December 18, 2014

December 18, 2014

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Engineer 

Dear Reader, 

 

It is 1:30am and this author can’t sleep. During and after the final of his psychology class many students came up to him and were thanking and praising him for his teaching, saying their good byes and wishing him a Merry Christmas. The response was beautiful and this author felt so happy and grateful to see and hear the many results of his work. Various students told him anecdotes of how they are trying to use Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) in their lives. Although they also expressed how they are grappling and experimenting with it, they all reported positive experiences and improved relationships and performance. 

Strangely, this writing still has the effect of convincing this writer of the absolutely real and profound consequences of SVB. Although these consequences have been happening all along and are very familiar to this writer, they are in such a stark contrast to the world in which we live, which is so full of Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB), that putting it into writing seems to have a finalizing, what behaviorist call, a consequating effect. 

In this writer's teaching something powerful and consolidating has begun to occur, because throughout this semester this writer has done more writing than ever before. His written words have increasingly more effect on his students and on himself. He has written many things on their papers and not one has come back to complain or disagree. To the contrary, they all approve of him. 

During class, of course, not everybody talks, but when students write their papers, they say many important things with their written words. This author is pleased with and impacted by this process, which encourages him to write back and to trust his own writings. While he is reinforcing the students’ verbal expressions in spoken and in written form, he finds that the written form is becoming more and more important. Furthermore, he got good responses to the postings he wrote to keep his students informed. Also, his writings in his journal have become more coherent and consistent. In effect, his writings are now laying a foundation for this writer’s vocal verbal behavior. Something new is happening, which wasn’t there before, which couldn’t be there because the foundation was missing. For a long time, this writer was feeling very uncertain about his writings. This uncertainty also affected his speech. Now that his uncertainty about his writing has begun to decrease, his speech is also improving. He is achieving better results with his spoken words, because of his writings.    

December 17, 2014

December 17, 2014

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Engineer


Dear Reader,

This is a continuation of a response to “Rescuing The Science Of Human Behavior From The Ashes Of Socialism” (1997) by Ullin T. Place. “How linguistic utterances control behavior” is not discussed as long as “the view prevails that a substantial part of human behavior is controlled by processes which are innate and thus by implication immune from modification by learning.” Although Place criticizes Chomsky’s “preoccupation with syntax”, he doesn’t recognize his own verbal fixation, which sets the stage for NVB and prevents discussion of this important topic. NVB and not the preservation of the “tradition behaviorist idea that the principles of animal learning can and should be applied to human behavior” led to “discrimination by the academic establishment.”

Restoring “to the academic respectability the idea of a link between linguistics and the scientific study of animal learning” is only possible when we address the SVB/NVB distinction, because it is due to our NVB-way of  talking and writing that this link keeps being missed. Unless we realize that the “persistent disparagement of behaviorism and the mood of apathetic fatalism with respect to human nature” is not “bred by nativism”, but by how human beings behave verbally, by NVB, we are not going increase SVB, which involves the “systematic application of positive reinforcement.” 

The “systematic discussion” of “the reality” and the “functional significance of the phenomenon of the novel sentence” couldn’t happen because of our NVB and is only going to happen due to our SVB. Communication of “information about remote contingencies”, which either aides or threatens our lives, requires SVB. Our individual use of “novel information-providing declarative sentences” that is necessary for problem solving, is only as good as the extent to which “contingency-specifying stimuli or rules” that make SVB possible “have become embedded in the culture.” Only during SVB, can the problem solver “construct sentences specifying behavior-consequences relations based on personal experience.” Without the ability to construct “novel sentences in the form of a descriptive rule”, that is, without SVB, we cannot solve any of our relationship problems. Only SVB makes us a “linguistically competent human being.” 

This author agrees with Place that “Something needs to be said about the role of reinforcement in maintaining and making possible the construction and emission of novel sentences by the speaker and their construal by the listener.” We need to talk about this, rather than write about it, because only then will we be able to identify the great difference between SVB and NVB. This author disagrees with Place’s distortion of the individual process of listening. He writes “If you listen to a tape recording of any naturally occurring verbal interaction between two or more people, or read any professionally prepared transcript of such an interaction, or simply listen to a conversation in which you are not a participant (italics added), you cannot avoid observing that virtually every sentence that a speaker completes is reinforced by the listener.” This author is against Place's suggestion that to be able to listen we have to stand aside. This separation of speaking and listening behavior is characteristic for NVB, while in SVB a verbalizer can be the same person as a mediator.

What Place describes as “continuers”, the “yes” or “no” or “Mmhmm”; in other words, the expressions of agreement and acknowledgment by the mediator to reinforce the verbalizer and what Harzem and Miles (1978) have called a “disenforcer”, the expression of “incomprehension”, “disagreement”, or “a request for clarification”, can be mapped onto SVB and NVB. Although it is true that “all such responses or absences thereof tell the speaker that the sentence has failed either to communicate or persuade and that some repetition, restatement, elaboration, or answer to the objection is required”, what this analysis leaves out is what the verbalizer him or herself as a mediator overtly says, to either continue or disenforce his or her overt speech. 

In the conclusion of his paper Place, who thinks Verbal Behavior is “flawed", insists on an analysis of human behavior at the level of the individual, nevertheless he refers to verbal behavior at the level of group. “The effect of these different varieties of consequence provided by the listener in either maintaining, terminating or disrupting the speaker’s flow is plain for all to hear (italics added).” However, what is not so plain for all to hear is that there are, in addition to what Perreira (2013) has called ecto-environmental or external verbalizers and mediators, also endo-environmental or internal verbalizers and mediators. Surely, each individual overt verbalizer also has his or her own covert private speech, which also mediates what he or she says. Moreover, the endo-environment of the ecto-mediator can be dramatically altered by the extent to which covert speech of the verbalizer can become overt. The exclusion of covert private speech from overt public speech characterizes NVB, but inclusion and exploration of private speech during our public speech characterizes SVB.

This author agrees that “there is a science of human behavior”, but this science requires a new way of talking called SVB, which always includes “a complete three-term contingency.” Like most people, Place is frustrated with the spoken communication. Like most people, Place is conditioned by, mostly exposed to and probably unknowingly troubled by NVB. His emphasis on the individual, on himself really, is because he doesn’t yet distinguish between SVB and NVB. Only in NVB “the terminator” doesn’t and can’t “act as a reinforcer” and doesn’t have “the effect of allowing the listener to take a turn to play the role of speaker.” In SVB there is constant turn-taking. The absence of turn-taking is characteristic for NVB. Without turn-taking we don’t really communicate.

December 16, 2014

December 16, 2014

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Engineer

Dear Reader, 

The following is a response to “Rescuing The Science Of Human Behavior From The Ashes Of Socialism” (1997) by Ullin T. Place. This writer agrees that “only by reinstating the link between linguistics and animal learning can confidence be restored in the possibility of a genuine science of human behavior with application to the problem of constructing a better social order.” However, he thinks of this missing “link” as something spoken, not written. Of course, writing can lead to speaking and that is why this author is writing about this spoken link.

The “failure of socialism” and the “discrediting” of “the very idea that by applying the scientific method to the study of human social behavior it is possible to devise ways to improve human societies in a way that will benefit everyone” is caused by how people talk, communicate, interact, relate and not by “competitive capitalism” or by “obscurantist principles such as tribalism, nationalism, and religious fundamentalism.” Since Place quotes Comte (1798-1857), who already argued that “the natural sciences can and should be applied with equal diligence to the study of the more intractable phenomenon of human social behavior”, it is astounding that he still equates the “failure of the social sciences” with the “failure to develop an effective science of human behavior at the level of the individual” (italics added). However, according to this author, it is the failure to develop an effective science of human behavior at the level of the group, which has prevented scientists from achieving the “kind of theoretical consensus that has characterized physics since Newton, chemistry since Lavoisier, and biology since Darwin.” 

Naturally, human behavior at the level of the group is less likely to be explored by those with an individualistic bias. In two of his three suggestions, Place emphasizes “the failure to develop an effective science of human behavior at the individual level”, but mentioning “the experimental studies of the behavior of other species of free-moving living organisms”, he contradicts this emphasis. Ironically, in his third suggestion, he blames Noam Chomsky, an individual, for the “wide-spread”, socially-accepted claim, which “inhibited the development of human behavior based on operant principles.” Of course, the “one phenomenon which above all others distinguishes human-behavior from that of other species of living organisms”, is socially mediated language, which only makes sense at the group-level.

Place’s assessment that Skinner’s book Verbal Behavior (1957) “represented a problem” and “had to be abandoned” reflects his ambition for “academic prestige” rather than social aptness. His question, about how “novel sentences are constructed”, requires the extension of Verbal Behavior this author proposes with Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) and Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB). These universal categories of Verbal Behavior contribute greatly to our understanding of the “functional significance” of a “novel sentence” and “the role of the listener’s reinforcement in keeping it going and making it possible.” However, there is, in the opinion of this writer, nothing wrong with Skinner’s book, about the verbal community, which shapes speaking, listening, writing and reading behavior. The question “how to live harmoniously and constructively together, using positive reinforcement in place of aversive control?” can only be answered when our SVB begins to replace our NVB. 

SVB is a group process, but NVB is an individual process. In SVB we talk with each other, but in NVB we talk at each other. SVB is bi-directional and NVB is uni-directional. In SVB we reciprocally reinforce each other, but NVB is based on ‘my way or the high way,' in other words, in NVB the speaker coerces the listener. SVB is mostly operant, while NVB is mostly respondent behavior. The contingency which sets the stage for stability, predictability and social cohesion, gives rise to SVB, while the contingency which only perpetuates survival of the fittest produces NVB. 

The much-lamented “failure [of behaviorism] to deal adequately with the phenomenon of language” is not because “human language and cognition can and must be studied without regard to the study of animal behavior” and has nothing to do with anyone’s aversion against the word “behavior”, but is a consequence of the continuation of NVB, which can occur because patterns of group behavior, while we interact, have not yet been properly analyzed. Emphasis on the organism was necessary, but should have led to further analysis of meta-contingencies, which pertain to behavior of the group.   

December 15, 2014

December 15, 2014

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Engineer

Dear Reader, 

 

This writing is a response to “Verbal Behavior in the Measuring Process” (1996) by L.E. Fraley. Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) and Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB) are mutually exclusive response classes, which occur in different environments. The former only happens in a controlled environment, in a safe and stable laboratory environment, which is a necessity for operant learning, while the latter occurs in a chaotic, aversive environment, in which our course-grained respondent behaviors limit the development of fine-grained behavioral repertoires and thus prevents investigation of what is actually happening while we talk with one another. Only during SVB can the communicators measure, that is, verify that a person’s private speech produces novel stimuli, which evoke new ways of talking. In NVB, by contrast, measuring will not and cannot occur, because the expression of the verbalizer’s private stimuli is considered to be a weakness. 

Every human being hypothesizes privately, subvocally, about the situation he or she is in. This doesn’t mean, however, that an inner agent is at work, but that due to previous exposures to similar environments, behaviors, such as measuring, become possible or impossible. Any hypothesis usually has its origin in what we say to ourselves privately, or, in what happens endo-environmentally. We  have a hunch about how something might work and then we set out to test our hypothesis.  

The transition involved in moving from our private speech to public speech is often overlooked in the course of hypothesis testing. Generally speaking, we would only express publicly, in writing, what has been empirically validated. Usually, we only want to express that about which we are absolutely certain. That about which we are uncertain is not to be emphasized, it makes us look incompetent. Yet, it is our ability to admit to ourselves that we are uncertain, which leads to the kind of private speech in which we might say to ourselves: maybe it is like this? What makes us measure that?

Fraley correctly makes the observation that “If we can already respond effectively and sufficiently to a situation, it tends not to stimulate measuring.” Ironically, in NVB all the communicators will make it seem as if they “already respond effectively and sufficiently to the situation”, while in SVB they are not. In SVB, which is the language of science, we speak with caution. NVB is the language of bias. “Ineffective behavior” creates the establishing operation that evokes measuring behavior.

December 14, 2014

December 14, 2014

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Engineer

Dear Reader, 

Due to the discovery of Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) the author’s life has changed beyond recognition. The direction of the change has become more stable: confrontations with unwanted stimuli occurs less and less and exposure to stimuli which stabilize and secure his life has increased. Because the learning of effective behavior and the decrease of ineffective behavior is gradual and cumulative, the change occurs almost unnoticed. There are no big changes. The biggest change seems to be when things momentarily go wrong. Then negative stimuli, quite suddenly, cause the author to behave in ways, which are reactive. Such behaviors are met with social disqualification. When they occur, the author feels embarrassed they happen so quickly and that he was unable to do anything to prevent them from occurring. Usually this happens in work-related circumstances in which the author is incapable of moving away from stimuli and due to his job must remain in their proximity. He is learning to better handle noxious stimuli. 

Certain stimuli are predictably having an upsetting effect on this author. Such stimuli are best avoided. However, in his work this is often impossible. A manic person may be demanding a response, which has a startling effect. There is no way of escaping this except by looking back afterwards and by thinking about what could have been done differently. The strong feelings that were expressed by this author are always a reaction to the demanding habits that people have. Bad and unhealthy habits, such as smoking, are reinforced, so that the thought of not being able to smoke is already anxiety provoking. 

Under certain circumstances demanding stimuli are more likely to elicit an upsetting response. When the author was driving the van to transport seven mentally ill clients, some of whom, because they were so excited, were talking very loudly, he was in a stressful situation.

The transport took place in the evening, to an event in another town, an hour’s drive away. The laid-back reggae music, which the author appreciated, was suddenly changed into loud and negative noise. And, because the reception kept fading, the coworker, in an attempt to please the clients, kept trying to change the station. She also gave clients turns to listen to their favorite music, if they could find it. Then all of a sudden, one of the clients blurted out: “can we smoke?”

This author said “No” thinking that the client wanted to light a cigarette inside the van. The client responded with an intense voice of frustration “Why not?” Perceiving that this client was not listening and was going to have her way anyway, this author repeated “No, you can’t smoke.” Then the client then said in a loud voice “We are allowed to smoke.” This author reacted “No! You are not going to smoke in the van. I will stop the car if you do.” Only then the client said “I did not ask about smoking in the van, but about having a smoke break before the concert.” People were laughing at this author, who felt bad that he had misunderstood the situation and spoken so authoritatively. 

Another stressor of the situation, which could have been avoided, was that the author could have let his coworker drive on the way back. Because she let him know that she was not used to driving a big van, this author decided to drive it. He put himself in the stressful position for the time it took to get to our destination and back home again. Fact was, however, this author didn’t trust his coworker to let her do the driving and so he took the responsibility for this important job. 

Before the trip started, the author had also heard some alarming news regarding one of his clients. She had been seen crossing the street diagonally, ignoring traffic. This author was thinking that when this client endangers herself like that, an accident is waiting to happen. Also, this author briefly spoke with one of his colleagues, who in his opinion, was very stressed and reluctant to talk. He should have given him the instructions for the trip. It said so on a piece of paper.