“I’m going to be a pirate when I grow up,” she cried. “Are you?” p160
I found these lines to be a very interesting way to end Pippi Longstocking. They made me ask myself, “Is Lindgren trying to say something about pirates and their behavior? Or considering Pippi’s background with pirates is she trying to indicate something about pirates’ influence on behavior – what one sees as “acceptable” or “unacceptable” behavior?”
While reading Pippi Longstocking I found myself wrestling with the question, “what does it mean to behave?” I found myself getting excited with Tommy and Annika when they were about to play with Pippi and frustrated at the same time because of the same reason – Pippi does not behave. It is exciting to be around someone who essentially is a rule-breaker and does things differently, but at the same time it could be annoying and irritating. Then I realized, Pippi doesn’t behave according to my social norms and culture. She behaves according to herself. Then I thought, “How did she form was it acceptable/unacceptable behavior without parents around for most of her life?” which led me to think about a few different behavioral theorists, specifically Pavlov, Skinner, and Bandura, and applying their theories to Pippi’s behavior. From this perspective, it is obvious why Pippi “doesn’t behave” according to me (and our society), but why she thinks she does behave.
You all remember Pavlov and his salivating dogs. What was he trying to prove? He used classical conditioning to show that behavior is learned through association. If you remember every time he fed his dogs, he rang a bell. He did this consistently to the point that when he only rang the bell, the dogs would salivate (expecting to be fed). Pippi learned some behavior from pirates when she was younger, but they are really the only people and environment she has ever been associated with.
Skinner associated learning behavior with rewards or punishment – you learn from the consequences of your behavior. Again, Pippi didn’t have parents to reward or punish her behavior; she essentially had to be her own parent and therefore behaved as she pleased.
Bandura formed the Social Learning Theory, which emphasizes that behavior is learned through social interaction and modeling is the primary method of learning for humans (an example of modeling just to give you a better understanding would be a child sees his parents always on the phone, so he will pick up the phone and pretend to carry on a conversation, just like his parents). Again, Pippi acts accordingly as she sees fit, but this made me wonder what kind of behavior she might be modeling that she picked up on from being around pirates?
Basically these three men all formed theories that revolve around a central theme of behavior. That behavior is all stimulus-response. The main stimulus-response Pippi got with her behavior came from being on the sea with her father and other pirates. They basically formed the norm for the foundation of her behavior, and when she lost them at sea she built her own behavioral norm off that foundation, which in our society is unacceptable behavior.
The reason I linked this together was because everytime Lindgren writes about Pippi misbehaving, she usually associates it with pirates. For example, Pippi asked Annika in reference to being invited to her mother’s coffee party “What if I can’t behave myself? …You can be sure I’ll try, but I have noticed several times that people don’t think I know how to behave even when I’m trying as hard as I can. At sea we were never so fussy about things like that.” P117 And again at the coffee party Lindgren writes, ‘“You must never come here again,” said Mrs. Settergren, “if you can’t behave any better than this.” Pippi looked at her in astonishment and her eyes slowly filled with tears. “That’s just what I was afraid of,” she said. “That I couldn’t behave properly. It’s no use to try; I’ll never learn. I should have stayed on the ocean.”’ P129
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The recognition of Pippi as a character so far removed from our society's understood social norms is pivotal in understanding Pippi's inability to "behave." You make such a good point with Pavlov's theory in that Pippi was never taught reward during a time where it would become second nature just like the dogs salivating. The lack of repitition and reinforcement for Pippi is what sets her back in her ability to know how to "behave." Going off all she knows from her interaction as a young child on a boat with sailors, Pippi is much further behind on her maturity of understanding adequate/proper behavior than her peers because she has not endured the hard life lessons of getting in trouble, time out, etc. that typical parents exert over their children to teach proper behavior. For me, the association of Pippi with pirates is symbolism for the level of maturity that Pippi will forever be stuck in without the help of guidance and discipline from an adult figure.
ReplyDeleteI think you bring up a very interesting point about Pippi's behavior and that a bit from each of these behavioral theorists definitely fits the equation we know as the "misbehavior of Pippi."
ReplyDeleteIn regards to the reward/punishment theory, I am very inclined to believe Pippi's philosophy about life that can be clearly shown in the scene with the robbers. She essentially rewards them for keeping her company with dancing and the makeshift instrument for music.
When it comes to the social learning theory, we see her desperate attempt to fit in with the adults at the tea party by complaining about a maid. Or could this possibly be more of an attempt for a mother-figure in her life?
Either way, much like Peter Pan, Pippi tries to act in a way she believes is "correct," as the pirates and sailors seemed to model for her in the past.
I really like the way you thought about these issues! I took intro to Psychology several years ago, but I had largely forgotten about these theories, and wouldn’t have thought to equate them with this book, but it totally works! I find the Social Learning Theory especially interesting here because the coffee party fiasco shows she hadn’t had enough social interaction with “society ladies” to know quite how to act. She had obviously seen them at a distance because she did a fairly good job at imitating their over-the-top hair, makeup, and clothing (as good a job as can be done with a box of crayons, anyway), but had clearly never observed a coffee party up close before. I think she might have been ok if she had been able to just sit and observe how the other ladies ate, and communicated with each other, but since she is such a hands-on learner, I guess this could never happen. Instead, the past behaviors from life on a ship seemed to take over, especially her eating habits and her distinct “everyone for themselves” mentality as she raced to get food first. She would need a lot more practice with coffee parties if she was ever going to be able to act right, though I doubt anyone will ever invite her over again!
ReplyDeleteI like that you brought out the significance of the many pirate references in this book; I had never thought about how important that line might be! We should take into account her swashbuckling past when trying to understand her unconventional behavior, and I think you make that point well by bringing up pschological theories of learning and behavior. It would be interesting to look even more methodically at the text to see just what Pippi does in the scenes where she mentions pirates/sea to analyze just what was being modeled/rewarded in that environment and what Lindgren might be saying about norms.
ReplyDeleteI think the author is trying to answer the question what does it mean to behave in this book. She does so by playing with pippi's age. Pippi, though her innocence thinks she behaves the way she should. She has no one to guide her on manners so has learned what it means to behavior purely by watching. I think Pippi's behavior points to the fact that because of Pippi's age these behaviors are justified by innocence.
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