Reach Out

The experimental analysis of behavior (EAB) is in trouble. Financial support for basic operant-conditioning research is difficult to obtain; teaching and research positions in colleges and universities are few; and bright undergraduates join other fields for graduate study. One reason for our difficulty (I include myself since I've been doing EAB research since 1965) is that EAB basic research does not focus sufficiently on problems relevant to the general population. I will touch on additional reasons later in these comments. But the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and other federal granting agencies increasingly support translational research directed at societal problems, and operant researchers are missing out. I take two main messages from Critchfield's (2011) interesting paper: EAB is in bad shape, and the low frequency of translational research contributes to the problem. Each of these points will be discussed.

The experimental analysis of behavior is not the only field to have difficulties these days. The cutoff point for funding from some federal agencies (e.g., NIH and the National Science Foundation [NSF]) is often less than 20%, meaning that 80% of submitted grants do not get funded, and in some cases the cut-off is less than 10%. There are many reasons, an important one being the weak U.S. economy. But, in addition, the public (and politicians) demands immediately perceivable efficacy. As readers no doubt know, science often proceeds by small steps, missteps, and feedback-loop progressions. Major advances follow many years, sometimes decades, of nonspectacular labor. Another misconception is that when an important result (e.g., referring to a therapy or drug) is inconsistent with previous reports, it is taken as a sign that science in general does not work. But of course one of the foundations of science is provisionality—of theories, assumptions, beliefs and, yes, “facts.” A third source of difficulty is the antiscience rumblings in society, partly based on the view that science and technology are responsible for many of the world's problems and partly on a perceived incompatibility between science and religious beliefs.

In addition to these general difficulties, EAB faces objections specific to operant-conditioning research. For example, one objection is that EAB treats people as if they were animals or, even worse, machines. Another objection is that it is unethical to use animals in research. Yet another is that EAB researchers study “bribery” (i.e., reinforcement), and reinforcement is harmful or ineffective. Lastly, EAB research is considered by some not to be relevant to the problems confronted in ongoing lives or to the issues that are at the forefront in other areas of psychology.

Critchfield argues that translational emphases would increase the likelihood of support. When I evaluated grant applications for NIH and NSF, questions were sometimes raised (especially by reviewers who were not EAB researchers) about relevance (especially with reference to basic operant-conditioning research). Those questions had to be satisfactorily answered for there to be any chance of support. Critchfield is correct in that explicit contact with identifiable societal problems (or issues judged to be important by researchers in other fields) is likely to increase support.

Another benefit accrues from a focus on application: It provides a way to evaluate the progress of research. Especially at early stages in a science, research can lead in many directions, some being more productive than others, and successful applications provide one measure of scientific success. Other sciences began with attempts to solve societal problems, and successes and failures in those attempts helped to shape the science (Neuringer, 1984; Zilsel, 1957). In place of application, researchers in EAB have emphasized orderliness of data as a criterion, but some orderly data are more likely than others to lead to understanding (e.g., to prediction and control in some instances), and to fruitful development of the science.

Another reason to work toward solving real-world problems is that we may be running out of time. Threats abound, including atomic warfare, global warming, overpopulation, pandemic diseases, natural resource depletion, and corporate abuse. Each of these has the potential to destroy our way of life, if not life itself. In a recent article, Weinberg (2009), a Nobel Prize–winning physicist, urged support for travel to Mars and beyond because we are destroying our world, and if humanity (and other life on earth) is to survive, we must be able to escape from the planet. A Skinnerian alternative is that to survive, we must learn how to change behaviors. Near the end of his life, Skinner (1987) expressed skepticism as to whether society could or would make the necessary changes, but those who devote their lives to EAB research may have no alternative than to keep trying.

In point of fact, basic EAB research has already had important effects on societal practices. Operant techniques are widely applied in educational and therapeutic domains. And in the social and political world as well, contingencies of reinforcement are increasingly seen as relevant. Here are two examples. Large corporations reinforce employees' health-related behaviors such as periodic health screening, exercising, and maintaining reasonable body weight (Lieber, 2010). One company pays its workers for participating in a “healthy back” program because back problems are a major source of absenteeism. Another provides airfare, hotel accommodations, and other travel perks worth up to $5,000 per year for individuals who maintain good health practices. Individuals (outside corporations) can also use behavioral techniques through Web sites (e.g., stickk.com) where individuals commit to desirable behaviors and lose money if they don't meet their self-directed goals, a social contingency described in EAB publications.

A second example has equally broad social implications. Bolsa Familia is a national program in Brazil in which the government pays poor families (money is given periodically, as if the families were earning wages) for meeting health- and education-related behavioral goals, including going regularly for physical check-ups, keeping children in school, and attending periodic workshops on nutrition and disease control (Rosenberg, 2011). Effects have been dramatic, not only to improve the health and education of millions, but also to reduce poverty. “Between 2003 and 2009, the income of poor Brazilians has grown seven times as much as the income of rich Brazilians. Poverty has fallen during that time from 22 percent of the population to 7 percent” (Rosenberg, 2011), effects in part due to the Bolsa Familia program. These are examples of operant reinforcement contingencies that have been studied extensively in EAB laboratories. Whether explicitly directed at particular problems or not, operant research has contributed to functional and successful social applications.

A different kind of translation may also increase support for EAB research—translation into the language and theoretical frames of other subfields of psychology, including cognitive, social, and behavioral neuroscience (Neuringer, 1991). Operant procedures are widely utilized in behavioral neuroscience, and effects of environmental contingencies on choices and actions have become a major area of study in social and cognitive laboratories (e.g., Bargh, 1997; Wegner, 2002). However, EAB researchers infrequently contact research in these other subfields. If EAB scientists read and cited more widely from outside our field, our research might be more generally relevant, and those in other fields might be more likely to read and cite our work. The self-contained nature of much operant-conditioning research contributes to others concluding that our research is not relevant to those who study different organisms and use different methods, and whose research is stimulated by different theoretical concerns. Answers to important questions are harder to obtain when one remains confined within the disciplinary boundaries defined by us and those in other fields.

Both forms of translation, to societal goals and to related fields of inquiry, require broadening of focus. Replace method-oriented research, in which the researcher limits his or her reading to EAB journals and experiments to operant chambers, with experiments directed at answering questions or solving problems that are common to many fields. To do this, researchers may need to reach out to acquire new skills, construct new types of equipment, learn new fields of study, explore new paradigms, and push the boundaries of our science. In short, reach out, as B. F. Skinner did.