April 26, 2015

April 26, 2015

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Engineer

Dear Reader, 

Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) involves a manner of speaking in which the speaker affects optimal arousal levels for the listener. The arousal level for the listener is neither too high nor too low, but exactly right. Whether or not SVB is produced is determined by the listener. However, the speaker can also be his or her own listener and thus determine if he or she is producing SVB. When the speaker and the listener are one and the same person, it is only for him or for herself and not for someone else that the listener of his or her own speech can determine whether he or she is producing SVB.

As the speaker is capable of discerning he or she is producing SVB, he or she becomes more accurate in discerning if listeners other than him or herself are experiencing SVB. What may be perceived as SVB by the speaker as his or her own listener may be Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB) for listeners other than the speaker. SVB occurs when the speaker as his or her own listener as well as the other listeners experience the voice of the speaker in the same positive manner. SVB perceived as SVB by the speaker as his or her own listener, can also first be perceived as NVB by other listeners and later as SVB. This can happen as other listeners are often not listening to the sound of the speaker, but to what he or she says. They often respond to the content of what the speaker is saying. Listeners may say they don’t like what the speaker is saying, but they don’t respond to his or her sound. 

When the listener is focusing on the sound of the speaker, the listener is more likely to perceive the sound of the speaker in the same way as the speaker, but when the listener is not conditioned to listen to the sound of the speaker, disagreement between the speaker and the listener about whether the speaker is producing SVB or NVB cannot be resolved as the attention of the listener keeps going to the content of what is said. If this kind of mediation by the listener happens, the speaker’s attention will very likely be distracted from listening to the sound of his or her voice while he or she speaks. 

If NVB instances happen at a high rate, while SVB instances happen at a low rate, then NVB occurs. If SVB instances happen at a high rate and NVB instances happen at a low rate, then SVB occurs. “When people speak, their speech is not the overt manifestation of an abstract grammar that rules and regulates what can be said or not, or how to say things.” Our speech is not caused by a language acquisition devise and thus the higher or lower rates of NVB or SVB produced by the speaker depend on the conditioning of the speaker's nervous system. Unsafe and threatening environments gave rise to high rates of NVB, the kind of speech in which, speakers and listeners predominantly emphasize the verbal, while escaping from the nonverbal, the environment within the skin. Safe and appetitive environments, on the other hand, set the stage for SVB, the vocal verbal behavior Ribes is referring to when he states “language as actual behavior has no grammar” (1991). 

Although Ribes is right when he states “grammar is not the condition that makes language effective or sound”, he is as verbally fixated as everyone else who was mainly exposed to and conditioned by NVB. It would never  occur to Ribes that only the calm sound of our voice can make our language a “meaningful social practice.” Although our language doesn’t require that it is “ruled by or adjusted to an ideal, abstract grammar”, for it to become more meaningful there must be a continuity of experience of safety and comfort. 

Ribes states “according to what has been said.” without realizing that nothing has been said, only something was written. Like Wittgenstein, he writes about “language as it is spoken in daily life”, but nothing indicates he actually speaks about it. I don’t agree with Wittgenstein who insists that “every sentence in our language is in order as it is.” This illustrates intellectual superficiality, because anyone who engages in conversation with others knows, that most of these conversations go nowhere and can’t go anywhere. Most of our conversations are NVB, which creates, maintains and exploits disorder. 


Only SVB can create order. SVB is not an intellectual accomplishment, but an experiential phenomenon. NVB facilitates the rejection and the abandonment of our experience of well-being. Ribes considers the importance of “language as a medium”, but is too enthralled by Wittgenstein’s “language games” to notice  that language is nothing but a sound produced by our vocal apparatus. He writes about the “acquisition of language” and “understanding and using words (which are tantamount to learning)”, but doesn’t mention the production and the listening to a sound to which we can all be attuned. 

Ribes wants readers to think of “language as an instrument.” He seems to refer to the human voice when he writes “language as an instrument, means effective use in relation to the behavior of other individuals”, but he primarily focuses on “thinking about its functions.” Thus, he only pays lip-service to the fact that “language is the instrument by means of which people relate to each other.” Apparently, Ribes wants the reader to think that “communication is a phenomenon taking place as a special function of language, but not as an equivalent to language,” but no explanation is given anywhere in his writings of an instrument that is producing harmonious positive sounds. 

Before I completed reading the section of the paper “language as a form of life,” I wondered if would contain anything that goes into the importance of sound while speak? The answer, as I expected, was no. Since Ribes is commenting on Wittgenstein’s ruminations about language, he only reiterates his view that “language games not only make up the meaning of words but the meaning of life itself.” What follows is long list of assumptions, but there is no reference anywhere about the important role of the human voice. 

The final section of the paper deals with “language as behavior.” I agree that “Psychology has not recognized that language, although ever-present in human behavior and its context, does not constitute a psychological phenomenon”, but the statement “all of human behavior is linguistic” is mistaken. Only SVB is linguistic, that is, verbal; NVB confines us to nonverbal responding. The fact that in NVB the sound of the speaker’s voice coerces the listener into submission, is not mentioned anywhere. Only something is said about “the groundlessness of believing, especially in small children.” Surely, it is sad that children continue to be conditioned to become adults mainly capable of NVB.