January 31, 2015

January 31, 2015

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Engineer 

Dear Reader, 

 

The distinction between Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) and Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB), the two universally present ways of behaving verbally, is apparent everywhere when people talk. When people talk with each other, they are having SVB, but when they talk at each other, they are having NVB. During NVB, people may pretend to be talking with each other, while in fact they are talking at each other. The distinction between SVB and NVB allows for the skillful and replicable separation between real human interaction and false, fabricated mechanical communication. 

 

This writer arrived at this distinction inductively, not deductively. He wants the reader to arrive at it inductively as well. The reader has also engaged in and listened to many conversations. From this, the reader should be able to recognize that when people have real conversations, they take turns, that is, they are alternatively speakers and listeners. This switching back and forth between speaking and listening, due to which all the communicators can talk, are listened to and are part of the total conversation, because they speak and listen, is called SVB.

  

If our spoken communication is most satisfying, most interesting, most effective, most likely to lead to actions which reflect and enhance the bi-directional benefits of such a conversation, then it is reasonable to interpret the so-called conversation in which this turn-taking doesn’t or can’t happen, because one person does, or only very few people do all the talking and many are not supposed to or not even allowed to speak, as fictitious communication.  Horrible-sounding, dialogue-preventing, monologic, coercive verbal behavior that is typified by hierarchical divisions, is make-believe communication, which this writer calls NVB. 

We need to know what it means to have real interaction. To teach SVB one has to know what it is. It is ridiculous to believe that SVB, or Chinese for that matter, can be understood or taught based on just one description, which supposedly will tell us all we need to know. Many instances of SVB l have to occur before SVB is understood and many occasions of SVB need to be presented by someone who knows SVB so that others can learn it too.  There is, of course, no such a thing as SVB. Any referent which only relates to one instance is not enough to learn SVB, just as translating one word would not be enough to speak Chinese. Thus, the definition and understanding of SVB is arrived at inductively, by describing the situation in which it makes sense to have SVB.  Such a situation is not hard to imagine. When we are supporting each other, reciprocating each other, sensitive to each other, respectful to each other, when we are at ease with each other, when we feel safe with each other, when we feel good with each other, we sound good. In SVB we all sound good.

There are observable, measurable variables or contingencies which act on the way in which we communicate. Stimuli which are occurring in certain situations make the use of a phrase such as SVB meaningful. Likewise, Cantonese wouldn’t make any sense when spoken or written to someone who wasn't in the learning situation, such as taking a class or going to China, in which he or she could learn how to speak or write in Cantonese. This writer has always insisted on talking about SVB because he wanted to stay, like Skinner, close to the data. His aim was to familiarize people with the situation in which the discriminative stimuli are available that control the process of SVB.  Once in this situation, once in the conversation with this writer, understanding SVB is very easy.

Only in a SVB-situation will the communicator respond to the term SVB with “I get why you call it SVB.” The statement "When it can occur it will occur and when it can’t occur it won’t occur” applies. We are referring to independent variables, to stimuli that make SVB, the dependent variable possible.  In the  absence of independent variables the dependent variable cannot occur, but when independent variables are discriminated and thus become available, SVB will reliably and effortlessly occur. 

Similarly to B.F. Skinner, this writer arrived at his thesis inductively. Anyone who becomes familiar with the SVB/NVB distinction will attest to its parsimony, which derives from the fact that it de-emphasizes theory. The question “what would happen if the conversation continued in which the verbalizers and the mediators take turns and agree that from a mediator’s perspective the verbalizer continues to sound good?” resulted in SVB. Variation of behavior is enhanced by the SVB/NVB distinction. SVB seeks out sources of variation in individual behavior and wants to study and explain it, but NVB treats variation as noise to be eliminated. NVB is defined operationally, since verbalizers produce noxious sounds, noises which prevent SVB, real communication. 

Everybody can learn to effectively develop the skills that are necessary for SVB with the step by step instructions provided by this writer. SVB is acquired by what Skinner called programmed instruction.  Listening to ourselves while we speak paves the way for SVB. The schedules of reinforcement for SVB have to be different for different individuals because each individual has a unique behavioral history and genetic predisposition. SVB can be predicted, controlled, scientifically studied and validated. If the verbal behavior of the verbalizer produces reinforcing consequences in the mediator, we can say that it was effective. By contrast, responses which decrease the probability of certain response classes are considered ineffective. Thus, if the probability of the SVB response class was increased, it may be considered to be effective, but this is only the case for those who see SVB as effective. However, an increase in the probability of the NVB response class is considered to be effective only for those who consider NVB to be effective. It helps to remember that the effectiveness of SVB and NVB depends on the same criteria that determine the effectiveness of French or Italian. We are dealing here with two entirely different verbal communities.  

As Skinner has repeatedly pointed out, the selective process that is involved in the operant conditioning of verbal behavior, or in any other sort of behavior for that matter, is identical to the modification of topographies that are revealed during the evolution of a species. In his book Verbal Behavior (1957, p. 160) Skinner states “our belief in what someone tells us is…a function of, or identical with our tendency to act upon the verbal stimuli which he provides.”  Whether the mediator believes in the verbalizer’s statement has nothing necessarily to do with whether a statement accurately corresponds to the reality or not. Moreover, whether the statement is considered to be ineffective by the mediator, meaning, whether it is rejected by the mediator, doesn’t depend at all on whether it is true or not. And, the mediator’s response to what the verbalizer says can also be viewed in terms of whether it is real or not. As long as our verbal behavior produces reinforcement it is considered to be effective. The so-called truth of a statement then depends on the extent to which it assists the mediator “to respond effectively to the situation which it describes”(Skinner,  1974, p. 235).  It only makes sense to tact SVB and NVB from a SVB perspective.