July 17, 2016

July 17, 2016

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Behavioral Engineer

Dear Reader, 

This is my thirty second response to “Epistemological Barriers to Radical Behaviorism” by Donohue et al. (1998). Please, read carefully the following sentence: “Requiring a student to accept that there exists a three-term contingency analysis, by which all of his or her behavior may be understood, can be seen as too quickly denying the richness of human experience to the point that the student rejects radical behaviorism without giving it further consideration. “

If we are required and coerced to accept something, we are not likely to accept it. In other words, it is a contradiction to require someone to accept something. If the three-term contingency analysis is explained properly, this is always due to Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB), the kind of vocal verbal behavior in which the speaker’s sound has an appetitive effect on the listener. In SVB there is no aversive stimulation at all.

Students “reject radical behaviorism without giving it further consideration” due to Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB), in which the voice of the teacher/speaker is perceived by the student/listener as an aversive stimulus. Only in SVB will “all of” the student’s/listener’s behavior “be understood.” It is not a question whether it “may” happen, it will happen! When understanding happens this is mutually reinforcing for the teacher (the speaker) as well as the student (the listener).

“Skinner simply wanted to develop an economical analysis that would ultimately lead to practical technologies for bettering the human condition” (e.g., Skinner, 1971). The SVB/NVB distinction makes total sense from a behaviorist perspective. Its implementation has always led to immediate “improvement of the human condition.” In other words, in SVB there is no longer any demand for instant gratification, as our talking, listening, exploring and learning are now experienced as reinforcing activities. Thus, “improvement of the human condition” is not SVB’s “ultimate” goal. SVB instead of NVB is felt as a relief. The “ultimate” goal of SVB can only be conceived as long as we engage in it.

July 16, 2016

July 16, 2016 

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Behavioral Engineer

Dear Reader,

This is my thirty first response to “Epistemological Barriers to Radical Behaviorism” by Donohue et al. (1998). “A goal of radical behaviorists is the simplification of seemingly complex behavior into a parsimonious and powerful set of analytic terms.” They didn’t write: it is the only goal! Skinner wouldn’t have been able to promote his science if he hadn’t made simplification of complex behavior his most important goal.

Behaviorists have inherited Skinner’s “powerful set of analytic terms,” but they haven’t really contributed very much in terms of simplifying “seemingly complex behavior.” If that had been their only goal, they would have had to adopt, like Skinner, the central role for Verbal Behavior. As this is not the case, most behaviorists merely pay lip-service to the “simplification of seemingly complex behavior”.

The distinction between Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) and Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB) arose from experimentation, replication, verification and implementation; it is more than just talk. The validity of the SVB/NVB distinction is only apparent to those who during their conversation discriminate these response classes. This writing is at best an invitation to such an interaction. The principles of operant conditioning are clear during SVB, but cannot be understood in NVB.

“Skinner sought to produce an economical and general set of principles with which the apparent complexity of human experience can be understood using the same principle-based analysis on all occasions” (Guttman, 1977). Skinner’s emphasis on the importance of verbal definitions was inspired by his experimentation with nonverbal animals. 

Skinner extrapolated his conceptualization of verbal behavior from his experiments with nonverbal animals. I, on the other hand, started with what many unknowingly also have problems with: the struggle between nonverbal and verbal behavior. The SVB/NVB distinction came about due to my struggle between my feeling and thinking. NVB creates and maintains this struggle, while SVB brings this struggle to an end.        

July 15, 2016

July 15, 2016 

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Behavioral Engineer

Dear Reader, 

This is my thirtieth response to “Epistemological Barriers to Radical Behaviorism” by Donohue et al. (1998). This paper is a stepping stone for the reader to understand the distinction between Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) and Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB). Each line taken from this paper illustrates the need for the shaping of a new behavior.

Many responses to this paper have been written as many things become possible only if we know the SVB/NVB distinction. My writings better analyze the “Epistemological Barriers of Radical Behaviorism.” I agree  “Language is simply a type of behavior (Skinner, 1957); it is subject to the same contingencies of reinforcement as all other behavior.”

Behaviorist have often written that “The same goes for thoughts and feelings; they certainly exist, but they are behaviors, no more and no less (O'Donohue & Szymanski, 1996). They do not have unique causal status as such in the analysis of behavior.” However, although they “do not have unique causal status” thoughts and feelings do have a unique status in the behavioral repertoire of most people.

When behaviorists write about thoughts and feelings that “they certainly exist, but……..”, they make something which is very important to individuals into something which is “no more and no less” important than any other behavior. Whether it is true or not doesn’t matter, what people think and feel is considered to be more important than any other behavior, by them. Any behavioral analyst involved in changing a person’s behavior knows about the primacy of thoughts and feelings.

If a therapist doesn’t give his or her total attention to what the client is thinking and feeling, he or she is unable to establish a relationship and the therapy will fail. This is exactly why the promotion of radical behaviorism has gone wrong. The SVB/NVB distinction is badly needed as it restores the importance of what we are thinking and feeling.

July 14, 2016

July 14, 2016

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Behavioral Engineer

Dear Reader, 

This is my twenty-ninth response to “Epistemological Barriers to Radical Behaviorism” by Donohue et al. (1998). When we consider the problems people have talking with each other and, this, of course, includes the problems involved in the “Epistemological Barriers to Radical Behaviorism”, we must acknowledge if a certain behavior occurs more often than another behavior, this indicates that this behavior is more often reinforced and that other behavior is more often punished.

“All behavior is understood to be a function of environmental variables, and behaviors are selected based on their consequences (i.e., through contingencies of reinforcement and punishment). This analysis does not change based on the seemingly complex act a person (or any other animal) has performed.” This is all that is needed to explain the relative low rates of our Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) and the relative high rates of our Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB) in the world at large.

If SVB was more often reinforced it would occur more often. As long as we don’t even know the difference between SVB and NVB and the benefits that can be achieved by differentiating between the two, we end up having more NVB, by default. Without the SVB/NVB distinction we have no control; we can neither increase SVB nor decrease our NVB.

The seemingly complex act of verbal behavior is explained by how others talk with us; they either reinforce or they punish us. If their  way of talking is punitive, as in NVB, we will be reinforced not for our verbal behavior, but for our obedience. In SVB there is only positive reinforcement, but no punishment. SVB is the speech of positive behavioral control, but NVB is the speech of coercive behavioral control. As we haven’t acknowledged NVB is caused by environmental variables, by people who couldn’t make us feel safe and supported, we don’t realize that different people are needed to learn SVB from.

July 13, 2016

July 13, 2016 

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Behavioral Engineer

Dear Reader,

This is my twenty-eight response to “Epistemological Barriers to Radical Behaviorism” by Donohue et al. (1998). Presumably “A goal of radical behaviorists is the simplification of seemingly complex behavior into a parsimonious and powerful set of analytic terms.” This goal could not be achieved since radical behaviorists didn’t know about the Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) / Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB) distinction.

Skinner’s operant science has created a new verbal community with its own language. It is no exaggeration to state that due to their new, advanced language, radical behaviorists got totally stuck with what they perceived as “their special place in the hierarchy of” a small subset of “living organisms” called scientists.

“Simplification of seemingly complex behavior” requires more than “a parsimonious and powerful set of analytic terms.” It requires SVB; spoken communication which is without aversive stimulation. NVB which relates to hierarchical differences involves threat and intimidation.  

Nonhuman animals induce with vocalizations either positive or negative affective experiences in conspecifics and humans do the same thing.

“Humans are taken to be similar to other animals in many important ways: As a species we are subject to the selection of physical attributes through evolution and the contingencies of survival, and as individuals our behaviors are subject to selection by the consequences those behaviors have in our ontogenic evolution (Skinner, 1981)”.

How we talk with each other seems complex, but “the number of basic kinds of explanations possible for human behavior involve a few basic principles with selective contingencies being at the core of these.“ The SVB/NVB distinction can teach us a lot about our behavioral history. The amount of SVB and NVB instances in each verbal episode tells us about the circumstances we have been conditioned by in our lifetime.