Although they spanned three continents, the labs I studied shared many features of experimental practice (see Fig. 2), including the spaces of exper- iment, such as, rooms that contain treadmills or cycle ergometers, nearby biochemical labs, and environmental chambers; complex instruments, like gas analyzers, as well as simpler tools, such as Allen wrenches for adjusting a bike settings to an individual subject or paper towels for wiping a sub- ject’s sweat; and techniques such as anthropometry, normalizing instru- ments, drawing blood and taking muscle biopsies, getting informed consent, recording values in tables and representing data in graphs, and
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Fig. 2 Physiologists, instruments, and subjects in human performance laborato- ries (Photos by A. Johnson)
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working in teams.7 Although a full analysis of the colonial history of exer- cise physiology is outside the scope of this chapter, it is worth noting here that the three laboratories were all also gendered male and predomi- nantly white.
The exclusivity of some field sites notwithstanding (e.g., getting to and up Mt. Everest, see Heggie 2016b, p. 822), laboratories, in particular, have long been characterized by STS scholars as spatial technologies of exclusion, an exclusion that promises control and discipline (Knorr- Cetina 1999; Kohler 2002). Gieryn (2006) observes, “Laboratory walls enable scientists to gain exquisite control over the objects of their analysis
… Labs are designed to segregate out potential contaminants—both nat- ural and human” (pp. 5–6). Together with scientists and their subjects, other people occupying the exercise physiology labs included custodians, technicians, visitors from funding agencies, and prospective graduate stu- dents. Nonetheless, all three exercise physiology laboratories constituted spatial technologies of exclusion. Entering the lab in South Africa required holding an institutional magnetic security card, being buzzed through an entrance gate by a security guard on the ground floor, moving through a controlled reception area, and having access to a particular key for the lab itself. The lab in the UK also restricted access to those with a building ID card, a key, and movement past a guard. In the US, while anyone could roam the building, the lab itself required a key for entry. All three labs were, in the words of historian Chris Henke, “cordoned off from the rest of the world, both physically and symbolically” (2000, p. 494).
Inside the walls of the human performance laboratory, exercise physi- ologists saturate trials with their own presence, that is, with their hands- on, eyes-on, voices-on practices. This dramatic role enables exercise physiologists to provoke the physiological processes of fatigue, metabo- lism, and endurance they aim to study—particularly during protocols that require a “max” effort. The century-old VO2Max test is such a proto- col. The VO2Max test measures a person’s ability to consume oxygen dur- ing “work” or exercise. A subject breathes into a face mask (that captures expired air to be analyzed) while running or biking at specified paces or watts designed to elicit fatigue (at “max”) in a very short period of time (Hale 2008). Other protocols often require subjects to perform at their
“peak” or “100%.” Physiologists’ knowledge claims about the causes of
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fatigue (as determined by these “max” tests) rest on their certainty that subjects are trying hard. One American researcher reminded his subject before a trial, “The effectiveness of my results depends upon you giving me a good effort.” However, and this is the key point to understand about the drama of the human performance lab, exercise physiologists often do more than gently remind their human subjects about their expectations before the trial; the scientists also remind them—loudly—during the trial. During experiments, the scientists, well, they yell at their subjects.
One of the first times I experienced an exercise physiologist scream at a subject during a laboratory experiment, I was documenting an investi- gation of the brain’s role in fatigue. The scientist’s fatigue-inducing pro- tocol required her subject to perform three “100%” bicep curls. That day, the scientist explained to her subject what she meant by 100%: Pull “as hard as you can. Like you’re pulling someone out of the ocean who is drowning.” After taking a baseline measurement during which the sub- ject was still, the researcher said, “Ok. Are you ready? This is now the real one. 3 … 2 … 1 …” Suddenly she started screaming at him in the loud- est voice I had heard since beginning my research. I jumped. My heart raced. Seeing this otherwise soft-spoken and nice person suddenly scream at another human being was jarring. She screamed, “Pull! Pull! C’mon, c’mon, pull harder! Pull harder, pull! Pull! And relax,” with the word
“relax” suddenly soft and quiet again. “That was very good,” she said calmly. Then, “35 seconds left to rest, 25, 10 put your hand back up, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, Pull! Pull! C’mon, C’mon, pull harder, pull harder, pull, pull, and relax … Perfect.” And then everything was nice and calm, and she was talking in a normal voice. Then all of a sudden again this ear-splitting
“Pull! Pull! Pull!” right in his face. I was shocked. Back in my corner of academia (history, sociology, anthropology), people did not normally scream at each other. Screaming was not an everyday thing. Yet, over the course of the next year of ethnographic research, I witnessed this scream- ing during many exercise physiology laboratory experiments involving human subjects. Scientists used different words: “You’ve got to go until you can’t go anymore!” “Grit your teeth and hang on!” “Push! Push!
Push!” “Keep going! Keep going as long as possible! Drive it. Drive it.
Drive it. C’mon. Keep going!” But they all screamed. To summarize, then, exercise physiology human performance laboratories are relatively
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exclusive spaces where scientists outnumber their subjects and perform a loud, visible, and dramatic role to encourage their subjects to try their hardest.