March 2, 2015

March 2, 2015

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Behavioral Engineer

Dear Reader, 

 

Sound and Noxious Verbal Behavior are two subsets of vocal verbal behavior. During Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB), the listener becomes the speaker and the roles between speaker and listener alternate. Since the speaker doesn’t own the contingency, there is no aversive control in SVB. During Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB), on the other hand, the listener never, seldom or only minimally becomes the speaker, who aversively controls the behavior of the listener. 

SVB and NVB refer to episodes and are measured as a proportion of positive and aversive exchanges within each episode. In the analysis of vocal verbal behavior most attention has historically been given to the speaker, as the stimuli of the speaker effect the behavior of the listener in more or less the same way than any other nonverbal stimulation, such as gesturing. However, the SVB/NVB distinction points out this similarity is only occurring in SVB, but not in NVB. Only during SVB is the speaker’s behavior verbal and the listener’s behavior mostly nonverbal, because, although the listener in SVB responds to the speaker's verbal behavior, he or she is not forced to be verbal as would be the case in NVB.  

In SVB the listener doesn’t make any effort to listen to or understand the speaker. In NVB, by contrast, the listener strains him or herself to listen to and focus on what the speaker is saying. Moreover, in NVB the listener is primarily verbal or verbally fixated as there is a mismatch between his or her negative private speech and the aversive public speech. Since it is the listener as a body who mediates the speaker, NVB has very different physiological conditioning consequences. NVB affects the contingency, that is, the neural behavior within our own skin, such that the listener  becomes more likely not to speak and is coerced into only listening behavior and such that it only makes the speaker speak, but not listen.

March 1, 2015

March 1, 2015

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Behavioral Engineer

Dear Reader, 

This writer woke up from a nightmare in which his computer was on fire. He screamed in horror because all of his writings were lost and the UFB stick had molten beyond recognition. Although he was upset, he knew things would be all right. It was not clear how the fire had broken out. His wife and a lady friend were at the scene, but they had nothing to do with it and he felt that being frustrated was useless. As he began to calm down, he woke up. 

Skinner’s Verbal Behavior (1957) is extended with two universal subsets of verbal behavior: Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) and Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB). SVB refers to the verbal episodes in which the speaker controls the behavior of the listener with positive reinforcement. NVB, on the other hand, refers to the verbal episodes in which the speaker controls the behavior of the listener with an aversive contingency. The discrimination between SVB and NVB is a result of what could be seen as an excavation process during which SVB is uncovered by NVB. We have to use NVB to get to SVB and without NVB we cannot get to SVB.

The place to dig is in our spoken communication. Much is hidden due to our way of talking and will become available if we just start talking. Talking must be seen as digging; not digging into someone else, but digging into ourselves. By listening to our sound while we speak, we discover how we relate to others. Excavation only makes sense if we find something. If we find nothing, we are digging in the wrong place. Fruitless talk is based on attempt to dig into others. There are many things to talk about and places to dig where we are more likely to find something. If we find something, it is important that we don’t destroy what we find with our crude tools. 


Even though we use NVB to get to SVB, we must do so very carefully. To remove the thick layers of earth that don’t contain anything, we use our heavy equipment, but when we get closer to the sediments which may contain what we are looking for, we use smaller and finer tools and use less and less NVB. Eventually, we may use tiny brushes and very little NVB.

If our talking doesn’t become more refined, we will pulverize our humanity. We have already squandered a great deal because of NVB. It is because NVB was not used for the purposes that it is good for, that we didn’t and couldn’t discover SVB, but once we begin to use NVB pragmatically much of value will and can be found. We must be able to call a spade a spade. 

Words are tools only as long as they have meaning. Their meaning is a function of how we use them and under what circumstances we use them. We can and should use them to uncover SVB. Meaning can be discovered in the places where people have once lived, that is, in our behavioral history. 


When we dig in the right place, we can find the archeological evidence of an ancient civilization. After we have found pieces of pottery, we may be able to piece together the whole pot. The more artifacts we find, the more an ancient culture will speak to us and comes alive. If we don’t find anything, our conversation must change; we must dig somewhere else where we can find something. Once we find some traces, we are motivated to be careful and to work very hard. Our own findings, but also the finding by others are reinforcing and they determine where, how and with what we dig. We start out with NVB, but as we become more organized and more sure of our findings, our vocal verbal behavior will become adjusted. 


This writer once helped excavate a temple on a hill side in somewhere in Israel. It was apparent that at different times different people had built a different temple. There were layers of sediments; at one time it was a synagogue, then it was a mosque and then it was a synagogue again.

The computer may burn and the UFB drive may be destroyed, but some of these writings were already send, received and saved. Likewise, ancient man also had to face that that death is immanent and so they made tombs, graves and temples that would surpass their lifetime. Life has meaning only because it doesn’t last forever. It is when our conversations begin to adjust to this reality that we begin to have appreciation and respect for every human being. In SVB our words will create new temples, palaces, art, jewelry, pottery, science and music, but above all happy relationships.

February 28, 2015

February 28, 2015

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Behavioral Engineer

Dear Reader, 

Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) and Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB) are two subsets of verbal behavior. This extension of Skinner's verbal behavior is particularly useful in answering the important question: why do we have so many communication problems? SVB is an operant behavior, because it refers to the verbal episodes in which the speaker controls the behavior of the listener with positive reinforcement. However, NVB is a respondent behavior as it refers to all the verbal episodes in which the speaker controls the behavior of the listener with an aversive contingency. 

Skinner, who initially defined Verbal Behavior as "the behavior that produces reinforcers that occur through another organism’s behavior" (Skinner, 1957), later refined his definition with “behavior that is reinforced through the mediation of other people, but only when the other people are behaving in ways that have been shaped by a verbal environment of language “(Skinner, 1986, p. 121) (italics added). He referred to the verbal community, whose members are conditioned by a set of verbal responses which signify a language. He didn’t write ‘shaped by a nonverbal  environment’, but he wrote “shaped by a verbal environment of language.”

According to Skinner’s refinement, only SVB is Verbal Behavior. NVB is not Verbal Behavior as there is no verbal community that is benefitted by the generation and maintenance of Verbal Behavior. Moreover, NVB makes impossible and lacks the exact, refined, verifiable kind of verbal behavior needed to produce peer-reviewed written verbal reports that describe our scientific investigations. It is no longer acceptable that scientists, as they have always done, only bother about written and not vocal verbal behavior. 

SVB is scientific vocal verbal behavior which can also be written down. Unless written scientific verbal behavior results in and maintains vocal verbal scientific behavior, we will not be able to address and solve our communication problems. Once we distinguish between SVB and NVB, we will realize that the structure of language, what we say, including the illusion that inner agents are causing our verbal behavior, is a function of how we say things. We can no longer remain unscientific if we relax and feel peaceful with one another. In other words, we get realistic only if we are no longer afraid, angry, forceful, frustrated, negative or defensive. 

 

  

The analysis of Verbal Behavior didn’t historically require any different concepts or principles for dealing with our verbal or nonverbal behavior. No scientific papers have improved our ability to deal with the problems involved in our vocal verbal behavior. What has not found its way into our relationships is that those who are involved in teaching others how to speak, read and write, are successful only if they provide reinforcement.  If we did this consistently in our interactions, we would be having SVB, but as we don’t do this, we keep having NVB. The difference between SVB and NVB is only going to become apparent to us if something stimulates us to become more focused on our nonverbal behavior while we speak. 

The distinction between SVB and NVB will make us discriminate a safe environment as safe and a threatening environment as threatening. Due to the ubiquity of NVB, we are often unable to make this distinction. We are so used to NVB that we have accepted it as normal. Seen from a SVB perspective, NVB will be considered as abnormal. Only during SVB do we find ourselves in the circumstance in which we can and will be able to listen to ourselves while we speak, but during NVB we cannot and will not be considerate about the verbalizer and the mediator within each person.    

February 27, 2015

February 27, 2015

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Behavioral Engineer

Dear Reader, 

This writer takes a critical look at Skinner’s definition of verbal behavior. He is convinced that Skinner's definition makes behaviorists focus less on spoken communication than on written communication. Verbal behavior, which focuses on mediation by other organisms, considers environmental variables of which it is a function. This is a step in the right direction, but it doesn't explain why written language has taken precedence over spoken language. There is a need to treat vocal verbal forms separately from written verbal forms and to remind ourselves that vocal verbal behavior is behavior that is reinforced through the responses of another organism (Skinner, 1957).  If we don’t do that, written forms of verbal behavior take, as they have already done and will continue to do, our attention away from vocal or spoken forms of verbal behavior. Our writing and reading takes our attention away from speaking and listening and from the crucial question why we talk the way we do, or rather, why we adhere to coercive and therefore problematic communication. No internal agents or evil individuals are causing this, but identifiable environmental variables.

We live in age in which vocal verbal behavior is diminished by our rapidly developing technology. Technology-driven contingency changes confuse the means by which we disseminate information, such as TV, radio, computers, I-phones, etc., with the methods, such as sequencing, prompting, priming and other techniques (Vargas, 2012). Not without reason, even most long distance education is based on an outdated Lecture Model, which couldn’t and never did match the behavioral variability of students. This Lecture Model, however, is a product of our still important, but neglected vocal verbal behavior, which not only “constrains our technologies” (Vargas, 2012), but also undermines our relationships.

Although most behaviorologists are familiar with the definition of verbal behavior and changed their way of talking accordingly, this change in their terminology did not and could not affect how they communicate, which is still represented by this outdated Lecture Model. A lot of behavior is considered as verbal behavior, but it elicits rather than evokes another organism’s behaviors. Moreover, the mediator can not and does not mediate such direct, nonverbal behavior, because he or she is not in the position to provide reinforcers, while he or she is coerced to reflexively produce whatever the higher status, forceful verbalizer demands. This mediator-unfriendly Lecture Model is only useful for making clear that much respondent behavior is masked as operant behavior. 

The Lecture Model is essentially based on the speaker's nonverbal way of communicating. When the dominating verbalizer speaks at the mediator, the mediator's respondent behavior is not to be confused with mediation. Verbal behavior, however, only occurs if the verbalizer speaks with the mediator, that is, only if the mediator can mediate the verbalizer. 

As there is a difference between operant and respondent behavior, Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) and Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB) are recognized as two subsets of verbal behavior. SVB refers to the verbal episodes in which the speaker controls the behavior of the listener with positive reinforcement, while NVB refers to the verbal episodes in which the speaker controls the behavior of the listener with an aversive contingency. Once agreement is reached about this distinction, NVB will no longer be considered as verbal behavior. This writer suggests that we should call it what it is: coercion, intimidation, abuse, domination and exploitation. 

February 26, 2015

February 26, 2015

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Behavioral Engineer

Dear Reader, 

 

The distinction between Sound and Noxious Verbal Behavior as two mutually exclusive subsets of verbal behavior involves the contingency analysis of how an individual interacts with him or herself as well as how two or more individuals interact with each other. Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) refers to the verbal episodes in which the speaker controls the behavior of the listener with positive reinforcement. On the contrary, Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB) refers to all the verbal episodes in which the speaker controls the behavior of the listener with an aversive contingency. These two different contingencies need to be broken down in three terms: an antecedent, a behavior and a consequence. 

The antecedent condition which calls for and makes possible SVB, is a particular sound, which is called Voice II. This stimulus sets the stage for SVB. Another stimulus, Voice I, sets the stage for NVB. As the speaker is the owner of the contingency, the speaker with Voice I emits and omits different behaviors than the speaker with Voice II. The contingency with which the speaker with Voice I controls the behavior of the listener is entirely different from the contingency with which the speaker with Voice II controls the behavior of the listener. The former uses coercive control, while the latter only uses positive reinforcement. The consequences for both the speaker as well as the listener are different in NVB and in SVB. Moreover, the difference between how two or more people talk with each other, also affects how each individual communicates with him or herself. 

In NVB, in which the listener is controlled with an aversive contingency, the speaker’s way of talking with him or herself is equally punitive. In SVB, in which the listener is controlled by positive reinforcement, the speaker’s way of talking with him or herself is equally reinforcing. Thus, the way in which a person talks with him or herself predicts how this person talks with others and visa versa. We may think we know this, but when it comes to the difference between whether we have reinforcing private speech or negative self-talk, it turns out that we have no clue about the fact that NVB covert self-talk is a consequence of NVB overt public speech and SVB covert self-talk is a consequence of SVB overt public speech. We are in the dark about all this as we still think we cause our own behavior. The three-term contingency, however, views behavior in terms of how we are affected by environmental variables, that is, by others.

Antecedents of SVB and NVB can be distinguished as discriminative stimuli and establishing operations. Since SVB episodes alternate with NVB episodes, each time they vary communicators can discriminate the  availability of a different contingency. There is a different relation between behavior and consequences in SVB than in NVB. Communicators incapable of accurate discrimination between these consequences mistake SVB for NVB or NVB for SVB. In either case, they focus on postcedents when they should focus on antecedents. In the analysis of verbal behavior, the need for increased focus on antecedents is often pushed aside by the general behaviorist emphasis in operant behavior on consequences. Proper analyses of the antecedents, of why we talk the way we do, becomes more likely, when we consider our so-called eed for spoken communication. This need is underestimated. Under normal circumstances, food is reinforcing to us only to the extent that we are hungry. Likewise, communication is only reinforcing to us to the extent that we long to talk.This is what is known in behaviorism as establishing operations. 

Nowhere is the difference between SVB and NVB more apparent than in the establishing operation . Speakers want to dominate and coerce others as they were conditioned by NVB interaction. Each time they talk they believe that now it is their turn to exploit others in the same way that they were exploited. Their relentless coercive control of the conversation makes SVB impossible. Often such domineering NVB communicators don’t even like to speak and rather avoid speaking altogether. Interaction is not what they long for as they are deeply frustrated by it. They may long for admiration, power, or dominance, but they don’t desire to communicate. 

How different this is for those who have more SVB repertoire. The need to communicate is proportional to the accumulation of repertoire that makes it possible. Those who have acquired more NVB than SVB repertoire can only pretend to communicate as they miss the skills necessary to have  SVB. They can’t even long for it, because they don’t know that they too can actually have it. Sadly, those who were conditioned mainly by NVB, tend to dominate the conversation. They discourage and disinforce (which is the opposite of reinforce) other the communicators. The consequence of their NVB punishes and weakens the tendency of other communicators to emit a SVB response. As positively reinforcing speakers are so easily stopped, ignored and dominated by coercive, pretentious speakers, NVB episodes far outnumber SVB episodes in most of our conversations.

NVB communicators believe that they can create motivation in others by threatening them with negative consequences. Inadvertently, the NVB communicators always elicit counter-control behavior in their listeners. Communicators engaging in such counter-control don’t and can’t develop SVB, but will only develop more NVB repertoire. Thus, the NVB speaker will always constrain the listener’s response, whereas the SVB speaker always enhances and reinforces novel listener’s responses.