Behavior Analysis
Looking for something specific? The following topics address a wide range of business needs and challenges.
Talking about Intentions
My most recent Behavior Watch commentary described a scenario in which my eldest granddaughter was trying to persuade her pet Pug to cease disrupting our card game by plopping down on the floor in…
Skinner and American Sniper
My husband and I went to see the controversial new Clint Eastwood-directed film, “American Sniper.” It is a vivid story of an American man, romanticized or not depending on your perspective, who did…
Two Granddaughters, a Pug, a Stuffed Toy Chicken, and Behavior Management
The other night I had the great pleasure of babysitting two of my granddaughters, ages 9 and 11. As we tried to play a card game on the floor, their pet Pug rudely kept using our playing field as his…
Behavior Analysis or Behavioral Enviroscience?
Who am I? “I am a behavior analyst,” I answer in whatever circumstance the question arises. I then have to explain why my first identity is not that of psychologist (yes, I am a professor of…
Behavioral Cusp: Getting the Biggest Bang for the Buck
We are pleased to have as our guest commentator this week behavioral education expert Ronnie Dietrich, a Senior Fellow of the Wing Institute in Oakland, California. Ronnie has been involved in the…
Beyond a String around the Finger: Creative Self-Management
A reminder-string around the finger surely wasn’t the first self-management technique, but it may be the best-known (regardless of whether or not anyone really does that anymore). Self-management is…
Strrrrrrrrrrrretch Goals
For those unfamiliar with them, stretch goals are the practice in business, sports, and personal life of progressively increasing the targets expected of a person or team. If I am a salesperson and…
Pet Projects
A lot of really interesting science has been undertaken using animals that either are naturally part of our home life or, in a few cases, have been specially adopted and adapted to the scientist’s…
Behavioral Hiccups and Other Manifestations of Change
Behavior analysis seems to me uniquely positioned for studying change. Indeed, our most basic research method is all about change. We first establish a baseline in which the behavior under study is…
Behavior, Automatic Reinforcement, and Rudolph’s Red Nose
The legend of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer was revealed in 1939 by Robert L. May. It went truly viral when cowboy/singer Gene Autrey first recorded that song we all know, in 1949. Never answered,…
Guest Commentary: Why Thoughts Aren't Causes
The Aubrey Daniels Institute is pleased to share the following commentary by Dr. Lee Hulbert Williams, Deputy Head of Department and Lecturer in the Department of Psychology at the University of…
Targeting the Behavioral Stream
A while ago, I found myself in a lovely restaurant in a small town in Belgium with a close colleague and his wife. We had enjoyed cocktails, a delightful dinner, a bottle of wine, and lots of bottled…
A Review of "Out of Our Heads: Why You Are Not Your Brain, and Other Lessons from the Biology of Consciousness" by Alva Noe
Philosopher Alva Noë tackles the age-old question of "what is consciousness?" in this book. Many astute observers of the psychological scene from William James to B. F. Skinner have weighed in on the…
Turkey in the Oven or in the Skinner Box?
Think about it. You can put a turkey in the oven only once. The pleasure for the turkey is over immediately (well, realistically some days before), and for you not long after the Thanksgiving feast.…
The Status of Behaviorism in Turkey
Note from the Institute: Although behavior analysis started in the United States, it has long been an international enterprise. To give readers an idea of the breadth of our discipline and its impact…
Gull-ture
We are pleased to have as a Behavior Watch guest commentator Jim Cook, a doctoral candidate in behavior analysis at West Virginia University. He takes us to the beach for some observations of unusual…
How to Shape a Zombie
Yes, yes, I know that one is supposed to say “How to shape zombie behavior,” but, hey, it’s Halloween and weird things happening are OK. And what could be weirder than thinking about…
Are We Superstitious About "Superstitious" Behavior?
In the spirit of the Halloween season, it seems appropriate to comment on superstitious behavior, the subject of one of B. F. Skinner's best-known scientific papers. He delivered brief presentations…
