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. 2003 Fall;26(2):253–265. doi: 10.1007/BF03392080

Conflicting approaches: Operant psychology arrives at a primate laboratory

Donald A Dewsbury
PMCID: PMC2731458  PMID: 22478406

Abstract

During a brief period, from 1955 to 1957, behavior analysts, primarily Charles Ferster, Roger Kelleher, and John Falk, conducted research on chimpanzees at the Yerkes Laboratories of Primate Biology in Orange Park, Florida. This was a time of conflict between operant conditioners and more traditional experimental psychologists at the national level, and there was a similar conflict at the local level in Orange Park. The principal overt issues concerned the use of deprivation procedures, the apparatus utilized, and the naming of animals, although more fundamental differences probably set the occasion for the disputes. The conflicts in Orange Park can be seen as a microcosm of the broader conflicts that occurred during a period when the operant approach was being extended and applied more broadly than before.

Keywords: chimpanzees, operant psychology, Charles Ferster, primates

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Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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