Definitions of Everyday Behaviors 25

Figure 2-5. This is a picture of a fanciful Lego struc-

ture. Goetz and Baer (1973) studied ways to increase
the creativity of such structures built by children.
regarded as a magical pro-
cess occurring deep within the mind. But if you
think about it, you only know if someone has
learned a fact if they state the fact. You only know
if they have learned to identify a species of tree if
they point to the tree. All learning eventually must
be displayed at an appropriate time and place.
While learning may be displayed privately so that
only the learner can observe it, learning in the class-
room must be displayed publicly. No teacher will
credit a student with having learned the answer to
a question if they cannot produce that answer. So
^ learning cannot be separated from behavior.
Skinner (1954) went a step further. He argued that
learning is the development of new behaviors. He defined
learning in the classroom as giving correct answers to
increasingly difficult questions. The behavioral definition
of learning eventually led to a new approach to teaching.
Skinner
^Learning
Learning is o
developed written programs that presented small units
of information. He posed frequent questions to
determine student mastery over the small units. He
then revised the programs until most students
answered the questions correctly. His behavioral
definition led to a new approach to learning. He did not
use tests to find out which students learned and which
did not. Rather, he sought to ensure that all students
could learn. He changed the emphasis from dumb
students to dumb teaching. This book uses Skinners
definition of learning.
Notice that Skinner was interested in the be-
havior of giving correct answers itself. He was not
interested in inferring that something was going on
inside of the person that he might call learning. The
learning consists completely of acquiring correct
answers to the questions. You learn American history
by acquiring answers to questions about dates, persons,
and events. You learn even more by acquiring answers
to questions about trends, epochs, and related world
conditions. You learn still more by acquiring answers to
questions that compare different eras. Learning does
not exist somewhere apart from the answering behav-
ior; learning is acquiring the behavior of answering
questions,
Skinners definition of learning did not focus on
movements of major muscle groups or use electronics to
detect tiny internal events. It did not involve behavior
so private that you cant observe it. Writing a correct
answer involves only slightly different movements of
the fingers and hand from writing a wrong answer.
Skinner specified that if you wanted to observe the
subtle behavior of learning, you must observe writing
correct answers. (Based on Skinners writings on
programmed instruction, particularly Skinner, 1954.)
9. Because it specifies exactly what to observe if
youre interested in learning, the statement
Learning is writing correct answers is called a
behavioral <4 / ArHin
imagine that the pain of cancer is
far from being a behavior of any kind. It may seem
like something that the cancer patient must en-
dure alone. It may seem that no one else could
know anything about it; it seems to be totally pri-
vate. The doctor can see the tumor, but only the
patient can experience the pain.

26 Lesson 2
Behavior analysts maintain that anything that a
person does is behavior. Therefore, the action of a person
feeling pain must be behavior. Ahles and his colleagues
(1990) found a way to measure some parts of this
behavior. They found that cancer patients emit subtle
pain behaviors that most of us could easily overlook.
These pain behaviors correlate with the patients
experience of pain. The patients guard painful parts of
their bodies when moving. They brace themselves to
reduce pain. They express pain through sighing,
sobbing, and cursing. They rub or hold sore areas. They
grimace and make terrible faces when in pain. Ahles
and his associates defined]pain behavionas guarding,
bracing, expressing, rubbing, or grimacing. The
researchers inferred the private experience of pain from
these behaviors and justified this inference by showing
that the total number of these pain behaviors that they
observed correlates with the patients own rating of his
or her pain.
This example is interesting because it illustrates a
method for observing private behavior. Pain is largely
private behavior, but it is accompanied by subtle but
observable behaviors such as guarding, bracing,
expressing, rubbing, or grimacing. By observing these
subtle behaviors, we can infer when the more private
aspects of pain are also likely to be occurring. We are not
interested in the observable pain behaviors so much as
the private experience of pain. To put it another way,
eliminating the pain behaviors would not necessarily
eliminate the pain. This approach to pam is quite
different from the earlier examples of tension,
creativity, and learning, in which the researchers were
interested in the observed behavior alone. The approach
to pain that Ahles and his colleagues developed can be
used to observe any private events that are accompanied
by observable behaviors.
The researchers method provided an objective
measure for when to give terminal cancer patients
narcotic drugs to ease their pain. Similar studies of pain
have sought to find other ways that dont involve drugs,
such as meditation, relaxation, and cognitive
restructuring.
Ahles and his colleagues observed cancer patients
guarding, bracing, rubbing, expressing, and grimacing
so that they could infer their pain. Clearly, such
behaviors as bracing and grimacing do not involve
obvious movements of major muscles. Nor are they
internal actions detectable only with electronic devices.
The researchers were
interested in a cluster of behaviors that included those
they could observe plus the feeling of pain itself. (Based
on Ahles, Coombs, Jensen, Stukel, Maurer, & Keefe,
1990.)
10. Because the private behavior of feeling pain is
something that a person does, feeling pain is a
form of haJoaxAcrT _________________
Notes
Note #1
Psychologists use the term operational defini-
tion, They define it as the operations used to measure
the concept being defined. They often use it to refer to a
concept involving a private event. This
definitions always refer to some aspect of behavior. For
this reason, the two terms are not synonymous (Moore,
1975; Skinner, 1945).
11. Remember thaC-un operational definition
_________ (is^jsnj) the same as a behavioral
definition.
Note #2
Behavior analysts emphasize that all behavior
involves the whole body. The most obvious aspect of
running is movement of the legs. However, running
also involves moving the arms and upper body. Other
aspects of it are breathing, pumping blood, and looking.
It also involves the coordination of looking and moving.
Thus, running involves legs, arms, lungs, heart, and
brain. The behavior analysis of thinking points to
saying words to yourself under your breath. However,
thinking also involves breathing, sitting, and looking.
Thus, thinking involves the vocal cords, lungs, spine,
eyes, and brain. We may readily label running as
behavior, because of the obvious movement. We may
incorrectly label thinking as mental, because of the lack
of obvious movement.
r
12. Whether a behavior is obvious, subtle, internal, or
private, it involves the (ijh.i'ytLe s body.
Helpful Hints
Helpful Hint #1
People can make direct observations of their own
behavior. If they use a behavioral definition

Definitions of Everyday Behaviors 1~
separate from the physical world of the brain.
Their approach reflects the old idea that the world
is divided into two realms: physical and mental.
As you already know, behavior analysts do not
deny that thinking exists. They argue that it ex-
ists in the physical world; we do not need to call
upon a hypothetical mental world that we can
never observe directly. They propose that think-
ing is a form of behavior that is very private. You
will see in this lesson that such cognitive activi-
ties as learning and creativity can be observed.
There will be additional examples throughout the
book. Interpreting private events as complex,
hard-to-observe behavior has led to a great deal
of misunderstanding. Insisting that private events
must themselves be explained may have led to
even more. Because^behavior analysts)deny that
private events cause behavior, many people be-
lieve that they deny the existence of thinking. This
is wrong! Behavior analysts simply claim that pri-
vate events are a type of behavior.
You might resist labeling silent reading as
behavior. Many people experience reading as say-
ing the words in a book to themselves. One idea is
that those words occur in their minds; but another
idea is that the words may occur in their speech
muscles. People appear to use the same muscles
when saying words to themselves as when saying
them aloud (Hardycke, Petrinovich, & Ellsworth,
1966). They may be silent only because the silent
reader does not expel the air required to sound
the word out loud. Of course, silent reading may
involve other parts of the body as well. By view-
ing silent reading as an activity of the body,
behavior analysts do not have to consider it a men-
tal activity located in the mind. Instead they
regard it as behavior that isnt obvious to others.
Silent reading may involve behavior in another
way as well. It may change some of the readers
observable behavior such as repeating facts or
demonstrating skills. For behavior analvstsCsIIenD
(freadingjis an example of private behavior.
C Problem solvimhas a form of thinking may also be
private behavior. Most people consider saying things
in your head to be what happens when you problem
solve. They regard it as mental activity occurring in
the mind. Yet saying things in your head may simply
be silent talk and therefore similar to silent reading.
Suppose you say to yourself, I could improve my
grade by studying more for tests. That seems to
involve doing everything you do when you say it out
loud, except that
you dont expel air to make an audible sound. Try
saying ouch to yourself. Notice the slight tension in
your throat as you say it. If you dont notice anything,
try humming The Star Spangled Banner and
sayingouch to yourself at the same time. Chances are
that using the vocal cords to hum will interfere with
the tiny movements of thinking the word ouch.
Similar tiny movements may account for other forms of
thinking. They may also account for seeing images in
your imagination in the same wav (Skinner, 1953).
I Behavior analystsVegard thinking, imagining.
and feeling as things that people do. They call human
conduct of this kindCprivate eventy and consider it
behavior. Most private events involve complex
activities that we dont know how to observe yet. Often
they also involve complex functions such as those
involved in conveying meaning to other people.
You may have read about behavior analysis in
another course. You may have learned that behavior
analysts deny that thinking and visualizing exist. That
is not the case! Behavior analysts argue that thinking
is private behavior. In their view, private behavior does
not cause public behavior, although it often precedes it.
They argue that behavioral scientists must analyze the
causes of private behavior just as they must analyze
the causes of public behavior. They assume that
peoples experience with past environments determines
what they think as well as what they do. Behavior
analysts see private events simply as additional be-
havior for them to explain.
Behavior analysis has been very successful in
Skinner on Awareness
Instead of taking awareness as a given, Skinner
views the act of becoming aware.,.. as another
learned behavior (Bry, 1991: p. 9). Awareness
involves looking and listening. It involves noticing
the differences between things. It involves acting
differently under different conditions. In short,
awareness is something that people do. We learn
to look, listen, notice, and act differently.
3. Because it involves people doing things,
behavior analysts like Skinner view aware-
ness as a form of ^ajoib'i'o f .