## About Behaviourism: Review (Week 1) our first week's introduction to **About Behaviourism** sets the stage for **philosophy of the behaviour sciences** and is meant to be Skinner's preferred framework (and by his approximation) the most coherent and useful form of behaviour known as *'Radical-behaviourism'* - beyond [operant learning](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operant_conditioning) Skinner adds that in addition to his philosophy of behaviourism, the experimental analysis and applications process to gain analysis data is the most useful. > [!info] keynote: > although this debate is still live, it is important to note: **Skinner’s radical behaviourism is highly influential historically but it is not the only current view in behaviour science or psychology** --- # chapter 1 > main idea: behaviour should be explained by what has happened to a person and what situation they are in, not by treating feelings as the true cause. > > consideration: saying “he did it because he felt x” may sound like an explanation, but it often stops us from looking for the real causes. - feelings are often treated as causes //people say anger, hunger, or desire caused behaviour, but skinner says this is usually too shallow - just describing behaviour is not enough //saying what people do does not tell us why they do it - early behaviourism focused on public facts //it tried to explain behaviour through things that can be seen and measured - radical behaviourism includes private events //feelings and self-observation matter, but they are not separate inner causes - private events are part of the body //they are not events in a separate mental world - behaviour comes mainly from history and setting //genetic makeup and past environment are the key causes - mental words can mislead inquiry //they can make us think we have explained behaviour when we have only renamed it # chapter 2 > main idea: people can notice things happening inside their bodies, but they learn to talk about those things through other people. > > consideration: self-knowledge is real, but it is limited and often inaccurate. - the body contains private events //people can feel pain, hunger, tension, and other inner conditions - people learn to name private events socially //others teach them using public clues like injury, not eating, or visible behaviour - words for feelings are often indirect //many feeling words come from public events or metaphors, not exact inner knowledge - self-reports are often rough guesses //other people cannot directly check what someone feels, so accuracy is limited - people also report their own actions //they can describe what they are doing, did, may do, or are quietly thinking - people do not always know why they act //they may invent reasons after the fact - self-knowledge is taught by a verbal community //it is not automatic just because someone has a body - self-knowledge can help self-control //knowing more about your own behaviour can help you predict and manage it - what is observed is part of the body, not a mind-world //inner awareness does not prove a separate mental place exists # chapter 3 > main idea: some behaviour is inborn, but that does not mean instincts are hidden inner forces. > > consideration: saying “it is instinct” often just labels behaviour instead of explaining it. - humans are born with built-in behaviour patterns //breathing, suckling, and some basic responses are inherited - reflexes describe behaviour, not final causes //saying a baby has a reflex does not fully explain why it behaves that way - instinctive behaviour is more complex than reflexes //some actions are more flexible but still part of inherited makeup - instinct should not be treated like an inner force //it is misleading to say behaviour happens because an instinct drives it - natural selection explains inborn behaviour //useful behaviour stayed in the species because it helped survival - survival conditions shape species behaviour //what helps a species live on becomes part of its inherited pattern - learning also prepares organisms for new settings //conditioned reflexes help an organism respond better during its own life - operant conditioning strengthens behaviour by results //if an action leads to food, safety, or some other useful result, it becomes more likely - inborn and learned behaviour often mix together //it is easy to confuse what is inherited with what is learned - “universal” behaviour is not automatically inborn //something common to all people may come from similar learning conditions, not just biology - separating nature and learning matters //it helps explain behaviour more clearly and improves prediction and control ### Last updated 2026-04-27 16:37 ## Additional Reading --- - Ainslie, G., 2001. _Breakdown of Will_, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. - Arnold, N. S., 1990. _Marx's Radical Critique of Capitalist Society_, Oxford: Oxford University Press. - Bates, E., Ellman, J., Johnson, M., Karmiloff-Smith, A., Parisi, D., and Plunkett, K., 1998. “Innateness and Emergentism”, in Bechtel and Graham (eds.) 1998. - Bechtel, W., 1985. “Contemporary Connectionism: Are the New Parallel Distributed Processing Models Cognitive or Associationist?”, _behaviourism_, 13: 53–61. (See Skinner 1977.) - Bechtel, W., and Abrahamsen, A., 1991. _Connectionism and the Mind_, Oxford: Blackwell. - Bechtel, W., and G. Graham (eds.), 1998, _A Companion to Cognitive Science_, Oxford: Blackwell. - Becthel, W., Abrahamsen, A., and Graham, G., 1998. “The Life of Cognitive Science”, in W. Bechtel and G. Graham (eds.) 1998. - Black, M., 1973. “Some Aversive Responses to a Would-be Reinforcer”, in H. Wheeler (ed.), _Beyond the Punitive Society_, San Francisco: W. H. Freeman, pp. 125–34. - Brewer, W. F., 1974. “There is No Convincing Evidence for Operant or Classical Conditioning in Adult Humans”, In W. Weiner and D. Palermo (eds.), _Cognition and Symbolic Processes_, Hillsdale, N. J.: Earlbaum. - Carnap, R., 1932/33. “Psychology in Physical Language,” _Erkenntnis_, 3: 107–42. - Chisholm, R. M., 1957. _Perceiving_, Ithaca: Cornell. - Chomsky, N., 1959. “Review of Verbal behaviour,” _Language_, 35: 26–58. - –––, 1971. “The Case Against B. F. Skinner,” _New York Review of Books_, 30: 18–24. - –––, 1975. _Reflections on Language_, New York: Pantheon Books. - Churchland, P., 1984. _Matter and Consciousness_, Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press/Bradford Books. - Cowie, F., 1998. _What's Within: Nativism Reconsidered_, Oxford: Oxford. - Day, W., 1976. “The Case for behaviourism,” in M. Marx and F. Goodson (eds.) _Theories in Contemporary Psychology_, New York: Macmillan, pp. 534–45. - Dennett, D., 1978. “Why the Law of Effect Will Not Go Away”, in D. Dennett (ed.) _Brainstorms_, Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press/Bradford Books, pp. 71–89. - –––, 1991. _Consciousness Explained_, Boston: Little, Brown and Company. - –––, 2005. _Sweet Dreams: Philosophical Obstacles to a Science of Consciousness_, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. - Erwin, E., 1978. _behaviour Therapy: Scientific, Philosophical, and Moral Foundations_, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. - Fodor, J., 1981. “The Present Status of the Innateness Controversy”, in J. Fodor (ed.), _Representations_, Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press/Bradford Books, pp. 257–316. - Gallistel, C. R., 1990. _The Organization of Learning_, Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press. - Graham, G., 1984. “Sensation and Classification”, _behavioural and Brain Sciences_, 7: 558–559. - –––, 1991. “Connectionism in Pavlovian Harness”, in T. Horgan and J. Tienson (eds.), _Connectionism and the Philosophy of Mind_, Dordrecht: Kluwer, pp. 143–66. - –––, 1998. _Philosophy of Mind: An Introduction_, 2nd edition. Oxford: Basil Blackwell. - Graham, G. and Horgan, T., 2000. “Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary”, _Philosophical Studies_, 99: 59–87. - Graham, G, and Valentine, E., 2004. _Identifying the Mind: Selected Papers of U. T. Place_, Oxford: Oxford University Press. - Graham, G., Horgan, T., and Tienson, J., 2009. “Phenomenology, Intentionality, and the Unity of Mind”, in A. Beckermann and B. McLaughlin (eds.), _Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Mind_, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 512–37. - Hempel, C., 1949. “The Logical Analysis of Psychology”, in H. Feigl and W. Sellars (eds.), _Readings in Philosophical Analysis_, New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, pp. 373-84. - –––, 1966. _Philosophy of Natural Science_, Englewood Cliffs, N. J.: Prentice-Hall. - Honig, W. and J. G. Fetterman (eds), 1992. _Cognitive Aspects of Stimulus Control_, Hillsdale, N. J.: Erlbaum. - Horgan, T. and Graham, G., forthcoming. “Phenomenal Intentionality and Content Determinacy”, in R. Shantz (ed.), _Prospects for Meaning_, Amsterdam: DeGruyter. - Kane, R., 1996. _The Significance of Free Will_, Oxford: Oxford. - Killeen, P., 1987. “Emergent behaviourism”, in S. Modgil and C. Modgil (eds.), _B. F. Skinner: Consensus and Controversy_, New York: Falmer, pp. 219–34. - –––, 1994. “Mathematical Principles of Reinforcement,” _behavioural and Brain Sciences_, 17: 105–172. - Leiteberg, H. (ed.), 1976, _Handbook of behaviour Modification and behaviour Therapy_, Englewoood Cliffs, N. J.: Prentice-Hall. - Levy, N. 2007. _Neuroethics_, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. - Lovaas, O. I. and Newsom, C. D., 1976. “behaviour Modification with Psychotic Children”, in H. Leiteberg (ed.) 1976. - O'Donnell, J., 1985. The Origins of behaviourism: _American Psychology_, 1870–1920. New York: NYU Press. - Mackenzie, B., 1977. _behaviourism and the Limits of Scientific Method_, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. - Mahoney, M. J., 1974. _Cognition and behaviour Modification_, Cambridge, MA: Ballinger. - Maloney, C., 1991. “Connectionism and Conditioning”, In T. Horgan and J. Tienson (eds.), _Connectionism and the Philosophy of Mind_, Dordrecht: Kluwer, pp. 167–95. - Meehl, P. E., 1978. “Theoretical Risks and Tabular Asterisks: Sir Karl, Sir Ronald, and The Slow Progress of Soft Psychology”, _Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology_, 46: 806–34. - Meichenbaum, D., 1977. _Cognitive-behaviour Modification_, New York: Plenum. - Melser, D., 2004. _The Act of Thinking_, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. - Montague, R. and Berns, G., 2002. “Neural Economics and the Biological Substrates of Valuation”, _Neuron_, 36: 265–284. - Nestler, E. J. and Malenka, R. C., 2004. “The Addicted Brain”, _Scientific American_, 290: 78–85. - Place, U. T., 2000. “The Causal Potency of Qualia: Its Nature and Its Source”, _Brain and Mind_, 1: 183–192. Reprinted in Graham and Valentine 2004. - Quine, W., 1960. _Word and Object_, Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press. - Rachlin, H., 2000. _The Science of Self-Control_, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. - Rey, G., 1997. _Contemporary Philosophy of Mind: A Contentiously Classical Approach_, Oxford: Blackwell. - Rescorla, R. A., 1990. “The Role of Information about the Response-Outcome Relationship in Instrumental Discrimination Learning,” _Journal of Experimental Psychology_: Animal behaviour Processes, 16: 262–70. - Rimm, D. C. and Masters, J. C., 1974. _behaviour Therapy: Techniques and Empirical Findings_, New York: Academic Press. - Robinson, T. E. and Berridge, K. C., 2003. “Addiction” _Annual Review of Psychology_, 54: 25–53. - Roediger, H. and Goff, L., 1998. “Memory”, in Bechtel and Graham (eds.) 1998. - Ross, D., Sharp, C., Vuchinich, R., Spurrett, D., 2008. _Midbrain Mutiny: The Picoeconomics and Neuroeconomics of Disordered Gambling_, Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press. - Ryle, G., 1949. _The Concept of Mind_, London: Hutchinson. - Schwartz, B. and Lacey, H., 1982. _behaviourism, Science, and Human Nature_, New York: Norton. - Sellars, W., 1963. “Philosophy and the Scientic Image of Man”, in _Science, Perception, and Reality_, New York: Routledge & Kegan Paul, pp. 1–40. - Skinner, B. F., 1948. _Walden Two_, New York: Macmillan. - –––, 1953. _Science and Human behaviour_, New York: Macmillan. - –––, 1971. _Beyond Freedom and Dignity_, New York: Knopf. - –––, 1974. _About behaviourism_, New York: Vintage. - –––, 1977. “Why I am not a Cognitive Psychologist”, _behaviourism_, 5: 1–10. (This journal is now known as behaviour and Philosophy.) - –––, 1984a. Abstract for “An Operant Analysis of Problem Solving”, _behavioural and Brain Sciences_, 7: 583. - –––, 1984b. “Coming to Terms with Private Events”, _behavioural and Brain Sciences_, 7: 573–581. - –––, 1985. “News from Nowhere, 1984”, _The behaviour Analyst_, 8: 5–14. - Smith, L., 1986. _behaviourism and Logical Positivism: A Reassessment of Their Alliance_, Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. - Stahl, J. R. and Leitenberg, H., 1976. “behavioural treatment of the chronic mental hospital patient”, in Leitenberg (ed.) 1976. - Stich, S., 1984. “Is behaviourism Vacuous?,” _behavioural and Brain Sciences_, 7: 647–649. - Tolman, E. C., 1938, “The Determiners of behaviour at a Choice Point,” _Psychological Review_, 45: 1–41. - Watson, J., 1913. “Psychology as a behaviourist Views It,” _Psychological Review_, 20: 158–77. - –––, 1930. _behaviourism_, Norton: New York. - Wells, A., 2000. _Emotional Disorders and Metacognition: Innovative Cognitive Therapy_, Chichester: John Wiley & Sons. - West, R., 2006. _Theory of Addiction_, Blackwell: Oxford. - Wittgenstein, L., 1953/1968. _Philosophical Investigations_, trans. G. E. M. Anscombe, Oxford: Basil Blackwell. - Zuriff, G., 1985. _behaviourism: A Conceptual Reconstruction_, New York: Columbia University Press.