June 24, 2014

June 24, 2014

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

Dear Reader, 

 

This writer has overcome his fear of repetition and of not being original. If the reader doesn’t find it interesting that he has to say the same things a couple of times, the reader doesn’t understand the need for this repetition without which Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) can’t be learned. This writer is teaching something new to the reader that can’t be learned in one stroke. It takes many readings to get a better understanding of SVB, and, moreover, the reader needs to test what is read while speaking. If this doesn’t happen, SVB will remain, like so many other things in life, something one has only read about. It is not the intention of this writer to please the reader into a sense of accomplishment when in fact the work hasn’t even gotten started. SVB begins to make sense only when we talk.  

To speed up the process, this text is best read out loud by the reader. After all, the premise of SVB is that the speaker listens to him or herself while he or she speaks. How is the reader going to listen to him or herself, if he or she is not making any sound? The reader must say these words out loud to be able to hear him or herself. Once the reader does that, the writer’s repetitions make more sense, because it is the sound of the reader, not the words of this writer, which reinforce this reading. If the reader doesn’t find it reinforcing to hear him or herself, this means that he or she is producing Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB).

This text puts SVB to the test in the most simple manner. If the reader is by him or herself there should be no problem in reading it out loud. The reader has to do it and the writer can’t do it for the reader.  If the sound which is produced by the reader is making is making him or her feel bad, negative, worried, coerced,  drained, bored, anxious, frustrated, distrustful, humiliated, pushed around, put down, intimidated, distracted, pushed, pulled, choked, punched, numb, punished, violated, annoyed or dissociated, then he or she produces NVB. 

When the reader hears something negative in his or her own voice, then he or she is producing NVB. However, when the reader hears something positive in his or her voice and begins to feel that he or she sounds nice, good, pleasant, calm, focused, meditative, conscious, thoughtful, relaxed, at ease, safe, sensible, alive, energetic, enthusiastic, motivated, alert, in control, full of humor and confidence, capable, decisive, deserving, powerful, goal-oriented, wise, present, rational,  developed, knowledgeable, capable, inspirational, supportive, realistic, great, satisfied, accomplished, then the reader produces Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB). 

In NVB we express all our negative emotions, but in SVB we express only our positive emotions. In NVB there are negative emotions to be expressed, but in SVB there are only positive emotions to be expressed. We are not making anything up and we let things be what they are, because we listen to ourselves while we speak. Only when we listen to ourselves while we speak, can we let things be what they are. We couldn’t let things be what they are, because we didn’t listen to ourselves while we spoke. To let things be what they are, we have to produce and observe the expression of matters as they are. We only do so in SVB. 

The reader shouldn’t have any problem understanding this. There is no need to make any effort to understand this. This writing is not understood as long as the reader is making any effort to understand it. The understanding that follows when no effort is made is different from so-called understanding, which requires effort. 

This writer calls it ‘so-called understanding’, because it should not be considered understanding as long as it requires effort. The reader cannot simultaneously sound positive and negative and have positive as well as negative emotions. 

Our ‘so-called communication’, in which we keep having mixed emotions, should be called NVB. The communication in which we are clear about our own and each other’s feelings, is called SVB. No effort is involved in such communication in which we understand each other, but effort is always involved in NVB, in which we neither understand ourselves nor each other. 

Effortless reading is just as important as effortless listening. Effortless writing is just as important as effortless speaking. When we are straining ourselves and each other it is because we are having NVB and we are not having SVB. Although SVB or NVB are present at any given moment, it is always either one or the other that is present. Although it may change very quickly, at any given moment, we always only have SVB or NVB. The reason we have not been able to notice this is because we are not listening to ourselves while we speak. 

When we strain ourselves to understand what we read, we also engage in NVB. When we strain ourselves, to write something, to please someone, we also engage in NVB. When we read something, which was produced under such conditions, we may not notice it, but we are conditioned, by such writing, to accept the strained circumstances in which it was written. Thus, much, if not most of our writing has made our lives more and more tense. Moreover, most writing takes us away from our spoken communication. This writing brings us back to a category of spoken communication which is different from the category we are used to and hear and read mostly about. By reminding the reader of the ubiquity of NVB, this writing brings us back to SVB. NVB is the stepping stone to reach SVB. 

Once we identify SVB and NVB, it becomes really simple, so simple that we can’t even believe it is that simple. We are used to calling things complex when we don’t understand how it works, because there are many unknown independent variables having an effect on the dependent variable, which is our behavior. 

With spoken communication as our dependent variable, it seems hard to figure out the reasons why we talk the way we do. However, when one knows about the SVB/NVB distinction, we deal with only two independent variables, two sounds, and we can call them Voice 2 and Voice 1. The sound of NVB is Voice 1, because unless we identify this sound, we will not be able to produce SVB with Voice 2.

June 23, 2014

June 23, 2014

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

Dear Reader, 

 

The other day, this writer was having a good conversation with a philosophy teacher, who also teaches at the local college. They had met before, but this time they met at a down town coffee shop, where they could talk. They acquainted themselves further with each other and the philosopher spoke of his interest in neuroscience and meditation and this writer spoke of psychology, behaviorism and the World Cup Soccer matches that are currently taking place. 

The philosopher said that this writer was the first behaviorist he ever met whom he liked. This was a great compliment to this writer, who is often trying to get to talk with other behaviorists, to introduce them to Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB), which is his extension of Skinner’s work. Although he is using behaviorist terminology as much as possible, this writer, who is a self-taught behaviorist, only uses the terms which he knows and finds useful. Furthermore, he explains things without any rigid allegiance to behaviorist parlor. On the one hand, this turns off many behaviorists, but, on the other hand, unlike most behaviorists, this gives him the opportunity to connect with non-behaviorsts. Anyone familiar with behaviorism knows that behaviorists have a real communication and image problem.  

The reason that this writer can be liked by someone who had never spoken with a behaviorist he liked, is because of SVB. This way of speaking about behaviorism makes it more palatable to non-behaviorists, who, if given the opportunity, are willing to admit they have a lot in common with anyone who talks with them and not at them. The latter, this writer calls Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB). The philosopher asked questions about this distinction of which he had never heard, but which made sense to him. The more questions were asked and answered, the better they understood each other. They totally agreed that the SVB-NVB distinction is important.

It may not be immediately clear from this writing to the reader that SVB has major philosophical implications, but the philosopher immediately picked up on the immense ramifications of SVB for human thought. The fact that this writer was able to explain SVB to him was rewarding for this writer, but was especially rewarding for the philosopher, who came up with all sorts of real life examples, which were explained by this new way of viewing things. In effect, the philosopher admitted that the behaviorist had something to say which made total sense to him. The excitement was emphasized because the philosopher was very aware of his negative expectations towards behaviorists. 

This writer’s ability to easily disprove the philosopher’s incorrect assumptions, was based on their shared understanding of what is meant by SVB and NVB. These terms designate something we can all relate to. Simple as it may sound, every human being knows the difference between when someone is talking at you or with you. The difference is made from the perspective of the listener. As speakers the philosopher and the behaviorist were their own listener and, consequently, they were listening to each other in the same way as they were listening to themselves. 

‘Normally’ in NVB, we listen to others very differently than to ourselves. Oddly enough, although it may be said that we can hear each other, in NVB we neither listen to ourselves nor to each other. In SVB, by contrast, we listen to ourselves as well as to each other. Moreover, in SVB, it becomes clear that self-listening makes listening to others possible and is therefore necessary. 

Listening to others, in NVB, means: disconnecting us from ourselves. Listening to others, in NVB, means: effort, struggle, distraction, irritation, anxiety, fear, anger, humiliation, hostility, abuse and energy depletion. Listening to negative emotions, in NVB, prevents us from having positive emotions in ourselves. 

In SVB, we listen to and enhance the positive emotions in ourselves and in others. It is called SVB, because we agree that we ‘sound good’, because we are attuned. In SVB, listeners co-regulate the speaker and speakers co-regulate the listener.

June 22, 2014

June 22, 2014

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

Dear Reader, 

It is very satisfying to write every day about the developments that are happening due to Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB). In the past, this author has made many audio-recordings of himself on which he explored listening to himself while he speaks, but now he writes about his thoughts and feelings in this journal, which is an ongoing accumulation of the discoveries that are made possible by SVB. The fact that this writing is pleasing this writer is why he keeps doing it. Because these words make sense, this writer is reinforcing himself. However, these words make sense to the reader too and their reinforcing effect is possible because the reader may read and enjoy this writing too. If there was no reader to enjoy this writing, this writing would not be reinforcing this writer. He reads his is own writing, as readers read his writing and they read his writing, in the same way as he reads it. 

When this writer was still recording audio tapes of himself to explore SVB, he didn’t know anything about behaviorism. It was important to him that he made these recordings, because by recording himself, he was working with evidence, which could be listened to again, in the same way that this writing can be read again and again. Although he often went on tangents and allowed himself to explore his own Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB), he collected evidence of that too. 

Now that he is writing about SVB and became more knowledgeable about behaviorism, he is producing less and less NVB than when he was speaking about it. There is less and less NVB to be explored, while SVB is abundantly available in his life. In this writing this writer is telling himself and the reader that this is really possible. When he first discovered SVB, he began to speak out loud with himself, because at in the beginning he couldn't even believe it. Because he did that, he convinced himself that it was true, that SVB really exists and that it is possible. Now that he writes about it, he is no longer trying to make himself believe it.  

This writer writes that SVB is possible, not convince himself or the reader, but because it is such a delight to write about it. It used to be such a delight to speak about it and when he made those audio-recordings, this writer would spend hours, sometimes days recording himself. Because through the years he has created so much SVB with so many people, he no longer feels like making audio-recordings. Although he sometimes still listens to them and still enjoys them, he now writes every day and only has time to read what he is writing while he is writing it. While he finishes this sentence, it seems as if these words are catching up with him. 

When the reader, the listener, who ideally reads out loud, reads and hears these words, he or she should get in touch with him or herself. However, if that doesn’t happen, this writing, this speaking is useless, but if it does, and this writer, this speaker, thinks it will, then the reader, the listener, realizes that SVB is possible, because the reader, the listener is another person than he or she thought he or she was.  In SVB the reader, listener becomes the writer, speaker. 


In NVB, the reader, listener was thinking that he or she couldn’t become the writer, the speaker. That was true. In NVB, the writer, the speaker was also thinking he or she couldn’t become the reader, the listener and this was true too; he or she couldn’t. In NVB we were confined to roles, which didn’t allow us to communicate: we can’t speak if we don’t listen and we don’t listen if we don’t speak; we can’t read if we don’t write and we can‘t write if we don’t read; we can’t write if we don’t speak and we can’t read if we don’t listen. In NVB, we can only verbally misbehave.

SVB reveals the possibilities which are necessary to have real communication. If these possibilities remain out of sight, out of hearing range, nothing stimulate us to communicate. We are not stimulated to communicate and that is why we don’t communicate. People may want to communicate, but they don’t know how to do it. Many people have told us how to communicate and we communicate in the way in which we were told, but what we were told was incorrect. We were stimulated to have NVB not SVB. These words stimulate SVB, the correct way of communicating.

June 21, 2014

June 21, 2014

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

Dear Reader, 

 

This writer had many conversations with people whose family members struggle with mental health problems. As he brought their attention to the environmental variables that are possibly causing their behavior, it became clear that there is little chance that we are going to be able to do something about these external circumstances. Most people lack any understanding about the contingencies of reinforcement, which cause and maintain our behavior and which need to be taken into consideration if we want to effectively change problem behavior. By viewing the problems as residing within the person or by saying that he or she is having problems, we are not in the position of helping them. To the contrary, as long as we are thinking and acting from this perspective, we will only make things worse. 

We don’t have the knowledgeable people available to be able to implement the behaviorist' knowledge and to reliably improve human behavior. Fact is, when people are brought to mental health institutions to receive help, they are not obtaining the environmental stimuli which are needed to change their behavior. This writer strongly believes that what is offered only adds to the problem. Generally speaking, mental health professionals reinforce rather than decrease the client's mental health problems. This is why the lack of knowledge about how behavior really works must be urgently addressed. 

Although this writer believes that better results can be obtained when, after the careful analysis of how behavior is caused and maintained and after environmental changes are made that would lead to better consequences, he is aware that the implementation of this view is not possible given the current state of affairs. Given the pervasive false view that individuals cause their own behavior,  it is not feasible to apply behaviorist knowledge and to focus on matters which occur outside of our skin. The only behaviorist option, which can be successfully implemented, is when the speaker reliably and consistently effects and modifies the environment within the skin of listener. 

Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) always positively effects the environment within the skin of the listener. If a speaker doesn’t create such a positive effect in the listener, the speaker’s speech is Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB). The NVB speaker always has an adverse effect on the listener, even if this listener accepts this speaker.  Since only the listener has access to what happens within his or her own skin, nobody except the listener can verify or determine what kind of changes occur due to the speaker. It is, however, up to the speaker to check in with the listener and to verify if positive effects have occurred, are occurring and continue to occur. If the listener experiences no positive interoceptive experiences as a consequence of how the speaker speaks, then the speaker is producing NVB becaus he or she is repeatedly causing negative responses in the body of the listener. 

As long as the listener’s private speech reports on the negative physiological condition of his or her body and as long as the negative stimuli originating within the listener’s body co-occur with the expressions of the speaker, the speaker is producing NVB. The negative experiences in the listener always co-occur with the negative NVB expressions of some speaker. When the speaker changes his or her speech from NVB to SVB, the listener experiences this as a physiological change in his or her body. This change, which often is expressed as a relief from pressure or stress, is felt by all communicators. Thus, in SVB the environment within the skin of the listener can be changed, while the environment outside the skin of the listener is deliberately avoided. SVB focuses the speaker as well as the listener’s attention on what happens within their body. As a consequence of this focus, speakers and listeners belong to the same (internal)environment. Whether our behaviors occur within or outside of our skin, the lawfulness of human behavior is the same.

SVB occurs when the body of the speaker and the listener are no longer experienced as separate, that is, as internal and external environments. What is internal and external is determined by the way in which we speak. Separation between internal and external dissolves during SVB, but it is maintained during NVB. In SVB, we co-regulate each other, because we are each other’s environment, but in NVB we dis-regulate each other, because, supposedly, we belong to different worlds.