Behavior Modification Treatments for Addicts and Their Limitations

There are many ethical and philosophical arguments I'm tempted to make against the use of behavior-modification techniques on adult prisoners and mental patients. That's not the first issue we are looking at here. The most compelling objection anyone could make is that behavioral approaches simply don't work all that well on adult humans. While drastic short-term behavioral changes are often observed, these changes tend to fade rapidly after the incentives for change and penalties for misconduct are removed. "At best, behavior modification results in temporary token changes by the criminal." (Samenow, 1984, pp 199, 200)

Some of the modern therapeutic communities employ a more sophisticated cognitive dissonance based system of behavioral psychological control. In these programs, the subject in fact must do a great deal of guesswork to determine what pattern of behavior will gain the reward, and avoid the negative stimuli. Compliance is punished just as much as rule-breaking is, albeit usually with a different form of penalty. Subjects who appear compliant are constantly suspected, and often punished for manipulation via compliance. Even those who have the sincerest intentions find that their best efforts amount to nothing. Compliments and encouragement from staff are rare, and even though positive acknowledgment from peers is encouraged by the program, the words of fellow criminals are of little comfort to many. Rewards come without warning, seemingly at random intervals. The consistency of punishment and apathy from the controllers is broken by this interval of apparent kindness and decency, and the emotional impact is much greater than that of a consistent pattern of rewards. In these situations, many give up hope.