Language Enlightenment

Monday, February 22, 2016

December 6, 2013

Dear Reader,

Although people have conditioned us to talk in a particular way and although we are not reinforced if we talk in a way which is different from what we were taught, this writer knows something about spoken communication which most people don’t know: there is only one way to communicate. We either communicate or we don’t. When we communicate, we will have Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB). We speak with, listen to, understand and reciprocate each other, when we pay attention to how we sound. In SVB we sound good, because we simultaneously feel good. If we feel anxious, angry, afraid, stressed or confused, we produce Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB). When we experience these negative feelings, we sound horrible. In NVB our sound becomes an aversive stimulus, which others, listeners, whether they know it or not, want to move away from. In NVB we move away from each other and from ourselves, we dissociate.

When we disconnect from ourselves and each other,, we do not communicate. We only communicate when we connect with ourselves and with each other. The idea that we can have communication by only connecting with ourselves, but not with each other, is absolutely wrong. We are equally mistaken if we believe that we can connect with others, but not with ourselves. In SVB we simultaneously connect with ourselves and with each other. Since our connection with others determines our connection with our selves, our connection with ourselves is a function of our connection with others. By losing our connection with others, we have lost our connection with ourselves and, like a child, that cries for its mother, we produce an attention-demanding sound.

A child, who is incapable of language, expresses its need for comfort by crying. The child can’t attend to itself and needs the attention from the mother. When the mother attends to the child, the needs of the child are met. When the child is happy, the mother is happy with her child. A mother’s happiness depends on the happiness of her child. If the child is not happy, the mother isn’t happy either. However, a mother’s unhappiness impairs her ability to care for her child. If a mother can’t make her child happy, this is extremely stressful for her. Moreover, an unhappy mother creates an unhappy child, who doesn’t and can’t get the attention it needs. An unhappy verbal mother is incapable of caring for her nonverbal child.

The lack of care that has occurred during a child’s nonverbal stage of development continues to express itself nonverbally, even though the child may acquire language. Due to this pre-verbal lack of attention children are bound to develop problems with expressive and receptive language. Difficulties in making themselves verbally understood and problems in understanding what others are verbally saying indicate that they were non-verbally, not appropriately responded to and listened to. Their natural need for nonverbal attention can neither be verbally addressed nor fulfilled and their speech as well as their lack of speech will demand the constant attention from others. Demand for attention is at the core of all NVB.

A verbal adult speaker produces NVB when he or she demands to get nonverbal attention from the listener. In SVB, analogous with the mother-child relationship, the verbally-skilled speaker gives attention to the nonverbal listener, who then in turn gives attention to the non-verbal speaker. Thus, in SVB attention is increased and enhanced by maintenance of alignment between verbal and nonverbal expressions of reciprocal well-being. In NVB, by contrast, the verbal speaker takes advantage of the nonverbal listener. Because in NVB what is said is more important than how it is said, the nonverbal listener is kept hostage by a speaker’s verbal antics and acrobatics. The fact that we all struggle verbally to get the attention from others indicates that something was missing while we grew up. Our struggle for attention primarily expresses itself nonverbally, in how we sound. Since we want what we want from others, our attention in NVB is away from ourselves. We get carried away by our verbal expressions and we sound increasingly more aversive, because we fail to recognize that our real need is nonverbal and can’t be satisfied by any words.

Our parents didn’t and couldn’t teach us about SVB, because they didn’t even know it existed. SVB is hardly reinforced by anyone because as of yet only very few people know about it. However, SVB needs reinforcement by others and as long as others are not really there, we will have to continue with our NVB. Unfortunately, our use of language is determined, and, above all, limited by our negative emotions, which are the expressions of our biological need for safety and comfort. There can be no comfort in language if we remain non-verbally, physiologically dis-regulated. When language itself separates us from the reality, we might as well have no language at all. Our refusal to speak or our inability to effectively participate in communication is caused by NVB. Early deterioration of the aging brain and greater loss of memory are also predicted by NVB and can be kept at bay with SVB. As stated before, all sorts of mental health problems can be explained from this scientific SVB/NVB paradigm.

December 5, 2013

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

Dear Reader,

In the same way this writer emphasizes specifics about spoken communication, others are convinced, based on their experience, that they know what interaction is all about. Although they may not be explicit about how what they consider to be objective knowledge derives from their experience, this is the reason they push only their view and remain incapable of considering or incorporating views and experiences of others. It is evident, however, that our different views are based on our different experiences. Because individuals have unique reinforcement histories, also what they consider to be objective knowledge is expressed, interpreted and used in different ways.

Since most scholars mainly read, study, and write and seldom communicate with each other, and even if they talk only talk with someone who thinks more or less exactly like them, there is little conversation in academia about the functional relationship between personal experience and knowledge. The fact that what one pursues scientifically or academically is personally enhancing is down played. Yet, the insolated world of scientists is as much, or even more, based on Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB) then the world of the less educated. When it comes to how we communicate, there is no significant difference between the scientist and the non-scientist. The absence of knowledge about Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) in both groups is apparent in their mutual agreement that knowing and understanding is valued more than experience. Educated and non-educated people claim that some sort of knowledge or higher power is above what they themselves experience.It makes no difference whether we believe this imaginary entity to exist outside or outside of ourselves.

During Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) there is a tangible individual experience of well-being. Without this individual experience there can be no SVB. When we do not feel safe, at ease, calm and connected with one another, we produce NVB. In SVB we check in with each other again and again whether we are still connected, but in NVB there is no such verification process going on. In NVB it is supposedly not important what we feel. In NVB we don’t care about what the other person feels. In NVB we assume that we can keep our feelings out of the conversation, because, supposedly, they make the conversation more difficult or unscientific. We are referring here to the uncontrollability of our emotions, which can get us carried away.

Ironically, the notion that we can keep our experiences and our emotions out of the conversation has led to expulsion of our positive emotions, but the acceptance of our negative emotions. Consequently, NVB reins almost everywhere. No matter how much we complain or protest about, we still keep producing more NVB. Since SVB signifies subsidence and absence of negative emotions, it is considered by most people to be impossible and idealistic. This falsehood is bestowed on us by NVB. It is absolutely possible to communicate without any negative emotion. Such communication, which signifies that we are happy, has led and will lead to discoveries, which could not be made otherwise. Getting rid of the false notion that we can be without emotion, is an important step in the direction of SVB. We cannot be without emotion, but we can definitely be without negative emotion. Our ability to be without negative emotions is very reinforcing. We will have good communication as long as we experience positive emotion. Communication breaks down when we feel and express negative emotions.

NVB is the spoken communication which is based on the expression of negative emotions. It goes on everywhere. We have accepted NVB as our normal a way of communicating, but it is abnormal: NVB makes us and keeps us unhappy. Since NVB is also disembodied communication, we do not have any conscious experience of our body, while we speak. If we did, we would be able to express this experience, but since we don’t, we can’t express this unconscious experience. Thus, NVB is based on the unconscious experience of our physical discomfort. We only realize this once we are out of it and change to SVB, our only way out. NVB is easier to be recognized in others than SVB. SVB can be recognized in others, but is easier to be recognized in our selves. Unless SVB is recognized in ourselves, we will not be able to continue it.

SVB is scientific in that it elaborates on the functional relationship between variables in our environment, other communicators, and how we communicate. Based on the ubiquity of negative emotions, perpetuated by NVB, there is a lack of knowledge about subjective experience. By attaining SVB this lack of knowledge will be acknowledged and dissolved. In SVB there is an alignment between what we say and how we say it, between our verbal and nonverbal expressions, between objective knowledge and our subjective experiences. In effect, SVB is predicted to revolutionize human interaction and relationship. Change in one event, communication, the dependent variable, can be produced by change in another event, the sound of our voice, the independent variable.

December 4, 2013

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

Dear Reader,

In SVB nothing is copied by anybody, because nobody can be the voice for someone else. We have to find our own voice. Communication with our natural, resonant voice can only occur if we pay attention to how we feel. In NVB we do not pay attention to how we feel; we dissociate from how we feel and separate from from our environment. In NVB there is no experience of how we feel. Moreover, in NVB knowledge is out of sync with our experience. In NVB we value knowledge more than our experience and subsequently, due to such so-called knowledge, we disconnect from our experience.

In NVB, our third-person, supposedly objective experience, is disconnected from our first-person, subjective experience. Due to our persistent over-emphasis on the former, the latter protests and is causing us to be continuously distracted from the former. In NVB, lack of attention for our emotions causes us to be obsessed with knowledge. Said differently, when our emotions are not expressed accurately, our failure to do so inevitably leads to ways of thinking which are problematic. NVB enhances and instills self-defeating, unscientific ways of thinking, but SVB restores and increases our experience and allows us to use knowledge in ways which are enhancing for everyone.

The fact that NVB can instantaneously disrupt and make SVB impossible, teaches us that we either are going to continue with NVB or we will continue with SVB. As it stands, we do not even know the difference between SVB and NVB, but once this distinction is made, we notice that our lack of knowledge regarding this distinction was the consequence of our lack of experience of this distinction. The distinction between lack of experience and lack of knowledge is vital for how we interact. Because of our over-emphasis on knowledge, our lack of experience is completely overlooked. We only pay lip-service to our own experience, which indicates that we do not recognize its essential function for human relationship. Each time we have had SVB, it was because it was possible for SVB to continue, but we will continue to have more NVB if it remains impossible for SVB to occur. Because SVB signifies the absence of NVB and because SVB exposes, analyzes and brings to an end NVB, NVB primarily continues by making it seem as if SVB does not exist. Yet, the stressful impact of NVB is experienced by each of us. Only when we express our stress and discomfort and hear its dreadful sound, will we be able to attain SVB.

We underestimate the importance of our own experience while we communicate. Because our experience is ignored and because NVB is more common to us than SVB, we believe that communication will improve once we come to know more about it. None of our scientific findings, however, have ever led to such improvement. To the contrary, the more we have come to know, the more difficult it became to maintain our hope that knowledge would one day fix our problematic communication. Although nobody believes anymore that knowledge can enhance relationship, we still continue to push the knowledge-agenda, while we ignore the importance of our own experience.

Private experience is made unimportant because it is considered to be subjective. What is supposedly more important is objective knowledge. In our scientific quest for objectivity we keep ignoring that human beings have subjective experiences, which must have their expression. By making it seem as if there is only one ideal way of communicating, we block out and ignore the expression of our subjective experiences. As long as our subjective experiences compete with our so-called objective, scientific knowledge, subjective experience is discarded by default. Consequently, the lack of hope that knowledge can improve communication is relegated to our private thoughts. Because individuals keep struggling within themselves between their subjective experiences and the facts of life, they create their own version of objectivity.

The choice for what is believed to be objective is not scientific. What is objective has nothing to do with what we believe. The heart in each human being’s chest is really there. Likewise, individual experiences are really there, even if this means that someone hears voices. Occurrence of so-called mental illness is based on ignorance about our experience. The more we know about our subjective experience, the better we will get at preventing mental disorders. Mental health problems always represent an individual’s demand for attention for his or her own subjective experiences. Again, the idea that the solution for mental health problems must come from objective knowledge is false. Improvement can only result from the deliberate attempt, by a knowledgeable person, to restore the importance of the patient’s subjective experience. However, the therapist is not generally to be considered as the dispenser of the reinforcement. The therapists doesn't know about the SVB/NVB distinction. If he or she knew then he or she would focus on enhancing the client's SVB and decreasing NVB. The reinforcing effects of SVB are self-evident, because individual communicators will begin to trust and express their own experiences. In SVB all communicators will become objective about their subjective experiences.

December 3, 2013

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

There is such a thing as real human interaction and it is easier to recognize this by calling it Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB). The word “sound” makes us to focus on our voice and other nonverbal aspects of our spoken communication, which have been endlessly dismissed: the expressions of our true emotions. We have rejected our own emotions because they were repeatedly rejected by others in our past. Moreover, we were not in a position to accept our emotions, because we didn’t and couldn’t yet understand them. The conversation in which our emotions were expressed and understood (SVB) has not yet happened and our parents knew as little as we did.

We behave in different ways and we experience our emotions depending on how we sound. We will only act calm and peaceful as long as we sound calm and peaceful, but we will not be able to act calm and peaceful if, as we so often in vain attempt, try to sound calm and peaceful. Even if we do our very best to sound happy, we still sound sad. No matter how much we try to sound calm and at ease, we still sound angry and agitated. Said differently, we only try to sound friendly, when we don’t feel friendly, we only try to sound positive when in reality we feel negative.

There is no need to try to sound enthusiastic when we really feel enthusiastic. We try to do that only when we are not feeling that way, because we want to make others think that we feel that way. Although we may be able to make others believe it, what we experience ourselves is not the same as how we are able to make others feel. This discrepancy in how we have expressed our emotions has conditioned and prevented us from feeling what we truly feel. Nevertheless, the reality remains that when we feel good, we sound good, just like that. In SVB we do not try to sound a certain way because our sound expresses precisely what we feel. When we feel upset, rejected and misunderstood, we sound that way too, but we are sounding different, the moment we feel accepted, listened to and understood.

The difference between SVB and NVB is enormous, because we have so often failed to communicate it. Our failure to recognize this difference is determined by the fact that in spite of SVB being possible, we live in a world which is dominated by NVB. Even if SVB was there, it was gone very quickly, because NVB soon took over. We continue again with NVB, because we dissociate from our SVB.

No matter how nice our childhood might have been, we were raised in and determined by Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB). The word “noxious” refers to the inevitable aversive neurobiological effect produced by the sound of our voice. NVB resembles negative emotions, which undermine our spoken communication. We must bring fear, anger, despair, distrust, shame and humiliation to an end, because it just sounds terrible. Our noxious-sounding voices elicit and maintain processes that make the interaction impossible, but our natural, effortless sound, constructs SVB.

Our exploration of SVB is accumulative in that every step adds to our first-person, subjective experience of it, as well as our third-person, objective knowledge about it. SVB, but also NVB, is always first experienced and can only then be known. That knowledge is secondary and experience is primary makes sense, because we feel the way we feel whether we understand it or not. Only an understanding which is in tune with how we feel while we communicate is of any use, because how we feel informs us about whether we are reinforced or not.

This additive process determines that if SVB continues undisturbed for a while, it gains momentum. What this means is that after an hour of SVB, things can be said and understood, which can’t be said and understood after half an hour of SVB. However, the things that can be said and understood after only half an hour are appropriate to that level. It is like doing intermediate algebra. One must first master the “Order of Operations” before one can solve a quadratic equation. The acronym PEMDAS, remembered as “Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally”, stands for “Parenthesis, Exponents, Multiplication, Division, Addition and Subtraction.” The numbers may change, but the way of working them is the same. The words we express may vary, but how we communicate is lawful. In SVB there is a particular sequence that has to be followed. We can of course say that we don’t want to or don’t like to adhere to that sequence, but that would be the same as imagining that we are solving an quadratic equation without using the order of operations. The reality of such wishful- thinking is that we fail at math. Similarly, we fail blatantly in our communication, because we don’t even know the simple things we need to do first before we can go on to more complex matters. The illusion that we can just jump into complexity, without being grounded in experience and knowledge, makes us continue our NVB, in which superficiality dictates the notion that we can copy the results from others.