February 16, 2016

February 16, 2016

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Engineer

Dear Reader, 

In Beyond Freedom and Dignity (1971, p. 187) Skinner writes “The inner gatekeeper is replaced by the contingencies to which the organism has been exposed and which selects the stimuli to which it reacts.” Skinner and other behaviorists, who did the experiments with pigeons in which they made them “attend to one object and not to another, or to one property of an object, such as its color, and not to another, such as its shape (p.187)”, acquired what is commonly described as confident behavior.  In Skinner it seems very evident that confidence also generalized to the way in which he spoke. 

In spite of the recognition which Skinner received, it didn’t lead to an environment in which he or other behaviorists began to pay closer attention to the importance of how we speak with one another. Prior hostile contingencies affect us in such a way that we fixate on the verbal, remain on guard and stay on the surface and therefore are unable to explore the vocal aspects of what we say while we speak. 

 

Since we don’t know under what circumstances we have SVB, we don’t often have it. As long as we feel threatened or negatively affected during our conversations, we are not able to learn the skills necessary for SVB.  We produce high rates of NVB and low rates of SVB as we don’t know how to decrease the former and increase the latter.  “The fact remains that it is the environment which acts upon the perceiving person, not the perceiving person who acts upon the environment (p. 188).” As this remains unaddressed, we continue to increase our NVB.  It makes no difference whether we are dealing with hostile politicians, scientists who are struggling to get funds for their research or people who have been diagnosed with a mental disorder; they are all trapped by contingencies that give rise to NVB.