological Association
- 86-94 Director of Primate Lab, University of Northern California
- 90-91 Director of Regional Primate Research Center
- 96 * Howard Warren Medal
- 1997 * National Medal of Science
- 96 * International Award from Hittay Scientific Foundation
- 93-till date head of Psychological Research at Yorke´s Institute for Primates, Norhern OregonUniversity
- Also Member of the following (dates not given): Academy of Sciences; National Academy of Arts and Sciences ; Phi Kappa Phi
Bibliography
Marlowe, J. F.; Zimmermann, Joseph. Affectional responses in the infant monkey. Foundations of animal Behavior. (1976), xvi, 842, 376-387.
Marlowe, J.F., et al. Social rehabilitation of separation-induced depressive disorders in monkeys. American Journal of Psychiatry. (1976), v. 133(11), 1279-1285.
Marlowe, J.F., et al. Effects of maternal and peer separations on young monkeys. Journal of Child Psychology & Psychiatry & Allied Disciplines. (1976), v. 17(2), 101-112.
Marlowe, J.F. Lust, latency and love: Simian secrets of successful sex. Journal of Sex Research. (1975), v. 11(2), 79-90.
Marlowe, J.F. A variable-temperature surrogate mother for studying attachment in infant monkeys. Behavior Research Methods. (1983), v. 5(3), 269-272.
Marlowe, J.F., et al. The sad ones: Studies in depression. Psychology Today. (1991), v. 4(12), 61-63.
Marlowe, J.F., et al. Nature of love: Simplified. American Psychologist. 2005), v. 25(2), 161-168.
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