Module 7 – script Welcome to the last module of our course. As the course is coming to an end, we hope you have enjoyed this class. In our last module, we will discuss the behavior-analytic approach to language, or verbal behavior. In addition, we will also discuss behavior that is under the control of verbal behavior versus behavior that is under the control of direct contingencies. The first topic we will be discussing is the behavioral approach to language. There are two properties of language: formal and functional properties. Formal properties are topography of the language, such as structure, phonemes and grammar. Functional properties, on the other hand, refer to the interaction between environmental variables and the verbal responses. In behavior analysis, we are more interested in the functional aspect of language. In other words, we are interested in how environmental variables evoke verbal responses, and how the verbal responses affect the environment. We do not deny the importance of structural properties of language, but the structure of language does not tell us why people say what they say, how they use language to impact the environment, and how language is developed. The functional approach to language, on the other hand, addresses these issues and is called verbal behavior. In his seminal work, “Verbal Behavior,” Skinner proposes that language is a learned behavior that is controlled by the same environmental variables and behavioral principles as the nonlanguage behavior. In contrast with nonlanguage behavior, which directly produces reinforcement by interacting with the environment without the need for a listener, verbal behavior produces reinforcement only through the mediation of a listener. Therefore, its effect on the environment is indirect. An example of nonlanguage behavior is brewing tea. This behavior directly produces the desired drink. On the other hand, verbal behavior such as requesting a cup of tea produces the drink through another person. As such, verbal behavior requires a speaker and a listener, also called an audience. Only through the responses of a listener does the verbal behavior of a speaker acquire the control of the environment. There is one question: Can the speaker and the listener be the same person in cases of self-talk, self-instruction, and thinking? For example, when you are cooking pasta, you might ask yourself “What do I need for cooking pasta?” And then, you answer yourself “pasta, water, and some salt.” There are differing views on whether a speaker can act as a listener as well within the field of behavior analysis. Under the molecular view, both the speaker and the listener can be the same person. This is also called speaker-as-own-listener. In other words, the behavior is reinforced by one’s own response, as each response is viewed as a discrete event, and the question is reinforced by the answer. By contrast, under the molar view, these responses form a single extended activity that is reinforced by the same environmental variable, in the above case, edible pasta. Therefore, the reinforcement is not mediated through a listener. In molar behaviorism, the listener must differ from the speaker in order for an activity to be considered as verbal behavior. Most verbal behavior theorists and researchers, including your textbook here, take the molecular view. In this slide I am going to talk about how the usage of the term “verbal behavior” is different from other disciplines. In applied behavior analysis, verbal behavior may or may not be vocal. Nonvocal verbal behavior includes sign language, answering questions on a worksheet, and pointing as a request, while in other fields, verbal behavior only includes vocal behavior. In verbal behavior, the unit of analysis is called a verbal operant. The verbal operant is a functional relation between a response and the same variables that control nonverbal behavior. These environmental variables include: MOs, SDs, and consequences. An individual’s set of verbal operants is called a verbal repertoire. There are six elementary verbal operants: mand, tact, echoic, intraverbal, textual, and transcription. We will look at them in detail shortly. Let’s start with mand. The term mand is selected because of its similarity to command, demand and countermand. In other words, a mand refers to a speaker requesting what is wanted. A mand is directly evoked by an MO, followed by reinforcement related to the MO. For example, hunger will evoke the verbal response “I want food”, which should result in food being delivered. In this case, the hunger (which is the EO) evoked the mand, with the reinforcer directly related to the EO. As with this example, it is usually the case that the mand specifies the reinforcer related to the MO. It is important to know that the mand should be followed by the reinforcement related to the MO. Imagine if the listener delivered social praise for manding for food. In this case, the frequency of mand for food in the presence of that listener will not increase. Among all verbal operants, mand is the first to be acquired by a human child. Because the mands result in the speaker getting the reinforcers, children with autism usually learn mands faster than other verbal operants. For individuals with limited verbal repertoire, a lot of problem behavior may be mands. For example, aggression leading to the removal of instruction could be a mand for a break or escape. Similarly, crying could be a mand for food if it results in food delivery by another person. Teaching appropriate use of mands may eliminate the problem behavior that is evoked by MOs and mediated by others. Therefore, it is important for practitioners to include mand training from the very beginning of behavioral intervention. A tact is another elementary verbal operant that refers to naming things that the speaker is in contact with in any sense modes, including seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, et cetera. That is, a tact is evoked by a nonverbal stimulus and produces generalized conditioned reinforcement. For example, upon having a bite of a cake, an individual said it “tastes sweet”, followed by a social confirmation “Yep!”. In this case, the individual was in contact with the nonverbal stimulus “cake” through the sense mode of taste, and this tact is reinforced by the resulting social exchange. Similarly, upon seeing a cake, the individual tacted the whipped cream on the cake and received a reply from another person. In this case, the person was in contact with the cake through the sense of sight, and the tact was consequated with social reinforcement. Extended tacts are evoked by novel stimuli that share the relevant or irrelevant features of original stimuli under which tacts were learned. There are four types of extensions: generic, metaphorical, metonymical, and solistic. These extensions are classified according to whether a novel nonverbal stimulus shares relevant or irrelevant features of the original stimulus. In generic tact extensions, the novel stimulus shares all the defining features of the original stimulus. As such, it is evoked by stimulus generalization. For example, after a learner has learned to tact “dog” upon seeing a Boston Terrier, the learner is able to tact “dog” upon seeing a previously unknown dog breed, Greyhound, without instruction. Metaphorical extension occurs when a novel stimulus shares some of the defining features of the original stimulus. After an individual has learned to tact “smells nice” upon smelling a flower, without instruction, the individual tacts about a person smelling like flower because that person also smells nice. This is a metaphorical extension; both the flower and the person share the nice smell. Metonymical tact extension happens when the novel stimulus shares some irrelevant but related features with the original stimulus. However, they do not share any relevant features. For example, saying “sleeping” when seeing a picture of a bed. Sleeping and the bed do not share common relevant features, but they are related to each other. Last, solistic extension is when a stimulus is related to a tact indirectly, which evokes substandard verbal behavior. For example, saying “dance a flamingo” instead of flamenco because they sound alike. The elementary verbal operant echoic refers to a speaker repeating words of others. The verbal response from the speaker is evoked by a verbal SD and produces generalized conditioned reinforcement. For example, when a person says “This is a lamp” upon hearing another person saying the same thing. This is an echoic response. As you may have noticed, the echoic response has point-topoint correspondence and formal similarity with the verbal SD. Point-to-point correspondence means that the beginning, middle, and the end of the response matches to the verbal antecedent stimulus. In our example, when the person repeats “This is a lamp” every single word in the response matches with the words in the verbal SD. Formal similarity means the response and the antecedent verbal stimulus are in the same sense mode and physically resemble each other. In our example, both the verbal SD and the person’s echoic response are auditory. Verbal behavior includes nonvocal responses. This means that imitation of a nonvocal verbal SD should also be treated as an echoic since the imitative verbal response and the model share pointto-point correspondence and formal similarity. Likewise, copying a text should also be treated as an echoic because the written verbal stimulus has point-to-point correspondence and shares formal similarity with the product from copying a text. Intraverbal is when a speaker responds to another person’s verbal behavior. It is similar to echoic, in that a verbal SD evokes a response that results in generalized conditioned reinforcement. However, an intraverbal does not have point-to-point correspondence with the verbal stimulus. In other words, you are producing a response that is different from the verbal SD. For example, if your professor asks you “What is reinforcement?” and you provide the correct definition, you might receive praise. In this case, your response is an intraverbal that is different from the verbal SD, maintained by generalized reinforcement. Mand, tact, and intraverbal are three commonly taught verbal operants in early behavioral intervention. Manding helps the learner to ask for what is wanted, including tangible items, information, et cetera. Tact helps a learner to speak about nonverbal stimuli that are present. These stimuli not only include the ones that can be seen, heard, smelt, and felt by others, but also include the ones that are covert, such as pain and adrenaline rush. Intraverbal is different from tact in that a learner talks about nonverbal stimuli that are not present when responding to verbal stimuli. For example, when a learner is asked to name an animal without being presented with a nonverbal stimulus of an animal such as a picture, the learner’s response would be intraverbal. By contrast, the learner’s response will be a tact if the learner responded to the question while being presented with a nonverbal stimulus of a animal. Textual is reading or decoding evoked by visual or tactual SD, such as print or braille. The textual response shares point-to-point correspondence with the antecedent visual or tactual SD. Hence, textual response does not include reading comprehension. However, the response is in a different form from the antecedents. An example of textual will be saying “Water” upon seeing the written word “Water”. Transcription is the reverse of textual. In transcription, a speaker writes down a spoken verbal SD. The verbal response in this case also shares point-to-point correspondence with the antecedent, but in a different form, writing. It is also referred to as taking dictation. In order to differentiate these six elementary verbal operants, you should ask the following four questions: Is the response evoked by an MO? If yes, the response is a mand. Second, is the response evoked by a nonverbal SD? If so, the response is a tact. Third, is the response evoked by a verbal SD that has point-to-point correspondence? If not, the response is an intraverbal. Last, if the response is evoked by a verbal SD that has point-to-point correspondence, does it also share formal similarity with the SD? If so, the verbal response is an echoic. If not, the response is either a textual or a transcription. Verbal behavior is usually complex and contains multiple functional relations among responses and stimuli. For example, while listening to someone’s continuous brag, you may feel annoyed and say “You know everything.” Your response in this case is evoked by a verbal SD and possibly an MO for removing the brag. Because your response does not have point-to-point correspondence with the verbal SD, it may be conceptualized as an intraverbal. However, since there is an MO, your response could also be a mand. This is called multiple control. There are two types of multiple control. The convergent and the divergent multiple control. In convergent multiple control, verbal behavior is controlled by multiple variables. For example, a husband says “Hey! The garbage is full” to his wife. The verbal response from the husband seems to be a tact but is also a mand because the response is evoked by both seeing a full garbage can and an MO for garbage removal. This is called impure tact. Similarly, when a learner says “I want chocolate” upon seeing a chocolate, this is an impure mand because the response is also controlled by a nonverbal stimulus. A pure mand is only evoked by an MO. In the last example in this slide, when a learner sees an orange and hears a question “what is an orange?”, he responds by saying “fruit”. The response is an impure tact because it is also controlled by a verbal SD. Divergent multiple control is when one antecedent variable affects the strength of multiple responses. For example, the EO “thirst” can evoke “I feel thirsty” or “Pass me the water”. In this case, the same EO evokes two different verbal responses. The former is an impure tact, while the latter is a pure mand. Recall that at the beginning of this module, we discussed speaker-as-own-listener. An autoclitic relation occurs when the speaker modifies his or her own verbal behavior. In other words, additional verbal behavior is evoked by the speaker’s own verbal behavior. In this case, there are two levels of verbal operants: primary and secondary verbal operants. The primary verbal operants refer to the six elementary operants. The secondary verbal operants refer to the autoclitic relation in which the additional verbal behavior is emitted to modify primary verbal operants. For example, when a person says “I believe it is raining”, the primary verbal operant here is “it is raining”. The person is tacting rain. The secondary verbal operant is the additional verbal response of “I believe”, which serves to modify the strength of the tact in this case. Another example will be “Chocolate, please”. “Chocolate” is a primary verbal operant, while “please” serves to increase the strength of the mand. When the secondary verbal operant is evoked by a nonverbal stimulus, this is called autoclitic tact. For example, in the primary verbal operant, seeing “mom” evoked a child to say “mommy”. In an autoclitic tact, the child can add “I see” to tell the listener that he came in contact with “mommy” through visual mode. Similarly, the child can add “I hear” to tell the listener he came in contact with “mommy” through auditory mode. That is, he heard mommy rather than he saw mommy. He can also add “I believe it is” or “I think it is” to indicate the strength or the weakness of his tact. In other words, adding either autoclitic tact indicates the child’s certainty of the tact. These autoclitic tacts function to shape listener’s response. On the other hand, autoclitic mand is controlled by an MO. Suppose a child is waiting with his dad for his mom, when he says “I see mommy”, the “I see” may be evoked by an MO for “hurry up, let’s go to her”. Similarly, in a sentence such as “I am sure it is going to be ok”, “I am sure” may be evoked by an MO for “stop thinking about it”. However, if “I see mommy” was taught as one whole unit to the child, then this response is a primary tact without autoclitic relations. In this case, “I see” is an inseparable component of this tact and cannot modify any verbal operant. Because autoclitics arise after the six elementary verbal operants are firmly established, autoclitics probably should not be a target in early behavioral intervention programs. Now we are going to talk about behavior that is under the control of other people’s verbal behavior or rule-governed behavior and behavior that is under the direct control of contingencies. Rule-governed behavior come under the control of verbal stimuli that describe contingencies. For example, if a rule states “It is cold out. Put on your coat to stay warm”, you would put on your coat. In this case, your response is controlled by the verbal description of a contingency. This is also called the instructional control of behavior. A rule-governed behavior may never be in contact with the actual consequences. For example, if a rule that says “Don’t smoke. Smoking causes cancer” controls a person’s behavior, that person will not smoke, and no consequences will be contacted. Rule-governed behavior is developed through exposure to reinforcement for previous rulefollowing behavior. Children’s rule-following behavior is often reinforced with social approval, praise, and good grades. As such, behavior comes under the control of instruction and is governed by rules. Rules can be defined based on topography or function. Skinner defines rules as contingencyspecifying verbal stimuli. In other words, rules must specify antecedent, behavior, and consequence. Catania has offered a broader definition. He defines rules as verbal antecedents, without specification of consequences. Regardless, rules must specify the behavior. Skinner also regards rules as SD. Of course, rules such as “come here” would sufficiently function as an SD. Other times, however, if a rule such as “start the car when you see the green light” is given, the interpretation of SD may be problematic, because it is the green light that evokes the response, not the rule. In other words, the green light is the SD. In response, Blakely and Schlinger suggest that rules are function-altering stimuli that specify the conditions under which responses should be emitted to other stimuli, same as the conditional stimuli. As such, the rule that states “start the car when you see the green light” specifies the green light as the stimulus for you to start the car. Malott suggests another possibility that rules can function as motivating operations. For example, when a teacher yelled at a student, “sit down now”, the student sat down. In this case, the rule might have functioned as a CEO-R. To identify rule-governed behavior, some indications should be considered, including a lack of immediate consequence, response-consequence delay that is greater than 30 seconds, and behavior change or maintenance without apparent reinforcement. These indications are based upon the behavior that is governed by rules may not be in contact with actual consequences. In contrast to rule-governed behavior, contingency-shaped behavior is selected and controlled directly by contingencies. In other words, responses need to have contact with consequences. If behavior is only shaped by consequences without instructions, the behavior is learned through trial and error. Behavior that is initially rule-governed can become under the control of the direct contingency later on. For example, when you first cook risotto, you may follow instructions. This is rulegoverned. If the result is a salty risotto, you will put less salt next time. In this case, reducing salt is shaped by direct contingency.
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