Author: B. F. Skinner Foundation

In no case, perhaps, can we say that any one instance of alliteration or other formal similarity is due to a special process, but a general pattern may be demonstrated.…

Unconditioned vocal responses sometimes enter into multiply caused verbal behavior. The form of the response Ouch! is modified by a particular verbal environment, yet an actual instance may be largely…

We may refer to sources involving echoic and textual responses as “formal” contributions to strength. The important difference concerns the minimal unit relationships available in the formal case. (p. 243)

Two responses are thematically related when they are controlled by a common variable with respect to which they lack the point-to-point correspondence seen in echoic and textual behavior. (p. 243)

In many ... examples it does not matter whether a source of strength is to be classified as a tact or as an intraverbal response. It is convenient to group…

One of the uses of verbal art is to give added strength to responses which, if made for other reasons, would probably be punished. The behavior of a jilted maiden…

To “prove” that part of a literary work has been borrowed we must not only show a similar passage in a work which the author could conceivably have read but…

When a response is under the control of a single stimulus, he can usually identify the stimulus and the controlling relation in answering such a Question as Why did you…

Nonverbal behavior may, of course, have multiple sources of strength. For example, one may slam a door partly to close the door and partly to make a noise under the…

Mixed intraverbals are exemplified by a telephone number or a car registration number containing the sequence 1, 2, 3, 4. One can learn such a number more easily because of…

An example of a double tact is the proper name which is appropriate to its subject . . . If we know a man with white hair named Mr. Leblanc,…

The child is approved for being silent, and the angry man is reinforced if his silence hurts someone. These “negative strengths” enter into the combined effects of multiple variables when,…

In considering the algebraic summation of the effects of reinforcement and punishment we must not overlook the positive reinforcement of keeping silent. (p. 236)

Instances in which there is “some reason for remembering” as well as “some reason for forgetting” show the algebraic summation of variables having opposing effects. (p. 235)

Under a carefully generalized reinforcement, the type of verbal operant called the tact approaches the condition in which its form is determined by only one variable. But insofar as the…

Two scientists may stop talking shop while in a crowded elevator if they are sensitive to an additional audience which may react to their verbal behavior as gibberish. If the…

The presence of a negative audience can be detected only in combination with a positive audience, since its effect is felt as a reduction in the strength of behavior appropriate…

When we use a measure of opinion to predict behavior, we argue that because one response in a thematic group has been made, other responses in the same group are…

TWO FACTS EMERGE from our survey of the basic functional relations in verbal behavior: (1) the strength of a single response may be, and usually is, a function of more…

Verbal behavior is shaped and sustained by a verbal environment—by people who respond to behavior in certain ways because of the practices of the group of which they are members.…

A preliminary restriction would be to limit the term verbal to instances in which the responses of the “listener” have been conditioned . . . If we make the further…

To say that we are interested only in behavior which has an effect upon the behavior of another individual does not go far enough, for the definition embraces all social…

When the mediating “listener” participates merely in his role as a physical object, there is no reason to distinguish a special field. The prizefighter or the physician achieves certain results…

Now that we have examined the variables of which a verbal response is a function, it will be helpful to restrict our definition by excluding instances of “speaking” which are…

It is a happy condition when the speaker who is talking primarily to himself achieves an effect upon himself at approximately the same time as upon his listeners (p. 223)

Once a response of this type [tact, echoic, textual, or intraverbal behavior] has been emitted, it automatically establishes a condition under which, in view of the reinforcing practices of the…

Although we are especially interested in variables which generate and maintain verbal behavior, it is useful to consider the conditions under which behavior comes to an end. (p. 220)

An extinguished response is not forgotten. It is simply not emitted in the circumstances in which it has been extinguished. This may be shown by changing the circumstances. (p. 207)

... verbal behavior receives intermittent reinforcement, and this fact has many important consequences. For example, we behave verbally with a great deal less assurance than nonverbally, but we are less…

Differential reinforcement shapes up all verbal forms, and when a prior stimulus enters into the contingency, reinforcement is responsible for its resulting control. (pp. 203-204)

There are many situations ... in which silence is used as a punishment, and it is therefore well to avoid any silence which may be interpreted as punishment. Certain standard…

In acquiring a verbal repertoire the speaker does not necessarily become a listener, and in acquiring the behavior characteristic of a listener he does not spontaneously become a speaker. (p.…

What has been damaged in aphasia is clearly the functional control of the behavior, and the damage respects the lines of control. (p. 195)

The pathological condition of verbal behavior called aphasia often emphasizes functional differences which are hard to understand in terms of the traditional account ... The aphasic has lost some of…

The “word” as a unit of analysis is appropriate to the practices of the community rather than the behavior of the individual speaker. (p. 190)

Classifications of responses are useful only in separating various types of controlling relations, and some responses may show features of both mand and tact. (p. 189)

... a verbal response of given form sometimes seems to pass easily from one type of operant to another. The speaker commonly starts with a tact and then appears to…

... we cannot tell from form alone into which class a response falls. Fire may be (1) a mand to a firing squad, (2) a tact to a conflagration, (3)…

 ... there are no true synonyms, for when all variables have been specified there is no remaining choice of terms. (p. 183)

Among the effects of excessive or inconsistent punishment are many neurotic symptoms, including the “repression” of some areas of verbal behavior. It is often necessary for the psychotherapist to establish…

The effect of a weak audience variable is evident in talking on the telephone. Frequent stimulation from the listener is necessary to support verbal behavior in strength. Are you there?…

If we define a proposition as “something which may be said in any language,” then instead of trying to identify the “something,” we may ask why there are different languages.…

An audience ... is a discriminative stimulus in the presence of which verbal behavior is characteristically reinforced and in the presence of which, therefore, it is characteristically strong. Discriminative stimuli…

There is no evidence that punishment ultimately reduces a tendency to respond. Its principal effect is to convert the behavior, or the circumstances under which the behavior characteristically occurs, into…

The assumption that a punishing consequence simply reverses the effect of a reinforcing consequence has not survived experimental analysis. (p. 166)

The vain man is reinforced by hearing or seeing his name, and he speaks or writes it frequently himself. Boasting is a way to “hear good things said about oneself.”…

“Autistic” verbal behavior may be compared with that of the musician playing for himself. Other things being equal, he plays music which, as listener, he finds reinforcing. In other words,…

Reinforcing sounds in the child’s environment provide for the automatic reinforcement of vocal forms. Such sounds need not be verbal; the child is reinforced automatically when he duplicates the sounds…

An important fact about verbal behavior is that speaker and listener may reside within the same skin. (p. 163)

The therapist may begin with a number of statements which are so obviously true that the listener’s behavior is strongly reinforced. Later a strong reaction is obtained to statements which…