November 30, 2013

November 30, 2013

Dear Reader, 

 

The question I am asking is: if you would be successful in your communication with others, what would the outcome be? Wouldn’t it be that you have happy, supportive relationships, that life has meaning because you are loved and enjoyed by others? Wouldn’t it be that you feel confident and stimulated to be the best that you can be? Wouldn’t it be that there will be understanding and respect among all those with whom you interact? Then, would there still be such a thing as your success? Wouldn’t success in our communication have to be reciprocal, because it always signifies the success we achieve together with our family members, our friends, our colleagues or anyone else with whom we communicate? If we have this successful communication with each other, wouldn’t we be inclined to listen to each other? 

If the above is our well-defined purpose, mustn’t our next step be to verify if our current way of communicating achieves or approaches this? Repertoire which achieves our goal can remain and repertoire that approximates our goal can be built upon and shaped into the expressions which achieve our desired goal. Behavior that doesn’t lead to the desired goal doesn’t require our attention. We only need to occupy ourselves with the construction of successful behavior, which, because of its reinforcing effects and its noticeable, steadily, increasing strength, counteracts our unsuccessful behavior. What did not happen and could not happen, during our previous unsuccessful behavior, was the reinforcement of our successful behavior. Our successful behavior was always there in spite of our more prominent unsuccessful behavior, but, since our focus was on our unsuccessful behavior, reinforcement of our successful behavior didn’t and couldn’t have much effect in terms of reducing our unsuccessful behavior. 

Positive reinforcement of successful behavior makes clear the extent to which we are troubled by negative behavior. Emphasis, of the reinforcing agent, on the elimination of unsuccessful behavior prevents the construction of successful behavior. Most dispensers of reinforcement, most other human beings, due to their own history of coercive behavioral control, are overly involved in reducing socially unacceptable behavior. They try to make others feel good by demonstrating how acceptable they are, but, instead of creating SVB, this increases NVB, co-dependence and enabling.