Abstract
The ordinary-language concept of values has a complex history in psychology and in science generally. The traditional fact-value distinction commonly found in traditional scientific perspectives has been challenged by the varieties of philosophical pragmatism, which have similarities to Skinner's radical behaviorism. Skinner's challenge to the fact-value distinction maintained that the phenomena of both “facts” and “values” are a matter of contingencies of environment-behavior interaction, and both phenomena may be observed when a scientist does research or makes recommendations in applied settings based on that research. Some of the processes and variables relevant to an analysis of values as behavioral phenomena are described, and examples of both nonverbal and verbal contingencies are considered, along with implications for the values of an individual and a culture. If the various issues of methodology can be addressed successfully, then behavior analysis will be in the position to move beyond descriptive studies of values, such as those found in humanistic psychology, by providing analyses of the variables of which values are a function.
Keywords: values, radical behaviorism, pragmatism
Full text
PDF
Selected References
These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.
- Glenn Sigrid S. Individual behavior, culture, and social change. Behav Anal. 2004 Fall;27(2):133–151. doi: 10.1007/BF03393175. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Hayes S. C., Brownstein A. J. Mentalism, behavior-behavior relations, and a behavior-analytic view of the purposes of science. Behav Anal. 1986 Fall;9(2):175–190. doi: 10.1007/BF03391944. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Hayes S. C., Kohlenberg B. S., Hayes L. J. The transfer of specific and general consequential functions through simple and conditional equivalence relations. J Exp Anal Behav. 1991 Jul;56(1):119–137. doi: 10.1901/jeab.1991.56-119. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Leigland S. Pragmatism, Science, And Society: A Review Of Richard Rorty's Objectivity, Relativism, and Truth: Philosophical Papers, Volume 1. J Exp Anal Behav. 1999 May;71(3):483–500. doi: 10.1901/jeab.1999.71-483. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Leigland S. The case against physicalism in the analysis of behavior. Behav Anal. 1993 Fall;16(2):351–355. doi: 10.1007/BF03392644. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Michael J. Distinguishing between discriminative and motivational functions of stimuli. J Exp Anal Behav. 1982 Jan;37(1):149–155. doi: 10.1901/jeab.1982.37-149. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Schlinger H., Blakely E. Function-altering effects of contingency-specifying stimuli. Behav Anal. 1987 Spring;10(1):41–45. doi: 10.1007/BF03392405. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Skinner B. F. Contrived reinforcement. Behav Anal. 1982 Spring;5(1):3–8. doi: 10.1007/BF03393135. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Whelan Robert, Barnes-Holmes Dermot. The transformation of consequential functions in accordance with the relational frames of same and opposite. J Exp Anal Behav. 2004 Sep;82(2):177–195. doi: 10.1901/jeab.2004.82-177. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]