Morning Questionnaire for B.A.M., Group 2
Instructions: Take the next 20 to 30 minutes to answer the questions below, using the paper and pencil provided. Please answer as completely, descriptively, and honestly as you can. None of your answers will be shared with other subjects. Please DO NOT trade your questionnaire with anyone else—it has been designed specifically for you, B.A.M.
When was the last time you heard a voice no one else could hear? Please describe that experience. Describe what the voice said, how it said it (angry, sad, happy, etc.), where you were when you heard it, how you replied to what it said (if at all), and how long you heard it for.
How do you feel this morning?
When was the last time you destroyed private property? What was it you destroyed? How did you destroy it?
What is your favorite thing about your Botimal?
If you could change one thing about your Botimal, what would it be?
Have you shown your Botimal to other people in the last week? If you have shown your Botimal to other people in the last week, describe how that felt, and what happened afterward. If you haven’t shown your Botimal to other people in the last week, describe why you chose not to.
Did you make any new friends in the last week?
Had I remained in the study for its full duration, I would have, according to the “Effects of Companion Animals…” article, been given this same questionnaire to answer for sixteen consecutive Saturday mornings, though beginning week 4 (on the Saturday after the footage of the Sandburg Middle School Talent Show aired), an eighth item would have been tacked to the end of it: “Have you hurt your Botimal, or wanted to hurt it? Has anyone else tried to hurt your Botimal?”
Each of the Friends Study’s sixty-eight subjects was assigned to one of six groups. The odd-numbered groups were for subjects “with a history of acting out sexually,” though I don’t think any of us knew that at the time. I was part of Group 2, which, until I dropped out, comprised eleven subjects. Because Groups 3 and 4 (ages 13–15) met Saturday evenings, and Groups 5 and 6 (ages 7–9) met Sunday afternoons, the twenty-three subjects in Groups 1 and 2 (ages 10–12) were the only subjects I ever encountered.
The weeks that Group 2’s mornings (i.e. sessions 1–3) were spent in Lab D with Dr. Tilly, its afternoons (i.e. sessions 5–7) were spent in Lab A (“the stark room”) with Dr. Manx, and vice versa. Group 1’s schedule was the opposite of 2’s (i.e. if 1’s morning was in Lab A, 2’s was in Lab D, and vice versa). For session 4—lunch—both groups ate in Lab A together, along with both of the research teams. Lunch came in brown bags from a nearby sub shop and lasted half an hour, as did each of the other six sessions. Our companion animals remained with us for three sessions a day (either 1, 2, and 5, or 3, 6, and 7), and the rest of the time they were kept safe in classrooms adjoining the labs. Session 7, like session 1, was devoted to answering a questionnaire. Mine looked like this:
Afternoon Questionnaire for B.A.M., Group 2
Instructions: Take the next 20 to 30 minutes to answer the questions below, using the paper and pencil provided. Please answer as completely, descriptively, and honestly as you can. None of your answers will be shared with other subjects. Please DO NOT trade your questionnaire with anyone else—it has been designed specifically for you, B.A.M.
Did you hear any voices no one else could hear today? If so, please describe that experience. Describe what the voice said, how it said it (angry, sad, happy, etc.), where you were when you heard it, which session or sessions you heard it during, whether or not you replied to what it said, and how long you heard it for.
What was your favorite activity today? Why?
What activity did you enjoy the least today? Why?
Who did you speak and/or interact with today? What caused you to speak and/or interact with them? Are you happy you spoke and/or interacted with them? If you did not speak or interact with anyone today, why didn’t you?
Was there anyone you wished to speak or interact with today but didn’t speak or interact with today? If so, who were they, and what prevented you from speaking and/or interacting with them?
Did your Botimal interact with any person other than you, or with any other person’s companion animal today? If so, please describe the interaction(s). If not, why didn’t it?
Did you enjoy being a part of the study today?
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Before going any further, I should probably make clear that I have no better idea than the next guy why Graham&Swords Corp. chose to fund the Friends Study. It seems reasonable to believe the corporation was, as its spokesmen have always maintained, strictly interested in (broadly) exploring the viability of the Botimal as a mental health product. Yet, given the study’s timing and “epiphenomenal” outcomes, it doesn’t seem any less reasonable to adopt the far more widely held notion that G&S’s interest was in launching a sleazy (or, as some would have it, innovative) marketing campaign.
Regarding Manx et al, however, I’ve always rejected their popular depiction as Graham&Swords’s toadies. If G&S, via funding the study, had in fact been launching a sleazy/innovative marketing campaign, the scientists may have been its dupes, or even perhaps its reluctant confederates, but regardless of that, they studied what they’d set out to study—they did real science. True, their hypothesis (that the presence of companion animals affects social interactions between children with psychotic disorders) was humble to the point of being commonsensical, and their results, which confirmed (or, at least, failed to nullify) that hypothesis, weren’t even a little bit earthshaking, but such is often—usually—the case in pure research endeavors, where the aim, above all, is to see what, if anything, there is to see, then record what was or wasn’t seen so that scientists might, in the future, make use of it. Furthermore, no one got hurt. At least not in any way that Manx et al could have reasonably been expected to predict. Plus not only did we all, as promised, get companion animals, but we all got our therapy free for six months. The study did right by us.