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| Theoretical Topics in PCH |
| Wednesday, November 15, 2017 |
| 8:00 AM–9:50 AM |
| Loft A, Niveau 3 |
| Area: PCH |
| Instruction Level: Basic |
| Keyword(s): Film Noir, Love, Stimulus Control, Stimulus Equivalence |
| Chair: Travis Thompson (University of Minnesota) |
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| Behavior Analysis and Private Events: Love Looks Not With the Eyes, but With the Mind |
| Domain: Theory |
| TRAVIS THOMPSON (University of Minnesota) |
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| Abstract: Love's causal role must become part of behavior analysis as a mature science. Love is the most powerful factor in our daily lives, yet we have scientifically ignored it. Empirical research indicates private states are associated with neurotransmitters binding to brain receptors, manipulateable experimentally. Skinner suggested (1945) the names for private states are learned through pairing the external circumstances. In or daily lives, such externally events from our original learning may no longer be present. Depression may occur in our room alone, longing for love, anxiety about a trip occur independently from those distant causes. Love provides discriminative stimuli, love can be a response class (e.g. as in making love), or a setting event (e.g. motivative). Loss of love is an EO for irrational, or sometimes violent behavior. Private events usually serve as Aristotelean Efficient causes. While proximal causes may be traceable in principle to a distant past reinforcement history, i.e. Aristotelean Formal Causes, such distant relationships are not essential to understanding current behavior and may not be relevant in practice. Behavior analysis can contribute to the understanding the causal role of love and other private emotional states if we began to systematically examine their role |
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| When We Speak of the Mental |
| Domain: Theory |
| JAY MOORE (University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee) |
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| Abstract: When we speak of the mental, we might be speaking about any of five things, either singly or in combination: (a) private behavioral events, (b) physiology, (c) dispositions, (d) stimulus control, or (e) explanatory fictions. Talk about private behavioral events is concerned with how events not accessible to others participate in contingencies controlling subsequent behavior. Talk about physiology is concerned with the structure and operating characteristics of physiological systems, where that knowledge is achieved through direct investigation rather than inference. Talk about dispositions is concerned with the probability of behavior engendered by contingencies, rather than underlying mental phenomena. Talk about stimulus control often invokes such terms as attention, generalization, and discrimination, and is concerned with relations between antecedent environmental circumstances and behavior, rather than mediating mental processes. Talk about explanatory fictions is concerned with supposed causal factors in other domains, such as the mind, and owes its strength to the everyday social reinforcement inherent in “folk psychology.” An understanding of the sources of control over verbal behavior leads in turn to a greater understanding of theories and explanations in a science of behavior, and their relation to prediction and control of behavioral events. |
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| Keyword(s): Film Noir, Love, Stimulus Control, Stimulus Equivalence |
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