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Skinner’s Analysis of
Verbal Behavior
Specific
MO/EO Response Reinforcement
Nonverbal Generalized
Response Reinforcement
SD
Verbal SD Generalized
W/pt-pt correspondence
Response Reinforcement
Formal similarity
Verbal SD Generalized
W/o pt-pt correspondence
Response Reinforcement
W/o Formal similarity
•
The Behavior of the Listener
• When a speaker talks to a listener verbal stimuli are emitted that are
discriminative stimuli
• The question is what are the effects of verbal SDs on listener behavior?
• Skinner (1957, p. 277-280) identifies two main effects of verbal SDs:
• Verbal stimuli evoke specific nonverbal behavior, and they evoke
specific verbal behavior
• When verbal stimuli evoke nonverbal behavior the behaver is still
functioning as a listener, but is differentially discriminating among
verbal stimuli (commonly called receptive language, RFFC)
• “The listener can be said to understand a speaker if he simply behaves
in an appropriate fashion” (p. 277).
The Behavior of the Listener
• A verbal discriminative stimulus can also evoke echoic, textual,
transcriptive, or intraverbal behavior on the part on a listener.
However, if this occurs, the listener becomes a speaker, which is
Skinner’s point that “in many important instances the listener is
behaving at the same time as a speaker” (p. 33, footnote)
• The most significant and complex responses to verbal stimuli occur
when they evoke covert intraverbal behavior from a listener (who by
definition, is now a speaker who serves as his own audience)
• Skinner devotes a full chapter to the topic of “thinking” in Science
and Human Behavior (1953, chap. 16), Verbal Behavior (1957,
Chap. 19) and About Behaviorism (1974, chap. 7), and he has several
sections dedicated to the topic of “understanding,” (e.g., pp. 277-
280; Skinner 1974, 141-142)
Listener Discrimination
Generalized
Verbal SD Response Reinforcement
“Get the Dora video” Child’s selects Dora video “That’s it!”
The Textual Relation
Verbal SD Generalized
W/pt-pt correspondence
Response Reinforcement
W/o Formal similarity
Verbal SD Generalized
W/pt-pt correspondence
Response Reinforcement
W/o Formal similarity
• SD
• SD
• SD R
• SD
• MO
Multiple Control
• The second type of multiple control identified by Skinner
occurs when a single antecedent variable affects the strength of
more than just one response
• “Just as a given stimulus word will evoke a large number of
different responses from a sample of the population at large, it
increases the probability of emission of many responses in a
single speaker” (p. 227)
• Michael (2003) identifies this type of control “divergent
multiple control”
Multiple Control
• Divergent multiple control
• R1
• R2
SD/MO R3
• R4
• R5
Thank You!
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