Behaviorology: The Natural Science of Behavior

Jerome D. Ulman

Ball State University

Abstract

Behaviorology is a natural science that investigates the genetic, physical, and cultural

variables that determine behavior, both human and nonhuman. It fills the gap between

biology and the materialistic study of sociocultural phenomena. Its basic unit of analysis

is the contingent relations between actions and events that follow those actions (i.e.,

consequences). Like evolutionary biology, the paradigm of behaviorology is

selectionistic: certain consequences select (reinforce) behavior. Behaviorologists, in

support of their scientific claims, point to a large body of behavioral engineering research

having proven efficacy: applied behavior analysis.

Ulman, J. D. (2004). Behaviorology: The natural science of behavior. In A. A. Shumeiko

& V. P. Balov, The Far East: Science, Education. XXI Century: Materials of the 2nd

International Scientifi-Practical Conference (V.3, pp.79-83). Komsomolsk-on-Amur,

Russia: Komsomolsk-on-Amur State University of Pedagogy.

 Behaviorology 2

Behaviorology: The Natural Science of Behavior

Ever since psychology emerged from philosophy in the latter part of the 19th

century, psychologists have debated about whether its proper subject matter consists of

behavioral events or mental events. Even those scientists who argued for study of

behavior failed to specify their subject matter clearly. The Russian reflexologists studied

responses but their accounts were cast in hypothetical neurophysiological terms. John

Watson, the father of North American behaviorism, stipulated that only observable events

are permissible as psychological facts. But he never defined the ontological status of

events taking place within the individual, thus leaving the inner world open for

speculation by mentalistic psychologists. In the thoroughgoing behaviorism of B. F.

Skinner, however, behavior is considered as neither a property of the organism (as

reflexologists suppose) nor a product of the psyche (as mentalistic psychologists believe).

For Skinner, behavior is the interactions of an organism with its environment.

Furthermore, behavior may be covert as well as overt—thereby (a) correcting Watson's

ontological error of restricting behavior to observable actions while (b) laying claim to a

domain of presumed mental phenomena that mentalistic psychology had hitherto

considered its own province. Skinner argued that mind is nothing more than a person’s

behavior and that all behavior lies along a continuum of accessibility from covert

(private) to overt (public).

The Emergence of Behaviorology

By the standards of natural science, a discipline is defined with respect to its

subject matter. Behavior—the interactions of an organism with its environment—

constitutes a subject matter open to investigation by a natural science discipline. From its
 Behaviorology 3

beginnings in Skinner's (1938) laboratory in the 1930s, this discipline we now call

behaviorology was and remains essentially an experimental life science. The

identification and study of the basic principles of behavior require special techniques of

observation over time coupled with the exacting techniques of experimental

manipulation. Behaviorology does not emphasize the stimulus event, for that would make

its analysis physicalistic; nor does it focus on the action, which by itself is mere

movement. Behaviorology investigates the relations between actions and events.

As the science concerned with the genetic, physical, and cultural variables that

determine behavior, both human and nonhuman, behaviorology fills the gap between

biology on one side and the materialistic study of human social relations on the other. It

was inevitable that the study of behavior and the study of the psyche would become

separate disciplines (see Fraley & Vargas, 1986). The core paradigms or approaches of

these two disciplines are incommensurable. In his last year of life, Skinner (1990) came

to the conclusion that the study of behavior never was, nor is now, a branch of

psychology (also see Ulman, 1993).

In The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Thomas Kuhn (1970) describes how

revolutions in science take place in stages. When an old paradigm breaks down, a crisis

in scientific explanation arises and a new paradigm subsequent emerges. Yet many

scientists may continue to adhere dogmatically to the older, outmoded paradigm. The

ultimate test of the new paradigm is its effectiveness in dealing with the problem that old

paradigm was unable to handle. The emergence of behaviorology from psychology

follows this pattern (Bruce, 1990). In fact, it would be more accurate to say “the

separation of behaviorology from psychology” because, paradigmatically, the former

 Behaviorology 4

never was part of the latter; it merely coexisted within the same departments of

psychology.

Evidence of the power of this paradigm in predicting and controlling behavior is

abundant as can be seen by surveying the research reported in such periodicals as The

Experimental Analysis of Behavior (1959-2003) and the Journal of Applied Behavior

Analysis (1968-2003). In the Kuhnian sense, then, behaviorology qualifies as a scientific

revolution. On the other hand, the so-called cognitive revolution in psychology (Baars,

1986) is not a scientific revolution at all. It is essentially an elaboration of the earlier

methodological behaviorism (e.g., Tolman’s cognitive behaviorism) that mimicked the

positivistic movement in physics. Furthermore, cognitive psychology defines its subject

matter differently from behaviorology and therefore represents a different discipline.

Behavioral materialists hold that behavior is the product of three kinds of

selection: (a) natural selection, (b) operant selection, and (c) cultural selection (Skinner,

1981). Natural selection is responsible for instinctive behavior or "released behavior"

such as that studied by ethologists (e.g., nest-building) and unconditioned reflexes.

Conditioned reflexes such as Pavlov investigated result from a particular conditioning

history but their effectiveness depends upon unconditioned stimuli. In the

behaviorological literature, Pavlovian conditioning is termed respondent conditioning

and the resulting behavior is termed respondent behavior

Unlike respondent behavior, operant behavior is determined by its history of

consequences and operant responses may vary a great deal in form. Skinner coined the

term operant to denote the type of conditioning taking place as the organism operates on

the environment. An operant is defined in terms of its effect on the environment. For

example, we can close a door by pushing it, kicking it, or asking someone else to close it.
 Behaviorology 5

All of these acts belong to the same operant response class because they all have the same

effect on the environment, a closed door. There are mixed opinions among experimental

analysts concerning the exact distinction between operant and respondent conditioning,

but there is near consensus that they are two fundamentally different behavioral processes

(Pear, 2001). Respondent and operant conditioning are interactive, however.

The Paradigm of Behaviorology

Like evolutionary biology, the paradigm of behaviorology is selectionistic.

Skinner (1981) describes selection as the causal mode of all the life sciences, a causal

mode that enables us to conceptually integrate biology, behaviorology, and the

materialistic study of sociocultural phenomena. Skinner explains, through selection by

consequences human cultural processes evolved from behavioral processes, which in turn

evolved from biological processes. Yet we must recognize that these three forms of life

processes operate on qualitatively different principles at different levels of organized

complexity that must be respected if we are to avoid the error of reductionism.

Behaviorologists are not pure environmental determinists; they do not view the

organism as a tabula rasa. At the same time, they reject the unsubstantiated claims of

some sociobiologists and evolutionary psychologists that human behavior is essentially

genetically determined. Behaviorology does not approach the questions of nature versus

nurture as a simplistic and speculative form of interactionism; rather, it endeavors to

identify phylogenic and ontogenic variables controlling behavior through exacting

experimental analyses.

Behaviorologists are concerned with the prediction, control, and understanding of

behavior relations. It takes as a given the neurophysiological processes of the organism

and considers such processes primarily to be the concern of the adjacent life science,
 Behaviorology 6

biology. Undoubtedly, certain physico-chemical changes occur within the organism's

nervous system as it interacts with its environment, but investigation of such changes

belong to the province of biology. By the same token, behaviorologists consider the

effects of the social environment on the behavior of the individual, but leave the study of

society to other disciplines. This demarcation of disciplinary boundaries does not, of

course, preclude the potential for fruitful interdisciplinary work. Behaviorologists need

not know about the details of nervous systems or social systems to be able to effectively

deal with individual behavior.

In general, for behaviorologists operant conditioning accounts for behavior that

has traditionally been considered purposeful or voluntary. But instead of positing

purposes or intentions as causes of behavior, behaviorologists treat such behavior as

being caused or selected by its consequences. When a person's behavior has been

reinforced, it means that under similar circumstances the person will behave in a similar

way in the future. This causal mode selection by consequences enables behavioral

materialists to discuss human actions ordinarily presumed to be intentional without

having to suppose teleological explanations (see Lee, 1983).

Behavioral Materialism: Behaviorology’s Scientific Philosophy

The behaviorological approach to the study of behavior is based on a philosophy

of science initially called radical behaviorism (see Skinner, 1974), one of Skinner's most

important contributions. (Here, the word radical means thoroughgoing.) As formulated

by Skinner, radical behaviorism is the basis for the philosophy of science of

behaviorology. Contrary to many critics, it was never a form of logical positivism (see

Smith, 1987). Nor is it a form of philosophical relativism. In recent years some

behavioral psychologists argue that radical behaviorism is a variation of the relativistic

 Behaviorology 7

philosophy of pragmatism. Behaviorologists take exception to divergence from

Skinner’s position and instead have adopted the term behavioral materialism (Ulman, in

press-a, in press–b; Vargas, 2000).

Behaviorology's Unit of Analysis: Contingency Relations

The contingency relation is the basic unit of analysis in behaviorology—as basic

as the cell is in biology. Also referred to as a three-term contingency (antecedent—

action—postcedent), it describes the relation between a class of actions, all of which have

the same effect on the environment; the events that follow the behavior (i.e., postcedents

or consequences); and antecedent events, the situation within which the actions occur.

For example, suppose we give a baby a rattle and observe that the baby shakes it

repeatedly. The antecedent situation is the rattle in the baby's hand, the behavior is any

action that produces a rattling noise, and the resulting postcedent event is the auditory

stimulation. If the baby persists in shaking the rattle, we may presume that the postcedent

event, the rattling noise, reinforced that behavior. We could of course experimentally

analyze the functional effect of the stimulation by replacing the rattle with an identical

one except that it does not produce such stimulation. If our experiment confirms the

effect, then technically the antecedent event (rattle in hand) is a discriminative stimulus,

shaking the rattle is operant behavior, and the resulting auditory stimulation is the

reinforcing consequence.

Thus, in operant conditioning (sometimes called instrumental conditioning),

certain actions produce environmental changes that increase the likelihood of similar

actions occurring in the future. In this way, the environment selects operant behavior and

the resulting behavioral process is called reinforcement. When consequences are

discontinued and the behavior eventually stops, a process called extinction. There are also
 Behaviorology 8

consequences that decrease operant behavior; this behavioral process is called

punishment.

Behaviorology and “Higher Mental Process”

The apparent simplicity of the concept of contingency can be very deceiving. In

the behaviorological investigation of verbal behavior (Skinner, 1957), for example, a

contingency analysis can become astonishingly complex. Applied behaviorological

research on stimulus control has produced a highly effective instructional technology,

including methods for teaching abstract concepts, verbal behavior, and symbolic behavior

(e.g., see Catania, 1998; Cooper, Heron, & Heward, 1987). The area within psychology

traditionally called perception can be interpreted as investigations of stimulus control—

with a lot of gratuitous psychological theorizing added (Skinner, (1974).

For behaviorologists, language is an abstraction that refers the complex

arrangement of social contingencies of reinforcement maintained by one’s verbal

community. Whether we speak English, Russian, or Swahili is determined by those social

contingencies. Cultural practices such as the language we speak and the way we make a

living are transmitted via contingencies of reinforcement from one person to another and

from one generation to the next.

Thus, verbal behavior is a product of contingencies maintained by our verbal

community, a uniquely human environment. There are two ways we humans can affect

our environment: directly, as when we turn a knob and open a door; and indirectly, as

when we ask someone else to open a door. Only the latter case is verbal behavior. Verbal

behavior is defined as behavior whose contact with the environment is mediated through

other behavior (Skinner, 1957). Even though rudimentary verbal performances have been

demonstrated in chimpanzees and other nonhuman, humans are the only animals whose
 Behaviorology 9

natural environment is largely verbal. Skinner (1957, Chapters 18 and 19) has extended

the operant analysis of verbal behavior to the analysis of thinking as well as logical and

scientific behavior.

Summary

Psychological researchers study mental processes by means of such practices as

statistically analyzing questionnaire data from a large number of subjects or making

subjective interpretations of what an individual says during an interview. The goal is to

somehow unlock the mysteries of the mind and thereby help people deal with their

problems in everyday living. The efficacy of the therapies flowing from the mentalists is

questionable at best. For behaviorologists, all such efforts only serve only to mystify and

cloud the picture in our endeavor to scientifically predict, control, and understand

complex human behavior. Instead, behaviorologists point to a huge body of behavioral

engineering research—applied behavior analysis and behavior therapy—with proven

efficacy. In sum, Skinner's (1974) behavioral materialistic answer to mentalism

straightforward: "What has evolved is an organism, part of the behavior of which has

been tentatively explained by the invention of the concept of mind. No special

evolutionary process is needed when the facts are considered in their own right" (p. 45).

The point of this paper is not to criticize mentalistic psychology, but to underscore the

fact that psychology and behaviorology are clearly separate and incommensurable

disciplines.
 Behaviorology 10

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