Skinner's Radical Behaviorism Theory

Skinner's Radical Behaviorism Theory

Radical Behaviorism Theory

Radical Behaviorism, postulated by BF Skinner and adopted by several other psychologists, as Ferster, Sidman, Schoenfeld, Catania, Hineline, Jack Michael, etc. emerged in the field of psychology as a philosophical proposal and as a research project in opposition to methodological behaviorism guidance positivist (Reynolds, 1975). Radical Behaviorism is the camp philosophy of behavior analysis. Issues in Radical Behaviorism worked assess the impact and validity of scientific research in the experimental study of behavior.

Skinner had as reference the ideas of philosophers of science, including Percy Bridgeman, Ernst Mach and Jules Henri Poincare. These created new explanatory models of thought that did not depend on any substructure metaphysics (Reynolds, 1975). Throughout his work, Skinner theorized that the logic model natural selection of Darwin could also be applied to the behavior of individuals as a new model of different causal mechanism.

As a radical behaviorist philosopher, Skinner argued that the different explanations of human behavior should be resolved on the basis of evidence refuting, not abstract speculation. Radical behaviorism is designed for experiments performed under the rigor of scientific knowledge production. Developed in a laboratory under controlled conditions, is a method capable of reapplication (Blackman, 1974).

For Skinner, the radical behaviorism would be a special case of the philosophy of science "is not science of behavior human, is the philosophy of that science" (The behavior). He seeks to understand human affairs, as " behavior "," freedom "and" culture "within the model of selection by consequences, and rejecting the use of non-physical investigated variables (without the space-time dimension) (Blackman, 1974).

Understood as philosophical thought, radical behaviorism should not to be confused with behavior analysis. This is because behavior analysis is beyond a philosophical field (radical behaviorism), a field of Basic Research (Experimental Analysis of Behavior) and a scope of knowledge and techniques (Applied Behavior Analysis) (Dinsmoor, 1971). Behavior analysis is a science of behavior, and dealing with application of behavioral science, its practice does not take place in an environment under controlled conditions, and yes, the environment common to all men and women: the planet we inhabit (Reynolds, 1975).

The term comes from English behaviorism behavior (behavior) and illustrates well the object of study shed radical behavior, understood as the relationship between the individual and his environment physical, chemical, or social. The "radical" behaviorism is due to the fact that the techniques described here do not appeal to mental states such as initiating cause of the behavior, but sees them as an early stage of their own behavior (Dinsmoor, 1971). With that, acquires the status of technical response issued, not because of mental or autonomous behavior, differing fundamentally from other schools of thought within psychology . Radical behaviorism is also known as Skinnerian because it was BF Skinner who developed his theory , based on their laboratory studies (Reynolds, 1975).

Being a natural science, behavior analysis seeks to understand the relationship between individual and environment in terms of behaviors, which may have their probability of emission reduced or increased, as the history ...