June 28, 2015

June 28, 2015

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Engineer

Dear Reader, 

This is my eight response to “A Rose by Naming: How We May Learn How to Do it” by Greer and Longano (2010). In Verbal Behavior (1957), Skinner writes about the speak-as-own-listener and yet most radical behaviorists are not even interested in having a real conversation in which they as speaker are their own listener. In effect, most behaviorists, just like non-behaviorists, adhere to the rules of Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB). 

NVB is and needs to be rule-governed, but Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) is contingency-shaped. How can writing about a speaker make sense if it is not about how the speaker sounds and only about what he or she says? If a speaker speaks, he or she produces a sound and his or her voice is an independent variable which determines the kind of conversation, the dependent variable. What is a listener if writing is not based on what the listener hears, if it excludes the sound which is produced by the speaker? Writing about speaking and listening is meaningless as long as it fails to mention that how a speaker sounds is determined by whether the listener listens or is capable of listening. Speakers don’t determine their sound in the same way they don’t determine their words. The speaker’s sound can only be expressed if the listener is listing or mediating him or her.

A major point in Skinner’s theory is that “verbal observing (listening) and producing (speaking) relations have special functions that set verbal behavior apart, and that is the social mediating function of verbal behavior relative to nonverbal stimuli.” Nonverbal stimuli, by contrast, act directly on the environment, but verbal stimuli act indirectly, because they are mediated by others. “Thus, as one acquires increased verbal correspondence between what is spoken relative to other stimuli observed, one expands one’s options for reinforcement associated with the various motivational conditions or establishing operations that correspond to the use of names” (underlining added). Here the issue of correspondence only seems to refer to what is said, but not to how it is said. 


If a teacher teaches with a high rate of SVB the student will non-verbally corresponds accordingly. However, if the teacher teaches with a high rate of NVB, the student will non-verbally correspond to that coercive way of teaching. These two ways of responding may verbally be the same, but non-verbally they are of course entirely different. Moreover, NVB instruction will inevitably lead to negative self-talk or to private speech. SVB instruction, however, leads to positive self-talk or private speech. 

The authors write “one expands one’s options for reinforcement associated with the various motivational conditions or establishing operations that correspond to the use of names.” One wonders, however, how reinforcing one's negative self-talk can be? Negative private speech inevitably sets the stage for NVB. 

The authors “propose that when the joining of observing and producing responses have verbal ramifications, as in certain verbal categorizations, Naming is the facilitator”, but I want to  add that given the SVB/NVB distinction, we must engage in a case of “Naming”, which applies to adult talking. 


"Derived stimulus relations need not be verbal, as in the case of music, art and dance”, but distance themselves from “emergent relations that are in some way tied to evolved survival functions in nonhuman animals” as the reinforcement of art, music and dance “are not verbal.” They don’t consider the importance of nonverbal reinforcement due to the way in which we sound while we speak. Supposedly, the speaker doesn’t produce any sound and the listener doesn't hear any sound either. 

The authors hesitate, but mention “Perhaps creative performance in the arts or problem solving in nonhuman species involves higher order operant relations or emergent relations that incorporate joining of observing and producing responses such that novel and effective responding results.” One doesn’t need to turn to creative performances as the speaker-as-own-listener creates SVB which gives rise to these  “higher order operant relations that incorporate joining of observing and producing responses such that novel and effective responding results.”

SVB and NVB already existed before I discovered them, but now that we have given a name to these subsets of our vocal verbal behavior, it is clear why there was a “discrepancy in the stimulus equivalence literature in which some emergent behavior involves processes of observing and producing that are not essentially verbal.” There is not enough talking going on, that is, SVB, about these matters, as only academic writing and reading is reinforced. The authors write “Perhaps the contingencies of reinforcement are simply different, as when we discussed the different types of observing and producing responses and the distinction between the reinforcement for each.” Indeed, the contingencies of reinforcement for SVB and NVB are different. 

The stimulus-stimulus pairing involved in “Naming” was called “ostensive learning” by Skinner (1957). He described it as the “pairing of a vocal stimulus (potentially a conditioned reinforcer) with another neutral stimulus, such as an action with an object.” His words indicate that he considered it as superficial learning. He emphasizes this by arguing that “children learn to become effective listeners through Pavlovian-type conditioning processes that set the occasion for the listener to respond to verbal stimuli with conditioned reflexes.” Skinner emphasizes operant behavior, not respondent behavior. 

The teacher who gives NVB instruction elicits behaviors in his or her students. but the teacher who gives SVB instruction evokes new learning responses in his or her students. As “echoics are foundational to the tact speaker function” there is a difference between pairings which occurred with SVB or NVB instruction. 


The authors write “perhaps, both the Pavlovian second order conditioning and the echoic are involved, but at different stages.” No doubt this must be the case. Moreover, Horne and Lowe (1996) suggest that a“the caregiver’s voice and sounds function as classically conditioned stimuli that have strong reinforcing effects on the child, so that when the child hear his or her own voice in the echoic, these sounds have reinforcing properties similar to those of the parents”. If the child was instructed by an abusive NVB caregiver, he or she will not be able to hear his own voice when he or she echoes what the parent is saying. He or she will echo the caregiver’s negative-sounding voice, which doesn’t allow him or her to hear his or her own relaxed positive-sounding voice. We can only hear our own voice during SVB, so only when the child gets SVB instruction, will it be able to hear his or her own voice. If the parents weren’t reinforcing the child with their instruction in the first place, the child will not be able to reinforce him or herself and consequently, as is always the case in NVB, he or she will demand from others that they reinforce him or her. Thus, the NVB the speaker aversively and coercively stimulates the listener and deamands to have his or her way.

The “correspondence between what has been heard and what is said serves as a conditioned reinforcer, and in typically developing children this occurs very early.” It should be clear here that this correspondence will only happen if the mother is healthy and happy and not depressed, fearful or stressed. In the former,  mothers would produce SVB, but in the latter they would produce NVB. During NVB, out of fear, stress, anxiety or frustration, we fake  correspondence between what is heard and what is said and such obedient responses are not emitted, but they are elicited. 

“In a study on very early development, Decasper and Spence (1987) reported that newborn children emitted auditory observing responses to their mother’s voices and not to other voices, suggesting that in utero conditioning of mother’s voices was responsible.” This also demonstrates that it must be SVB instruction rooted in love, support, care, protection and joy, rather than NVB instruction due to depression, impatience, despair, fear or frustration. “It does seem feasible that Pavlovian second-order conditioned reinforcement for the stimuli involved in the observation experience for Naming may be responsible for the prerequisite conditioning of the echoic as a reinforcer.” Certainly, without such conditioned reinforcement developmental cusps will be missed. If we are raised properly, with love and care, we learn SVB, but if we are neglected or abandoned, we will learn NVB.  

Parroting is not verbal, but “duplicating the sounds can initially reinforce speech sounds or singing, and hearing the sounds by speaker-as-own-listener results in automatic reinforcement.” And “Attending to the observed response that one [as a baby] produces results in within-the-skin listener reinforcement, perhaps because the correspondence between hearing and saying is already a conditioned reinforcer.”   

When we learn about SVB, that is, when we listen to ourselves while we speak, like nonverbal children, we first need to hear our own sound, without having to be concerned about what we say. When we hear whether we have SVB or NVB, we have mastered “Naming” the two subsets of vocal verbal behavior.  This will exponentially increase our chances for positive reinforcement, because being able to “Name” SVB and NVB, will allow us to have SVB and to prevent NVB. Also we can practice SVB on our own as speaker-as-own-listener and SVB will be automatically reinforcing to us. NVB doesn’t need to be learned, it only needs to be recognized and prevented. Extinguishing NVB is done by avoiding and escaping from the environments with people who maintain it. Only when another person as listener mediates our SVB as a speaker, will our SVB be reinforced and strengthened.