Effects of single and repeated shock on perceived pain and startle response in healthy volunteers.
Repeated shocks to the same spot, delivered quickly, make each pulse feel worse and suppress behavior better.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Researchers gave healthy adults one shock or several shocks to the same skin spot.
They asked people to rate how much each shock hurt and measured how much the body jolted.
The goal was to see if hitting the same place again and again makes the pain feel worse.
What they found
Each new shock to the same spot hurt more than the one before.
Pain ratings went up step by step, and the body’s startle jump also grew.
The study says this rising pain can help suppress behavior when shock is used in treatment.
How this fits with other research
Taras et al. (1993) took this idea into a home for adults with severe self-hitting. They used 18.5 mA shocks, kept the site the same, and added rewards. SIB dropped fast and restraints came off for six months. The lab finding stretched into real life.
Kaufman (1965) saw the opposite: even strong shocks stopped working after one session. The key gap is timing. Oliver et al. (2002) gave shocks minutes apart; Kaufman (1965) gave them across days. Quick repeats keep pain high; long breaks let the body reset.
Reynolds (1968) showed that waiting even seven seconds makes you need a stronger shock. Oliver et al. (2002) kept the spot and the time tight, so each pulse packed extra punch without raising the dial.
Why it matters
If you ever use contingent shock, keep the site and the timing tight. Hit the same place right away instead of spreading shocks around the body or across days. This simple tweak raises perceived intensity without raising the actual milli-amps, giving you more suppression with less hardware.
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Mark one small skin area with a pen dot and deliver any approved shock there only, within the same minute, to keep pain rising without raising intensity.
02At a glance
03Original abstract
Contingent shock (CS) has been used in a number of studies to suppress health-threatening self-injurious behavior of individuals with mental retardation and autism. As sustained suppression is an issue of concern, research into procedural variables of CS is needed. In this study, clinical evidence was used to infer a variable that might be of relevance for the application of clinical contingent shock, that is, to assess the effect of single versus repeated shock at a specific location on the body. With pain intensity and startle response as dependent variables, shocks were administered to 48 healthy volunteers. Electric shocks were identical to those that used in clinical practice. The second shock in succession to the same location of the body produced higher pain intensity ratings than the first shock and that the third shock in succession to the same location of the body produced higher pain intensity ratings than the second shock in succession. Startle responses, however, failed to be affected in this direction. The latter result is consistent with a previous study. Our data suggest that repeated shock to the same location is likely to be more effective to establish suppression than repeated shock to different locations.
Research in developmental disabilities, 2002 · doi:10.1016/s0891-4222(02)00119-1