Narrow down the results
… as is well known, the concept of zombies (pardon the pun) arise from Voodoo culture and everyone associates Voodoo with Haiti, where a French dialect is spoken). So, these to-be-zombies are going along behaving as people do - walking, eating, … behavior does not occur without reinforcement, we can further assume that whatever unearthly behavior was going on was maintained by some type of reinforcement contingency. But how, you now ask, can behavior be maintained if someone is dead? Well, …
… Spooked This being the Halloween season and all, it seems appropriate to bring up the subject of being spooked. Someone is said to be spooked by a circumstance or situation when they exhibit fear. The person is said to be afraid. Behaviorally, being spooked by something involves a hesitancy to engage whatever it is that is responsible for the …
… Thus, the surprising recent report that only 60 psychology research studies out of 100 attempts were replicated has raised general concerns about “scientific” findings in psychology and their application. The report is particularly concerning because, in these failures to replicate, there was no evidence that the original experimental data had been fabricated or otherwise manipulated. Although there may be valid reasons for such failures to replicate (and none of the studies were related to behavior analysis) the findings do beg the question of how …
… in the past, and that by not delivering attention, the behavior would extinguish (go away). The staff's “solution” raises several issues. First and foremost is an ethical one. Addressing disrobing with a plan based on anecdotal assumptions … say in a case like this that the treatment should have worked except for an unresponsive client. (Blaming the client for failing to “behave properly” often happens when treatments don’t work.) Ethical issues aside, we can ask why “planned … to eliminate behavior, but it didn’t here. No one bothered to assess whether attention from others really was what was maintaining the disrobing. “Planned ignoring” was based on someone’s intuition that it was a good treatment for such …
… antithetical to a scientific view of behavior. As a second example, consider the cartoon above. Our furry (except for the tail, of course) friend notes that when the light comes on, he presses the lever and gets a check (I doubt that). It is tempting for many to say that the rat is pressing the lever “in order to get paid,” or that our young man is asking “in order to get money.” The cause of pressing and asking in these descriptions is in … antithetical to a scientific view of behavior. As a second example, consider the cartoon above. Our furry (except for the tail, of course) friend notes that when the light comes on, he presses the lever and gets a check (I doubt that). It is …
… most commonly taught, such as asking open-ended questions, encouraging the speaker, and rephrasing for understanding, are fairly well known and will not be discussed here. These techniques are designed to draw out the speaker’s knowledge about a … skill. Before we talk further about active listening, a word of caution. If you cannot listen calmly to comments that contain implied or stated criticism, you will severely limit a free flow of information from your followers. If you cannot see … First, look for behavior that suggests that the speaker is either trying to escape or evade responding. Do they give details freely or do they carefully manage what they share? Do they volunteer information on problems or do you have to drag …
… exam, one of my students observed that her rat had the ability to get the reinforcer.” Relatedly, star athletes often are said to have “great athletic ability,” scholars are said to possess similar “intellectual abilities,” and novelists often are singled out for having “the ability to write.” … is just a description of circumstance, another way of saying that a person has a particular history that enables certain kinds of behavior. When used in this way, ability becomes a shorthand description of actual behavior, past or present. A …
… the sexy (OK, maybe I am little perverse) phrase “A-B-C” workable as a description of the three-term contingency, but it ain’t great, as they say. The reason is that “antecedent stimulus,” technically speaking could imply things other than the … host of stimuli about which we know little, in which responding is reinforced. My point may seem nitpicky, and I won’t wait for the world to beat a path to my door, but it steers me, for one, away from using “A-B-C” to describe Skinner’s … the sexy (OK, maybe I am little perverse) phrase “A-B-C” workable as a description of the three-term contingency, but it ain’t great, as they say. The reason is that “antecedent stimulus,” technically speaking could imply things other than the …
… How to Manage Through Uncertainty If you look around the workplace today, whether your company is thriving or fighting to stay alive, it’s not uncommon to see and feel uncertainty. The instability of the marketplace, vying for top talent, and engagement are all very real concerns for both … we acknowledge it or not, our behavior is affected by what happens around us. While some industries are experiencing long-awaited growth, other industries are tightening their belts and holding their collective breath until their business …
… Behavioral Minute: Managing in Times of Uncertainty Economic downturns, mergers, or even internal policy changes can all disrupt business as usual. Whether your organization is thriving or fighting to survive, being able to manage all types of uncertainty that arises, particularly with your people, will give you the advantage every time. In this video, David Uhl offers two very sound things leaders should do to successfully manage during uncertain times. You may also be interested to read: A Dozen Ways to Weather the Economic Storm . … Economic downturns, mergers, …
… the “matching law” and it basically says that living beings distribute their responses in proportion to the reinforcers available for each of those responses. It first was demonstrated with pigeons choosing between two responses that were … the “matching law” and it basically says that living beings distribute their responses in proportion to the reinforcers available for each of those responses. It first was demonstrated with pigeons choosing between two responses that were …
… all things that come out of France. One such thing is the recent whacky idea of placing the middle seat of the familiar airplane 3-row seating arrangement facing in the opposite direction from the window and aisle seats. The claim is that in so doing it is possible to squeeze a few more seats in the economy, or steerage, section of passenger …
… understand the complex programming and systems that drive the automation. This can pose a serious safety risk under certain conditions. There is a paradox in how technology affects safety at present. Overall, safety has been much improved by increasing automation and assisting technologies in many industries: aviation with better computer systems in aircraft, automobile braking systems that have become more automated, and in manufacturing settings where everything from assisting technology to robotics has reduced human exposure to hazards. But, what happens when those technologies fail, as they inevitably will do? In fact, there is evidence that the human operators may not be prepared to handle these …
… and concerned only with treating symptoms while leaving the root cause of the problem, lurking somewhere within the brain or soul or mind of the person. Worse yet, it was assumed that if one merely eliminated a symptom, another would take its place because of this failure to eliminate the problem’s root cause. The latter was the first to fall under the blows of Occam ’s razor … that environment and the person. Rather than being a mere stage on which behavior problems originating in the mind or brain or soul play out, the environment is the source of behavior, including behavior problems. Behavior problems are defined …