Radical behaviorism


Radical behaviorism was pioneered by B. F. Skinner and is his "philosophy of the science of behavior." It refers to the philosophy behind behavior analysis, and is to be distinguished from methodological behaviorism—which has an intense emphasis on observable behaviors—by its inclusion of thinking, feeling, and other private events in the analysis of human and animal psychology. The research in behavior analysis is called the experimental analysis of behavior and the application of this field is called applied behavior analysis, which was originally termed "behavior modification."

Radical behaviorism as natural science

Radical behaviorism inherits from behaviorism the position that the science of behavior is a natural science, a belief that animal behavior can be studied profitably and compared with human behavior, a strong emphasis on the environment as cause of behavior, and an emphasis on the operations involved in the modification of behavior. Radical behaviorism does not claim that organisms are tabula rasa whose behavior is unaffected by biological or genetic endowment. Rather, it asserts that experiential factors play a major role in determining the behavior of many complex organisms, and that the study of these matters is a major field of research in its own right.
The most precise way to describe radical behaviorism as "radical" is to understand that instances such as evolution and cell division are occurrences that just happen. There is no third party that assists in this transformation; they can, however, be explained by other naturally occurring events. They should not try to be explained through objects that are not tangible, e.g., ghosts or inner entities. Radical behaviorists therefore conclude that naturally occurring events may be examined in relation to our past and present environments through the effect they have on human beings.

Common misunderstandings

Although there are many criticisms of Skinner's work, many textbooks and theorists like Noam Chomsky label Skinnerian or radical behaviorism as S–R, or Pavlovian psychology, and argue that this limits the approach. Although contemporary psychology rejects many of Skinner's conclusions, his work into operant conditioning which emphasizes the importance of consequences in modifying discriminative responses is useful when combined with current understandings about the uniqueness of evolved human thought over other animals.
Many textbooks argue that radical behaviorism maintains the position that animals are passive receivers of conditioning, failing to take into account that:
Radical behaviorism is often dismissed as a form of logical positivism, a doctrine that had come into disfavor by the late 20th century. Skinnerians maintain that Skinner was not a logical positivist and recognized the importance of thinking as behavior. This position is made quite clear in About Behaviorism. A clearer position for radical behaviorism seems to be the movement known philosophically as American pragmatism.
For a review and summary of Skinner's book Verbal Behavior see the article Verbal Behavior.

The basics: operant psychology

Skinner saw that classical conditioning did not account for the behavior most of us are interested in, such as riding a bike or writing a book. His observations led him to propose a theory about how these and similar behaviors, called operants, come about.
Roughly speaking, in operant conditioning, an operant is actively emitted and produces changes in the world that alter the likelihood that the behavior will occur again.
As represented in the table below, operant conditioning involves two basic actions, which are accomplished by adding or removing one of two basic types of stimuli, positive reinforcers or negative reinforcers.
Stimulus typeEffect: increase behaviorEffect: decrease behavior
Positive ReinforcerAdd positive reinforcerRemove positive reinforcer
PunishmentRemove punishmentAdd punishment stimulus

In other words:
Instrumental conditioning is another term for operant conditioning that is most closely associated with scientists who studied running through a maze. Skinner pioneered the free operant technique, where organisms could respond at any time during a protracted experimental session. Thus Skinner's dependent variable was usually the frequency or rate of responding, not the errors that were made or the speed of traversal of a maze.
Operant conditioning affects the future of the organism, that is how the organism will respond after the actions summarized above occur.

Explaining behavior and the importance of the environment

argued against the use of references to mental states and held that psychology should study behavior directly, holding private events as impossible to study scientifically. Skinner rejected this position conceding the importance of thinking, feelings and "inner behavior" in his analysis. Skinner did not hold to truth by agreement, as Watson did, so he was not limited by observation.
In Watson's days, it was held that psychology was at a disadvantage as a science because behavioral explanations should take physiology into account. Very little was known about physiology at the time. Skinner argued that behavioral explanations of psychological phenomena are "just as true" as physiological explanations. In arguing this, he took a non-reductionistic approach to psychology. Skinner, however, redefined behavior to include "everything that an organism does," including thinking, feeling and speaking and argued that these phenomena were valid subject matters. The term radical behaviorism refers to just this: that everything an organism does is a behavior .
However, Skinner ruled out thinking and feeling as valid explanations of behavior. The reasoning is this:
Thinking and feeling are not epiphenomena nor have they any other special status, and are just more behavior to explain. Explaining behavior by referring to thought or feelings are pseudo-explanations because they merely point to more behavior to be explained. Skinner proposed environmental factors as proper causes of behavior because:
This holds only for explaining the class of behaviors known as operant behaviors. This class of behavior Skinner held as the most interesting study matter.
Many textbooks, in noting the emphasis Skinner places on the environment, argue that Skinner held that the organism is a blank slate or a tabula rasa. Skinner wrote extensively on the limits and possibilities nature places on conditioning. Conditioning is implemented in the body as a physiological process and is subject to the current state, learning history, and history of the species. Skinner does not consider people a blank slate, or tabula rasa.
Many textbooks seem to confuse Skinner's rejection of physiology with Watson's rejection of private events. It is true to some extent that Skinner's psychology considers humans a black box, since Skinner maintains that behavior can be explained without taking into account what goes on in the organism. However, the black box is not private events, but physiology. Skinner considers physiology as useful, interesting, valid, etc., but not necessary for operant behavioral theory and research.

Private events in a radical behaviorist account

Radical behaviorism differs from other forms of behaviorism in that it treats everything we do as behavior, including private events such as thinking and feeling. Unlike John B. Watson's behaviorism, private events are not dismissed as "epiphenomena," but are seen as subject to the same principles of learning and modification as have been discovered to exist for overt behavior. Although private events are not publicly observable behaviors, radical behaviorism accepts that we are each observers of our own private behavior.
Many textbooks, in emphasizing that Skinner held behavior to be the proper subject matter of psychology, fail to clarify Skinner's position and implicitly or even explicitly posit that Skinner ruled out the study of private events as unscientific. This is Watson's position, not Skinner's.

Outgrowths

There are radical behaviorist schools of animal training, management, clinical practice, and education. Skinner's political views have left their mark in small ways as principles adopted by a small handful of utopian communities such as Los Horcones, and in ongoing challenges to aversive techniques in control of human and animal behavior.
Radical behaviorism has generated numerous descendants. Examples of these include molar approaches associated with Richard Herrnstein and William Baum, Howard Rachlin's teleological behaviorism, William Timberlake's behavior systems approach, and John Staddon's theoretical behaviorism.
Skinner's theories on verbal behavior have seen widespread application in therapies for autistic children that are based on applied behavior analysis.

Criticism

Criticisms of behaviourism focus on its theoretical weaknesses as well as its cold methods. Psychologists today consider this classical form of behaviorism to be "wrong" in the sense that modern cognitive research has clearly demonstrated the role of mental processes in psychology. Behaviorism cannot explain all of human behaviorfor instance, behaviorism predicts that it should be possible to perform gay conversion therapy, and fails to explain why conditioning is not effective in altering human sexual orientation.