Fred Nickols, in arguing against behavioral psychology, argues against what
he calls:
>blithe acceptance of the proposition that behavior is shaped by its
>consequences.
Fred, I just want to ask one thing: What constitutes, for you, acceptable
grounds for acceptance of a scientific proposition?
And, Fred, I just want to make one statement: There is no area of
psychology for which there exists more, and more carefully created and
tested, empirical evidence ("hard science") than for the proposition that
behavior is shaped by its consequences.
And, Fred, let me make one clarification for Jon Krispin (not that he
isn't fully capable of clarifying his own statements -- and not to say
that our host didn't do a good job of clarifying already): You're right.
It is confusing to say, as Jon does (and, by mutual agreement, so do most
behavioral psychologists) that "consequences strengthen or weaken ...
preceding behavior." However, no behavioral psychologist intends to make
the claim that cause and effect work backwards in time. The language we
use (confusingly, I confess) is just shorthand for the longer statement:
"Positive consequences following behavior increase (or "reinforce") the
likelihood that the same behavior will reoccur in the future given
sufficiently similar antecedent circumstances." [And, by the way, there
are quite precise, empirically derived specifications of what we mean by
"the same behavior" and "sufficiently similar."] It is just a lot easier
to refer to "the behavior" that has occurred as a way of specifying which
kind of behavior we mean.
--"John Gunkler" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com>
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>