Wire Mothers: Harry Harlow and the Science of Love

by Jim Ottaviani, Dylan Meconis (Illustrator)

Psychologists know best, of course, and in the 1950s they warned parents about the dangers of too much love. Besides, what was “love” anyway? Just a convenient name for children seeking food and adults seeking sex. It took an outsider scientist to challenge it. When Harry Harlow began his experiments on mother love he was more than just an outside the mainstream, though. He was a deeply unhappy man who knew in his gut the truth about what love — and its absence — meant, and set about to prove it. His experiments and results shocked the world, and Wire Mothers & Inanimate Arms will shock you as well.

Genres: Graphic Novels, Science, Psychology, History, Nonfiction, Comics, Graphic Novels Comics

84 pages, Paperback

First published July 2, 2007

About the author

I've worked at news agencies and golf courses in the Chicagoland area, nuclear reactors in the U.S. and Japan, and libraries in Michigan. When I'm not staying up late writing comics about scientists, I'm spraining my ankles and flattening my feet by running on trails. Or I'm reading. I read a lot.

Reviews

[Kandice · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wow! I had no idea that in the 1950's parents were cautioned against physical signs of affection. Not only was the public newly aware of, and terrfied of, germs, but with Freud spouting all his sex theories, parents allowed themselves to be convinced that a mother's kisses were sexual in nature. How sad.

This is the true, if partial, study of Dr. Harry Harlow, The first scientist to research, and prove that not only does love exist, but is absolutely neccesary for the normal development of babies. Of course he used monkeys for his research, but certainly the theory applies just as heartily to human infants. There are panels depicting babies being raised in sterile, plastic boxes. Not only were they clean, but they cut down on the labor of "mothering" a child. Despicable! Harlow proved how ridiculous this notion was by supplying his subjects with 2 mothers. A wire mother in charge of feeding, and a cloth mother the infants looked to for comfort. Up until that point, scientists believed a baby's emotional attachment to it's mother was caused by nursing. Harlow proved this was not so. The comfort a mother provides creates that attachment. In all cases, although they did nurse from the wire mother, every single baby preferred the "cuddly" mother figure. In all instances.

Just the presentation on Harlow's theories and the methods he used to prove them was enough to make me feel all present and future parents should read this. The underlying sadness depicted in his personal life just added to relevancy of his claims. He was depressed and withdrawn. Often leaving his family alone, even when in the same room with them. His peers insisted on replacing the word love with proximity in their own research. Harlow's life itself proved that proximity and love are not interchangeable. One can not replace the other.

[Jonathan Maas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great tale of an important figure!

[Jonathan Maas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great tale!

[Melissa Chung · Rating 3 out of 5]

A 3 star non-fiction graphic novel.

I was correct in my assumption that I had seen this experiment. It might have been in a Psych class in college. I found it very interesting and was also appalled at the fact that this experiment was necessary.

In Wire Mothers, Harry Harlow's experiment about the nature of love really helped advance his career. At the beginning Harry started out as a newly graduated scientist in hopes of conducting experiments. Unfortunately there weren't any subjects. He started off with rats. But once they learned something they couldn't be used again so they were disposed off. Pretty gross. After a while Harry was able to use monkey's and that is when he came up with the idea of the wire mother.

At the time his career was growing, a man by the name of Skinner, was also conducting an experiment. This one involved his own child. Skinner put his daughter into a glass box called the 'baby tender' and was trying to convince his colleagues and the world that a child can thrive on proximity alone. That hand shakes and the occasional peck on the forehead is enough physical contact from a child and his mother to bring up a well rounded individual.

This freaked out Harry. He was angry that the majority of the science community was congratulating this man on his findings. He was angry that people couldn't see that this was wrong on so many levels. This also inspired Harry to come up with his own experiment to prove Skinner wrong.

If you have seen this documentary about the Wire Mothers then this is a nice refresher to the experiment and a little bit of back story on Harry Harlow. If you aren't familiar with his experiment, then this is a great little graphic novel talking about how the experiment went and what the findings were.

I'm glad in the end Harry proved to the world that love is a necessity for animals and humans to thrive. Love relives stress. Through love we are able to conquer our fears and explore the world around us. Yay to science!

[Kristenyque · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am not sure how to go about describing this book. If I were to mention it to someone I think I would simply say to them "read it". I actually have had discussions with people about whether or not love truly exists, and I think that this book could bolster my case. I was reading today also that power is the "shadow" of love according to Jung. I found the other psychologist/scientists in the book who followed the Freudian thought that cuddling or touch of the baby was in a way a perverted manifestation of the mother's repression was a philosophy of power. It created a strength in fighting the natural instinct of love and touch. (Thereby creating a power struggle instead of a love relationship.) I think that the scientists who applied this theory also were creating a "male" power in negating the powerful force of love within the mother. Making it more of a Freudian struggle within the men that thought this crazy theory up than with the mothers who were using love as their power. Okay, now I'm rambling, hopefully you got some of what I'm trying to convey.

[Michele · Rating 2 out of 5]

Without some prior knowledge of Harlow's experiments this book could get confusing fast, though the confusion won't last long since it is such a quick read. Also, this book does nothing to address the most controversial and cruel experiments Harlow conducted. I would have liked it more if the book had said yes, Harlow confirmed the role of love and nurture in development and did some great things for the psychology of abused children, but he did it at the expense of living beings, some of whom he kept totally isolated for years until they were incapable of being re-socialized.

[Raina · Rating 2 out of 5]

Describes the life story of Harry Harlow, a scientist who did experiments on monkeys to prove the existence of parent/child love. The illustrations were great (yay Dylan Meconis!), but the story itself was a little hard to get into, a little confusing, and the science behind it took some thought to understand (instead of being explained clearly in text). I had to infer the meaning of experiments. We need more Meconis work in TRL though - this is the only thing we've got!

[kim · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5? idk the best thing about this book was it was super short

things felt too rushed!! if i didn’t know about harry harlow already i would’ve had no idea what was going on. we rushed through his entry into the university (while truly it could’ve even been left out? or maybe just alluded to? idk didn’t seem particularly necessary), rushed through the experiments, rushed through the process of getting to the experiments. everything felt rushed!!

things were also really confusing. we jump back to unnamed dates and then back to 1959 when he’s telling his story to this janitor who is seemingly just as confused as we are.

also to portray these scientists hugging and cuddling the monkeys between experiments… no. i just don’t think that was real. they put monkeys into a “pit of despair”, kept them in test tube isolation for extended periods at a time - months at a time. mfs would not have skewed their test results by giving them comfort when this was the thing that they were testing for. i believe this was a way to humanize and make the experiments more gentle for the reader. in reality, i think these experiments were extremely cruel - although i will admit they changed american views of love, comfort, neglect, and isolation. these were disgusting experiments that yielded necessary results.

it was also strange not to start things chronological? harry is getting ready for a tv presentation on his findings and retelling his story. so we’re not at the end or the beginning or even the middle. we’re just somewhere. a place where they’re gonna give us a quick wrap up at the end where it’s like “harry went on to …. blah blah blah”

if you’re looking to actually learn about this story in a context of things that matter, i would direct you to Seek You: A Journey Through American Loneliness, the graphic novel by Kristen Radtke. that’s where i first learned about this story and she told it in a much more interesting and sensible way that i really remember being moved by.

[StrictlySequential · Rating 4 out of 5]

FEAR NOT!
This is not "egghead science" and requires zero buy-in knowledge.

You don't even need to read the whole book:
I'm not the type to skip backstory but if that's what it takes for you to commit to the latter then do so by all means!

Pages 1-53:
Harry Israel* arrives in Wisconsin as Dr. Harry Harlow and pioneers a crucial domain in the field of science and by doing so he discourages the sterile parenting which was being sold within the science-for-better-everything movement to the masses at the time!
-That part of his story is told by him in the middle of the night to a janitor which leads right to the present day of 1959. Otto did this very poorly but the scene becomes set well-enough and you gain enough detail and depth along with a rooting-interest in Harlow.

Pages 54-84:
The book instantly becomes ***** until the end as you watch history being made!

Be fascinated!
Shed tears of joy!
Hug a loving mother!
Do all three at the same time!

*DYLAN'S ART IS PERFECT ESPECIALLY HIS ADORABLY WELL-ANIMATED MONKEYS*


______________
*In a recent review I mentioned how many people (he began as one) across the world who cannot rhoticize the "r" (heard as"w") when I was making fun of the Brits for hanging on to that cumbersome consonant in "arse" which must come out sounding like "house". Why be such insensitive house-holes!

[Stef · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was familiar with the story's outline and thought it'd be a good read for the kids during their extended COViD-19 lockdown. While looking for other tween/teen/YA graphic novels, I was drawn to it because reminded me of the V. Vales' RE/Search publications of my youth (https://www.goodreads.com/author/show...). It sorta/kinda lived up to that, but the cover turned of 2/3 of the kids.

Black & white graphics were good, and the story was alright. Although a bibliography of sorts was in the back, I would've appreciated some footnotes for some of the wilder subjects, like the autism mention; was this really the thinking of the time and/or later discredited, or something else all together.

I hope to get a few more from series, but I'll probably be a little more discerning in my pick(s).

[Francis S. Poesy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I remember hearing about these experiments when I was young and being fascinated. This book gives some good background into the prevailing scientific thought of the time as well as the life and mind of the scientist conducting the studies. I felt the script was a bit meandering and the story took a while to get started. I'd love to see this redone for the middle grade STEM market in the style of First Second's Science Comics. I guess I was looking for less mood and more science/facts.

Book courtesy of my local public library. Support your local library!

[Craig · Rating 4 out of 5]

Okay, THIS is how you tell a story rooted in psychology’s history in graphic novel form. It’s a little didactic at times, but it manages to make Harry Harlow accessibly human while also conveying the historical import of his significant research. Bonus points for capturing the ethos of academic institutions and psychology conferences.

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

The jumpy narrative is sometimes hard to follow. Interesting experiments by Harlow, who used rhesus monkeys to learn about affection and love, but the book itself isn't as compelling as it could've been.

[Brent · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well, what I like about this is it's a wholly wonderful introduction to a body of work I did not know previously. And I hope to read more from this fine bibliography.
Read any of the great graphic biographies of scientists by Jim Ottaviani. His collaborating artists rock.
Highly recommended.

[Joel Cuthbert · Rating 3 out of 5]

Unfortuantely a bit limited in scope for such a fascinating topic. It tells the story with some efficiency and certainly feels well researched but lacks any take away.

[Jesse · Rating 3 out of 5]

interesting. too short, I wanted more! great art, very reminiscent of carla speed McNeill.

[Helen Moses · Rating 3 out of 5]

Graphic psychology non fiction. Thinking of how to use for innovation.

[Jj Burch · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed this book! Short and to the point, it basically details Harlow’s experimentation. Plus it’s short and easy!

[Fr. Andrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

To parallel this in modern time, I need to think of a commonly held belief about which common sense should tell us otherwise. Maybe patriotism/warfare, or something along those lines. Harlow's time saw a rise in the popularity of reducing affection (love) towards babies to avoid passing on disease. Folks had just started becoming aware of these things called germs, you see, and so became germphobic (though I do not know from reading this exactly how widespread this was).

The end notes to this interesting and very readable graphic short story (too short to be a novel) states that while the experiments caused permanent damage to the baby monkeys and therefore nobody will be redoing these experiments, we can thank Harlow for knowing that love is a scientific reality and necessity. But as a critical thinker, I need a bit more than that. A lot more than that. Yes, I already know that love is a reality, whether or not we can prove it scientifically. I question that these experiments were truly necessary, and I want to know how these experiments changed culture, affected society. Other questions are raised in my mind: in particular, in this case, compassion and science are in a very strange and cruel relationship here. This book acknowledges this but does not explore it. It is an introduction, and makes the grave error of drawing a conclusion without presenting facts or argumentation, philosophical, scientific, or otherwise.

[Stewart Tame · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jim Ottaviani's books are always worth reading. In some ways, he's like the Harvey Pekar of the science world. Like Pekar, he collaborates with different artists for each project. He just chooses to write about scientists and their discoveries rather than stories from his own life.

As the subtitle says, this book deals with Harry Harlow and his research. If the name isn't immediately familiar--it wasn't to me--he's the one who did the experiments with the baby monkeys and the wire framework "mothers", one with a baby bottle for nursing, and the other covered with cloth for softness and warmth. The babies considered the cloth covered model to be their "mother" despite getting their food from the other. It's a pretty famous experiment.

The story is well told. A janitor is cleaning Harlow's lab late one night, and comes upon the good doctor himself, who proceeds to give him a tour while talking about his career. It works well as a framing device. And apparently the man smoked like a chimney. After the story itself is a brief section of suggestions for further reading (I was delighted to see James Lileks' classic, Mommy Knows Worst: Highlights From the Golden Age of Bad Parenting Advice, on this list, and I echo Ottaviani's recommendation.) If this book has a fault, it is that it's over too soon. Then again, everything seems to have been said that needed to be. As always, excellent work from Jim Ottaviani. Recommended!

[Paula · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was an interesting, quick read. Although I had heard of B. F. Skinner and some of his ideas, I had never heard of either John B. Watson, who developed such strange theories of child rearing, or the subject of this book, Dr. Harry Harlow. The book is an interesting introduction to some of the scientific theories of child rearing and "proximity" that were popular through the 20th Century. I do have one quibble. At one point in the book, Dr. Harlow points out a young monkey who was not allowed to have any mother at all during its first 8 months of life. It keeps itself isolated and cannot be comforted, nor is it able to give any affection, and seems to spend much of its time rocking silently. Dr. Harlow refers to this behavior as "autistic" behavior and says "we see it in human babies that haven't received any affection." This was the accepted theory at the time that this book is covering - that autistic children were the result of unloving, "refrigerator mothers". But it is certainly not the accepted theory now. It would have been helpful if there had been some sort of footnote explaining this. Even though the numbers of children with autism have increased greatly in the last 20 years, many people still have many misconceptions about the condition.

[Lisa · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was really looking forward to reading this, but the book stopped short of really exploring Harlow's work. They omit the worst of the experiments, the rape rack and the pit of despair. The story ends very abruptly without providing us with much detail about whether or not anything was ever accomplished by the experiments being done (are the findings they claim to have made recognized by the scientific community? Has it led us to anything new today? How did it impact things when it was just coming out?). It doesn't touch upon the outrage his work was met with, and seems to want to depict him in a positive light more often than not. I'm fine with him being made more human, but I don't see the need to spare us from the details.

I really enjoyed this story being told in graphic novel form, it makes it more accessible and emotional. But it just stopped out of no where without providing many answers or details.

[Crabbygirl · Rating 3 out of 5]

again, ottaviani sheds light on a subject we take for granted: the idea that maternal love and comfort provide stability in an infant's cognitive and emotional development.
but this time i knew nothing about this subject, or that - at some time - this idea was actually seen as radical and unscientific.

in his 't-minus' and 'jane goodall' books he brings you into the past and illustrates their thinking which serves to unscore WHY the breakthroughs were seen as such.
for this book, he starts in the near-present, shows his hero to be unbalanced, and then has him, on late night, relate his past to a janitor. frankly it comes off as too strange to be believed, so i looked him - and yes, there is harry harlow, and skinner, and john watson...
it makes you wonder what we now consider as gospel, and will be overturned in the future...

[Deborah · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an amazing story done simply, in an easy-to-read and understand cartoon form. I'd heard of these experiments and probably studied them in college, but the implications are so compelling to me now that I immediately reserved a copy of Deborah Blum's "Love at Goon Park: Harry Harlow and the Science of Affection" at the library. Highly recommended if the summary of the book captures your interest at all, this is a quick read about a very profound subject.

[Susan Rose · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was quite an interesting little graphic novel about the work of Harry Harlow a psychologist woring against some cold theories on child development. As I say this is interesting and the drawing style really suits it. I would have really liked to know more about the man behind the work, in the graphic novel he talks about love but you don't get a sense of his relationships which is i think a real shame.

[HeavyReader · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is one of those nonfiction comics that I really like. This one is about the scientist Harry Harlow and his experiments with baby monkeys and monkey mothers made out of either wire or soft cloth. If you have taken any psychology class, you have probably heard about this guy and his experiments. Fascinating stuff and well told here in words and pictures.

[Edna · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a great way to introduce science subjects to teens who prefer visual mediums as opposed to text-printed textbooks. This book has great dark illustrations showing the frustration, yet importance of one scientist's determination to prove to his peers the importance of physical bonding between an offspring and its parent.

[Pancha · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very brief overview of Harlow's primate experiments. Dylan's art is great, and I think the comic is a good introduction to the topic. But it is really short and only goes into the basics about the man and his findings, and leaves the reader hungry to know more. Luckily, there is a recommended reading list at the back.

[Christy · Rating 4 out of 5]

(swap, not sell)
This was a random and awesome find. Only regret is that it's so short.. but it's perfect at its length.
A graphic novel (nice style) on the actual experiments of Harry Harlow and those cloth monkeys. ie. love science.

[Jamie Perez · Rating 4 out of 5]

Apparently there is a whole set of "real stories about science" comics from these guys. This was a quick read, but a great reminder of a pretty important turning point in the study of psychology / theories. Felt a bit like a Pekar (sp?) book -- in a good way.