Behavior Analysis and its application to human behavior:
“The science of behavioral control …... was born in the laboratory with the discovery of the ‘conditioned reflex’……Over the years behavioral scientists have worked on the premise that human behavior, like other natural phenomena is subject to natural laws. Through a careful experimental analysis laws of behavior have been derived which have increased man’s understanding far in excess of what was once thought possible… laboratory studies, first with animals …… slowly built up a store of knowledge which eventually allowed for the extension of both method and principles to settings beyond the confines of the laboratory … applications of the principles … are reaching out toward every corner of our culture… facts are with us…” 1966.
And in 1970:
“From the behaviorist reformulation of psychology, behavior emerged as a directly manipulable datum, and what the behaviorist learned about controlling behavior has recently reached the stage of widespread technological application …… the experimental analysis of behavior is … employed in mental hospitals, institutions for the retarded, day care centers, reading clinics, guidance centers, prisons, educational institutions and outpatient clinics …… if a technology allows effective remedial action, it should equally permit the devising of preventive measures. The time has come for us to begin suggesting new tactics for the prevention of behavioral problems.”
A substantial body of literature - journals, articles, textbooks - testify to the efficiency of TEAB and I know there are many who were inspired by Skinner’s vision and passionate appeal in 1972 :
“Another practical consequence of basic research remains to be emphasized. Our culture has made us all sensitive to the good of others, and we are generously reinforced when we act for their good, but the display of gratitude which reinforces the teacher or therapist who is in immediate contact with another person is often dangerous. Those who are especially sensitive to the good of others are often induced to go into teaching or therapy rather than basic research. Progress would be more rapid if the same kind of reinforcement could be brought to bear on the researcher, if he could be appropriately affected by the extraordinary extent to which he is also acting for the good of others. The basic researcher has, in fact, a tremendous advantage. Any slight advance in our understanding of human behavior which leads to improved practices in behavior modification will eventually work for the good of billions of people.” (Skinner’s emphasis.)
As a practitioner in a helping profession, I am a witness: grateful clients have brightened my day. Despite the need for additional data, I proclaim ‘my psychology’ derives from experiments where animals and scientists ‘talk’: Doctor Dolittle is alive! I explain why conditioning is psychosomatic - and no one is startled. (41)
People seem to care less about being compared with ‘lower’ species.
I am astonished to hear Cesar Millan (42) assert he trains people and rehabilitates dogs. I remember being warned not to say train in connection with humans.
Social and geographical climates appear to have changed: researchers from diverse disciplines are attempting to delay - or prevent - the extinction of animals and vegetation: they fight for survival, preserve environments, protect natural resources.
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(41) Murray Sidman notes: “The pursuit of science is an intensely personal affair.” And that doesn’t mean science is a solitary venture: “As a young graduate student …. I felt that my work had to be different, that it had to produce something that would startle the world. Along these lines I once wrote a paper, describing some of my work, in which I emphasized how different my experiments were from anything else that had ever been done. One of my teachers, W.N. Schoenfeld, agreed that the data were very interesting. But he went on to add that I had written the paper from a peculiar point of view. I had emphasized the differences between my work and everyone else’s. But science does not ordinarily advance that way. It is the job of science to find orderly relations among phenomena, not differences. It would have been more useful if I could have pointed out the similarities between my work and previous experiments.” (Sidman’s emphasis)
(41) Murray Sidman notes: “The pursuit of science is an intensely personal affair.” And that doesn’t mean science is a solitary venture: “As a young graduate student …. I felt that my work had to be different, that it had to produce something that would startle the world. Along these lines I once wrote a paper, describing some of my work, in which I emphasized how different my experiments were from anything else that had ever been done. One of my teachers, W.N. Schoenfeld, agreed that the data were very interesting. But he went on to add that I had written the paper from a peculiar point of view. I had emphasized the differences between my work and everyone else’s. But science does not ordinarily advance that way. It is the job of science to find orderly relations among phenomena, not differences. It would have been more useful if I could have pointed out the similarities between my work and previous experiments.” (Sidman’s emphasis)
(42) The ‘dog whisperer’, host of Dog Whisperer on the National Geographic Television channel
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