THE CENTURY PSYCHOLOGY Richard M Elliott, Kenneth MacCorquodale, SERIES Editor Assistant Editor Verbal Behavior BY THE SAME AUTHOR The Behavior of Organisms Walden Two Science and Human Behavior Schedules of Reinforcement (with C B Ferster) B F SKINNER Verbal Behavior APPLETON-CENTURY-CROFTS, New York Inc Copyright 1957 by APPLETON-CENTURY-CROFTS, INC All rights reserved This book, or parts thereof, must not be reproduced in any form without permission of the publisher 597-1 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CARD NUMBER: 57-11446 PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA To JULIE and DEBBIE, my primary sources PREFACE A IT HAS TAKEN a long time to write this book classification of verbal in an early version of Part II was completed in the summer responses A few supporting experiments were then carried out with of 1934 the Verbal Summator, and statistical analyses were made of several literary works, of data from word-association experiments, and of guessing behavior All this material was used in courses on Literary and Verbal Behavior at the University of Minnesota in the late Harvard University in the summer of 1938, and at the of University Chicago in the summer of 1939 manuscript of the present scope was to have been completed under a Guggenheim Felthirties, at A lowship in 1941, but the war intervened The Fellowship was resumed in 1944-45 and a version nearly completed It was the basis of a course on Verbal Behavior at Columbia University in the summer of 1947, stenographic notes of which were circulated by Dr Ralph Hefferlein in mimeographed form the following year In the fall of 1947 material was extracted from the manuscript for the William James Lectures at Harvard University, several hundred mimeographed copies of which have since been circulated In preparing these lectures it was found that the manuscript had begun to take on the character of a review of the literature and that the central theme was becoming obscure In completing the manuscript for publication, therefore, summaries of the literature were deleted Completion of the final manuscript was postponed in favor of a general book on human behavior (Science and Human Behavior) which would provide a ready reference on matters not essentially verbal The present version is more than twice as long as the James Lectures and contains many changes made to conform with recent progress in the experimental analysis of behavior, human and otherwise With the exception of the last two chapters, it was written during the spring term of 1955 at Putney, Vermont The work has been generously supported by the Society of Fellows of Harvard University (a three-year fellowship), the University of Minnesota (a one-half year sabbatical leave), the vii Guggenheim Foun- PREFACE Vlll one-year fellowship), and Harvard University (the William James Lectureship and a sabbatical leave) To all of these, thanks are due Unfortunately it is impossible to make an adequate acknowl- dation (a edgement of the generous help received from students and colleagues during these years and from criticisms of earlier versions, published or unpublished The final manuscript has profited greatly from critical and editorial help by Mrs Susan R Meyer and Dr Dorothy Cohen and from careful preparation by Mrs Virginia N MacLaury Cambridge, Mass B F, SKINNER CONTENTS PAGE vii Preface Part I: A Program CHAPTER A Functional Analysis of Verbal Behavior General Problems i 13 Part II: Controlling Variables The Mand 35 Verbal Behavior Under the Control of Verbal Stimuli 52 The Tact 81 Special Conditions Affecting Stimulus Control 147 The Audience 172 The 185 Verbal Operant as a Unit of Analysis Part III: Multiple Variables Multiple Causation 227 10 Supplementary Stimulation 253 1 New Combinations 293 Part IV: The of Fragmentary Responses The Manipulation of Verbal Behavior Autoclitic 31 13 Grammar and Syntax 14 Composition and as Autoclitic Processes Its Effects 331 344 COM EMS X Part V: The Production of Verbal Behavior CHAPTER PAGE 15 Self-Editing 369 16 Special Conditions of Self- Editing 384 17 Self-Strengthening of Verbal Behavior 403 18 Logical and Scientific Verbal Behavior 418 19 Thinking 432 Two Personal Epilogues Appendix: The Verbal Community Index 453 461 Parti A PROGRAM Chapter i A MEN ACT upon Functional Analysis of Verbal Behavior the world, and change it, and are changed in turn by the consequences of their action Certain processes, which the human organism shares with other species, alter behavior so that it achieves a safer and more useful interchange with a particular environment When appropriate behavior has been established, its consequences work through similar processes to keep it in force Jf by chance the environment changes, old forms of behavior disappear, while new consequences build new forms Behavior alters the environment through mechanical action, and its properties or dimensions are often related in a simple way to the effects produced When a man walks toward an object, he usually finds himself closer to it; if he reaches for it, physical contact is likely to follow; and if he grasps and lifts it, or pushes or pulls it, the object frequently changes position in appropriate directions All this follows from simple geometrical and mechanical principles Much of the time, however, a man acts only indirectly upon the environment from which the ultimate consequences of his behavior emerge His first effect is upon other men Instead of going to a drinking fountain, a thirsty man may simply "ask for a glass of water" that may engage in behavior which produces a certain pattern of sounds which in turn induces someone to bring him a glass of water The sounds themselves are easy to describe in physical terms; but the glass is, of water reaches the speaker only as the result of a complex series of events including the behavior of a listener The ultimate consequence, the receipt of water, bears no useful geometrical or mechanical relation to the form of the behavior of "asking for water." Indeed, it is ' APPENDIX 466 forcement by the verbal environment Rapping on an empty glass or table at a restaurant is comparable, as is the vocal Har-rumph! Any behavior which has an effect upon another person as a mechanical object (pulling, pushing, striking, blocking, and so on) may acquire a behavioral effect if incipient stages of the behavior serve The contingent reinforcement is usually avoidance of, or the later stages of the behavior For example, A stops from, escape the approach of B by holding out his arm and placing the palm of his as stimuli against B's chest At this stage the behavior of A would be roughly the same if B were an inanimate object (if B were swinging hand toward A, for example, at the end of a long rope) But if being stopped by A is aversive to B, or if A stops B only when likely to treat eventually responds to A 's outstretched arm to avoid aversively, actual contact this change has occurred in B., A's response is B When reinforced not by its mechanical effect on B but by B's behavior It becomes a "gesture" and is classified as verbal Every listener and speaker need not pass through similar changes, for the gesture is eventually set up by the community The traffic policeman's gestured "stop" is as culturally determined as a red light or the vocal response Stop! Such gestures may gain current strength from similar nonverbal contingencies The "speaker" may be readier to respond in a given way and achieve a more consistent effect upon the listener because of related mechanical effects Even the railroad semaphore in its "stop" position probably borrows strength from the resemblance to an actual barring of the way Familiar gestures having roughly the same effects as Go away! Come here! (gestured with either the whole arm or the index finger), Pass by!, Sit down! (as to an audience), and Stand up! are subject to similar interpretations These are all mands which specify behavior resembling the mechanical effect of the nonverbal responses from which they are derived (Putting a finger on one's own lips shows something like the metaphorical extension of putting a finger on the lips of someone else The latter may occur if the parties are close together.) If, for purely physical reasons, A cups his hand behind his ear in order to hear B more clearly this becomes for B a stimulus in the presence of which louder behavior (vocal or nonvocal) is differentially B increases the intensity because A cups his hand, cup- reinforced If ping the hand becomes a "gesture" and may be classed as verbal If B can avoid punishment at the hands of A by engaging in a THE VERBAL COMMUNITY 467 particular form of activity, A may shape B's behavior by delivering of withholding aversive stimulation For example, if A drives B away from a supply of food by beating him, A's raised fist eventually causes B to withdraw in order to avoid blows rather than to wait to escape from them When this has happened, A may gesture rather than strike If A sometimes allows B to eat, B eventually responds to A's fist as a stimulus upon which punishment for approach is contingent A may eventually use a raised fist for finer shaping of behavior For example, B may be kept active if A responds as soon as B stops The contingencies are the same as in keeping a horse moving by cracking a whip In addition to starting or stopping, B's behavior may also be guided in direction or intensity level If B is predisposed to reinforce any reaction indicating its A A may , reinforcing effect shape B's behavior with upon him For example, conspicuous ingestive behavior on the part of A may reinforce B for cooking or serving a special kind of food A's behavior in licking his may become a gesture equivalent to Give me some more of that may become the equivalent of the Yum-yum shaped verbal community The unconditioned behavior of an particular chops as his vocal ra-ra by a audience which has been reinforced by an entertainer reinforces the entertainer in turn Part of the reinforcing effect is the contrast between the intense quiet of the enthralled audience and the noisy release as the entertainer stops If the audience can induce the entertainer to continue by heightening this contrast, the noise may become a gesture Clapping, stamping, whistling, and other forms of applause are verbal responses equivalent to Again!, Encore!, or Bis! Eventually such a response may be used to shape up the behavior of a speaker as in parliamentary debate Most of the mands we can account for without assuming a prior verbal environment are gestures Paget has tried to derive vocal the tongue are parallels by pointing to the fact that movements of accompany movements of the hand A child, engrossed in some manual skill may be observed to chew his tongue or move it about his lips Paget has suggested that movements of the tongue accompanying manual gestures could modify breathing sounds or such a primitive vocalizations to supply vocal responses But even of vocal the diversity process makes little progress in accounting for responses which specify kinds of reinforcement In explaining verbal behavior in the form of the tact, we must look likely to * Paget, R A,, Hwman Speech (New York, 1930) APPENDIX 468 for different sources of nonverbal materials, for the behavior of the "speaker" must be related to stimulating circumstances rather than to aversive stimulation or deprivation The behavior of a hunting dog may be said to "signal" the presence of game to the human hunter, as the barking of a watch dog "signals" the approach of an intruder In so far as these are relatively invariable and unconditioned, the hunter and the householder respond to them as to any stimulus associated with a given event say, the noise pro- duced by the game or the intruder as a "speaker" that new phenomena when the dog is trained arise As soon as the hunting dog It is only reinforced for pointing, or the watch-dog for barking, the topography of the behavior may come to depend upon the contingencies of is reinforcement rather than upon unconditioned reflex systems In these examples the behavior is never greatly changed, but in others the form is eventually determined by the community that is, it becomes conventional It has often been pointed out that the frequency of initial m's in words for mother may have some relation to the frequency of that sound as an unconditioned response in situations in which mothers frequently figure, where the rest of each word is presumably shaped by the particular community The shortage of unconditioned vocal responses appropriate to specific situations is an obvious limitation in explaining an extensive repertoire in this way Another common explanation appeals to onomatopoeia The old "bow-wow" theory of the origin of language emphasized formal similarities between stimulus and response which survive in onomatopoetic or "model-building" repertoires We can "warn someone of the approach of a dog" by imitating its bark, as the tourist draws a picture of the article he wants to buy but cannot name, or as the Indian guide announces good fishing by moving his hand sinuously The vocal, pictorial, or gestured response is effective because it is physically similar to "the situation described." But the "use of such signs" by either "speaker" or "listener" is not thereby accounted for If we assume, however, to-be, we have only someone that certain listeners-to-be and they hear a dog bark that this to wait is run away when reinforcing to certain speakers- a few thousand years if necessary for emit a vocal response similar enough to the bark of a dog to be reinforced by its effect on a listener The result is at best an imto be distinguished from a mand All onomatopoetic responses suffer from the fact that their distinguishing formal pure tact, scarcely to properties affect the listener in a way which is closely tied to a par- THE VERBAL COMMUNITY 469 But listeners may react to dogs in many ways and many reasons, and some sort of generalized reinforcement could ticular situation for conceivably follow The origins of most forms of response will probably always remain obscure, but if we can explain the beginnings of even the most rudimentary verbal environment, the well-established processes of linguistic change will explain the multiplication of verbal forms and the creation of new controlling relationships Fortunately changes in reincan be traced forcing contingencies historically and observed in cur- rent communities On the side of form of response, we not need to suppose that changes follow any particular pattern (such as that of Grimm's Law); indeed, to explain the creation of large numbers of forms, the more accidental changes there are the better On the side ' 'meaning" modern historical linguistics has identified many sources of variation Some are concerned with accidents or faults in transmission Others arise from the structure of the verbal commu- of New controlling relations arise when a literal response is taken metaphorically or when a metaphorical response through subsequent nity restricted reinforcement ter process, if first abstract As an example of the lat- that the standard response orange has been the stimulus control of oranges, then we can imagine brought under a becomes we assume occasion upon which some other object of the same color evokes it is effective upon the listener, as it may be without the response If special conditioning, it may be reinforced with If this is sufficiently useful to the community, respect to color alone the relatively abstract color-term orange emerges More subtle abstractions seem to emerge in the same way The fall of a coin or die leads at last to the concept of chance when the defining properties are free of instances in which something falls The method John Horne Tooke is relevant again here A Sequel to the Diversions of Purley by John Barclay (London, 1826) examines the origins of terms concerning spirit and mind in an early anticipation of twentieth-century behaviorism, tracing them back etymologically to more of robust concepts in human behavior It has often been pointed out, particularly in explaining the origin of myths, that this process works in reverse sponse may be taken literally The that a metaphorical remetaphorical report that a man became beastly when drunk gives rise to the story of a man transformed into an animal upon drinking a magic jpotion In the elaboration of such stories, new variables gain control of old responses APPENDIX 47 The study of the verbal behavior of speaker and listener, as well as of the practices of the verbal environment which generates such behavior, may not contribute directly to historical or descriptive linguistics, but it is enough for our present purposes to be able to say that a verbal environment could have arisen from nonverbal sources and, transmission from generation to generation, would have been subject to influences which might account for the multiplication of forms and controlling relations and the increasing effectiveness of in its verbal behavior as a whole INDEX Abbott, Lyman, 271 Abbreviations, 257 Abstraction, 107, 127, 469 Abulia, 206, 408 Austen, J., 98 Authority, 43 Autistic verbal behavior, 439 Autoclitic, Ch 12, 31 iff Acrostics, 247 Advice, 40 Aesop, 153 Age, verbal behavior as a function Agglutinated languages, 117 Agnosia, 218 Agrammatism, 219 Alcohol, 213, 295, 390 Alexia, 218 Ali Baba, 359 Automatic writing (or speaking), 388f Aversive control, 33 (See Punishment) Avoidance, 33, 54 of, 213 Barclay, John, 469 Barrie, J M., 213, 392 Beauty-parlor effect, 384 Behaviorism, 456f Behold, 58, 152 Belief, listener's, 88, 159^, 365 Bennett, A., 259 Allegory, 99, 105, 233 Alliteration, 56, 246f., 282f Allport, Gordon W., 275 Allusion, 72, 281 Bias, 147 Bilingual behavior, 78 Blending, 295f Boasting, 58 Bodkin, Maude, 398 Borrowing, literary, 242, 387 "Bow-wow" theory, 468 Brachylogy, 298 Braille, 65 Bridges, Robert, 334 Bridging, 416 Brill, A., 303^, 394 Amanuensis, 71 Ambiguity, 240, 275 Anadiplosis, 353 Anagram, 290 Analogy, 92 Analytic languages, 117 Analytic statements, 129 Anarthria, 218 Anastrophe, 340, 353 Anderson, S B., 424 Anglo-Saxon poetry, 247 Animal cries, 462 f Broken English, 345ff Browning, Elizabeth Barrett, 273 Animism, 138 Announcement, 82, 152 Anthypophora, 280 Buffon, 182 Bull, 286 Anticlimax, 280 Antonomasia, 100 Burney, F., 79 Burns, Robert, 245 Butler, Samuel, 60, 309, 388, 401 Bunyan, Aphasia, 190, 194, 218, 366, 390, 421, (See P., 233 Hysterical asphasia) Apocope, 211 Aposiopesis, 281 Caesar, Julius, 452 Call, Applause, 467 Approval, 54 Archetypal patterns, 398 Argot, 245f Carew, T., 99 Carnap, R., no, 319 Carroll, J B., 76, 266 Carroll, Lewis, 161, 579, 294, 307, Catachresis, 102 Aristotle, 92 Assertion, 326!*., 334 Assonance, 246?., sSaf Categories (game), 291 Astrology, 407 Audience, Chu 40 Calumny, 159 7, Causal dependence, 75 172^., 230, 394 47* INDEX 472 Day, Thomas, 307 Deaf-mute, 68 Deafness and defective feed-back, 384 Dean, Leonard, 377 Ceremonial trappings, 14 Cessation of verbal behavior, 220 Chaining, 72 Chants, 407 Character writing, 397 Charade, 289 Chauser, 338 Chesterfield, Lord, 156, 344 Chiasmus, 353 Declaration, 82 Definition, 359f.; (ostensive), 360 Definition of verbal behavior, 2, 14, 360 Defoe, Daniel, sggf De Laguna, Grace, 463 association, 56, 75 Classification of verbal responses, 186 Delirium, 390 Denoting, 82, 14 Class-instance distinction, 16, 20 Dependent variable, verbal behavior Clang Coleridge, S Command, 38 Deprivation, 3if Quincy, T., 213 Describing, 53, 82 Designation, 114 Deterioration of form of response, 30 Diary writing, 180 De Common noun, 113 Communication, 7, 10, 44, 82, 152, 364 Community (See Verbal community) Composition, Ch 14, 3448: Concept formation, 113, 127 Concise Oxford Dictionary, 345 Conditioned aversive stimulus, 54 Conditioned reflexes (and reference), (and abstraction), 108; (in i54f., 214; (in listener), 154^, Conditioned reinforcers, Conditioned seeing, 158 Dichtung, 418 86f.; emotion) 357 53f Dickens, Charles, 23, 105, 161, 236, 347, 36f 390 393 Dickinson, Emily, 439 Dictation, 70 Differential reinforcement of rate of re- sponding, 203 Conditioning, process of, 29 Conditions affecting stimulus Difficulty of response, 2O9f., 2i8f., 230, control, self-editing, Ch (of tact relation) i49f.; (of response) 293!! Diven, K., 155 16, Confession, 150, 168 Confident, 395 Conrad, Joseph, 156, 165, 222, 270, 279 Conscience, 167, 394, 444 Constant, Benjamin, 379 Contempt, 370 Contiguous usage, 75 Dostoyevsky, 98, 402 Double-Crostic, 290 Dramatic irony, 232 Drawing, 70 Dreams, 393, Drugs, 213, 295 Dynamic Conundrum, 289 42; Copernican system, 458 Copy book, 70 Correctness of verbal behavior, 147 Correspondence theory of meaning, 235 Discrimination, process of, 31 Distortion, Conditions of as, 13 T., 213, 242, 307, 393, 396 (of properties, 22ff., 199; (of mand) behavior under verbal control), tact), 90; (of extended tact), 106; 78; (of (of abstract tact), 113 9, 91, ii4ff Covert verbal behavior, (as source of pri- vate stimuli) 14 if.; (in thinking), 434 Cries (in multiple causation) 245; (animal), 462 Cross-word puzzles, 289, 426 Echo-augury, 271 Echoic behavior, 55f Echoic probes, 259 Echoic prompts, 255 Crying, 45 Echolallia, 56 Ecstatic composition, 382 Crying "Wolf," 99 cummings, e e., 355 Egocentricity, 27, 164 Cursing, 49 verbal behavior (See Aphasia) Damning, 49, 216 Damaged Darwinism, 458 Dashiell, J F., 439 Editing, Ch 15, 369^ Eisegesis, 27of Eliot, George, 392 Eliot, T S., 155, 162, 239, 241, 284, 307, 344 Emerson, R W., 344, 453 Emission of response, 22 Emotion, 31, 48, 50; (vocabulary of), 138; (listener's, as reinforcer), 154; (controll- INDEX 473 ing variable), 214; (verbal conditioning in listener), 357^ Empson, William, 240, 275, 307 Energy of response, 23, 204 Entreaty, 39 Environment, verbal, Appendix, 461 Epanalepsis, 276 Epictetus, 44 Fragmentary responses, Epigram, 281 Functional analysis Ch i, iff of, Epileptic cry, 215 Epilogues, 453ff Epistrophe, 276 Equivalence 92 Erasmus, 377 Escape, as verbal behavior, 33, 54 W K., 264 Ethology, 462 Euphemism, 235 Euplastic composition, 382 Evaluation, 42 8f Evelina, 79 Exclamation, 217 Estes, Explanatory fictions, Freud, 294* S., 372, 374f- 377> 379> 386ff., 394 397, 443^, 458 of Games, verbal, 288ff (effect of specal measures Finney, C I., 391 Foley, J P., 75 Folk-etymology, 61, 244 Forgetting, 206, 235; (as effect of punishment), 168, 179 Forgiveness, 168 Form of response dependent on contin- gency, 209 Formal contributions of strength, 243; (in literature), 245ff Formal probes, 259 Formal prompts, 255 Formalism, 20, 27, 449^ Forster, E M 165** Fortune-telling, 406! Fowler, H W., 72, 235, 252, 271, 395 "Fractured French," 410 of), 53!*., 83; 148 Generic extension, 91 Gestures, 47, 71, 465*? W S., 287 Glissando, 68 Gilbert, Goodenough, Grammar, Grose, Flattery, 41, 159 Flight of ideas, 73 behavior, Gardiner, A H., 337 Garrick, 79 Generalization, 92, 128 Generalized condition reinforcers, Graphology, 17 Graves, Robert, 240, 392 Greenspoon, J., 149 Grimm's Law, 469 Filibuster, 200 verbal Galsworthy, John, 392 Extended mand, 46 Extended tact, 91 Fiction, 149^ (See Literature) Fictional causes, of 97, 157, 201, 235, 259, 273, 287, 3i> Goethe, 392 Fable, 99, 233, 277 Familiar, as a verbal response to private stimuli, 136 Feed-back, defective, 384 Ferster, C B., 204, 380 measure as strength, 27^ Explication, Expression, 10, 42, 90; (of emotion) (in origin of language), 464 Extinction, 30, 206 293ff Frederick the Great, 462 Free-association, 73 Frequency of response F L., 7, 186, #5 Ch 13, Dictionary F., 33iff of the Vulgar Tongue, 231 Group, value of verbal behavior for 432f Guessing, 105 Hadamard, J., 389 Handwriting, 70 Haplography, 73 Haplology, 73, 211, 298 Harvard, 377, 453, 456 Head, Henry, 24 Hearing voices, 264 Hebrew, 462 Hemingway, Ernest, 356 Heterological paradox, 320 Hieroglyph, 18, 65, 126, 191 Hint, 258 (See Prompt) Hobbes, Thomas, 335 Holland, J G., 416 Homer, 201 Homological, 320 Homonymy, 118 Hopkins, Gerard, 414 Horse, behavior of, 225 Housman, A E., 155, 213, 391 Hudson, W H., 377 the, INDEX 474 Hugo, Kant, Victor, 112, 240 vetbal, 285!:.; Humor, (license), 395; (See Games) Hungry, as verbal response, 135 Huxley, Aldous, 213 Hw, 122 (footnote) Knowledge, 363 Korsakoff's syndrome, 405 Hypallage, 353 Hyperbaton, 340, 354 Hyperbole, 150 Hypnosis, 160, 366, 388, 410 Hypostasis, 18 Hysterical aphasia, 168 Hysterologia, 333 Hysteron proteron, 333 Iambic pentameter, 76 Iconography, 194 Ideal language, 1236: Ideas, 5, 78, 128, Ch 19, 4531" Identification, 164, 275 Lacour-Gayet, G., 383 Language, 2; ("little"), 173; (as verbal en* vironment), 461 Lapses, 294^ Laughter, 285; (as expression), 214!; (as autoclitic), 318, 378 Lecky, W E H., 148, 370 Lee,I.J., 138,335 Let, 49 Lewis, Sinclair, 339 "License," literary, 396 Lie, 149 Limericks, 73 Ideograph, 191 Images, 6, 158 Imitation, 59, 64 Linguistics, 4, 46 f Listen, 50 Listener, 33, 36ff., 86, 159, 268ff Imitative responses, 126 Imperative mood, 44 Literary borrowing, 73, 24 if., 307, 387 Literature, 49f., 73; (metaphor in), Implication, 281 Incantation, 407 Incubation, 413 Independent variables, 28 Induction, 107 (See Generalization) Inflection, 120 Information, 7, 89 Innate vocal behavior, 44, 462 Innuendo, 281, 287 Insinuation, 281 Instance-class distinction, 16, 20 Instruction, 462 Interjection, 44, 163, 217 Interpretation, 26, 79, 90 Interrogative, 44 Intonation, 186 Intraverbal behavior, iff*; (and reference), 128 Introduction (social), 360 Introspection, 385 Irony, 232, 281 Irrational behavior, 46f James (William James ,451 Kaplan, W K., 149 Keats, John, sosf , 369, sgof Keller, F S., 43 King James Bible, 222, 239, 349 Kingsley, Mrs Elizabeth, 289 Lectures), 453 Jespersen, O., 13,44 Jester, 395 Johnson, Samuel, 240, 443 Jourdain, P., 112 Joyce, James, 98, 284^, 307, 308, 358 Judaeo-Christian conscience, 167, 394, 444 Jung, C G., 74f., 265 (and science), 99, 127, 429; (special fects in), 159; (multiple causation 239; (literary environment), 396 Litotes, 325 Locke, J., 446, 448 Logic, 4, 366 Logical verbal behavior, Ch 18, 4i8ff 98; ef- in), Logograph, 191 Logopoeia, 285 Logorrhea, 401 Look, 49^ Lord's Prayer, 41 J L., 242 Lowes, Macaulay, T B., 160 Machen, Arthur, 223 Macmillan, Z L., 75 Magical mand, 48 Malaprop, 102, 300 Malinowski, B., 432 Mand, Ch 3, 35!? Mandler, G., 149 Marouzeau, J., 408 Marvell, Andrew, 307 de Maupassant, 281 Maurer, D W., 245 May, 49 Meaning, 7*f., 13, 430?., 79, 144 Mechanical production of verbal behavior, INDEX 475 Nomination Mediating instructions, 58 Medium extension of (as tact), 103, 236, of verbal behavior, 14, 69, 191 Meiosis, 281 Nonsense, 208, 238 Melopoeia, 285 Notes, 69 Melville, Herman, 98 Memoranda, 69, 406 Memory, verbal, 2071".; (speaking "from Numerology, 407 memory"), 142; (expert), 104, 208 Metalanguage, 319 Metaphor, 72, 92; (and abstraction), Metathesis, 304 Metonymical extension, 99 Metonymy, 99 Object language, 319 Objective verbal behavior, 83, 147 Objects as controlling stimuli, Observing behavior, 416 243 io8f Offer, 40 Ogden, C K., 4, 271 O Henry, 232 Michotte, A., 137 Military commands, 30, 38 Milton, 158, 392 Mimicry, 63, (as scientific Omen, 407 technique) 17, ant), 185 125f Operant conditioning, Mishearing, 271, 301 Misreading, 301 Mnemonic 2O3f Opiates, 213 Optative, 44, 49 Oracles, 406 Origin of language (verbal environment), devices, io4f., 406 Mockery, 233 Model building, 124 Moliere, 450 Mood, Onomatopoeia, 125^, 297, 468 Operant behavior, 20; (the verbal opei- 46 iff 186, 333ff Orthography, 117 Moore, George, 222, 271 Moore, O K., 424 Ouija board, 384 Ostensive definition, 360 281 Morality plays, 105 J P., 202 Morpheme, 120 Morrow, Mrs Dwight, 202 Motivation, 31, 212 Oxymoron, Mozart, 448 Multiple causation, 2276% Murray, H A., 266 Palilallia, 64, Morgan, Paget, R A., 467 Pain, expression of, 214 390 Palindrome, 247, 292 Parable, 277 Paradigms of speaker 57> 84 85 Muse, 391 and Music, 66, 68, 73 de Mussel, A., 392 Paradox, heterological, 320 Mutism, 380 Myth, 99 Paraleipsis, 281 listener, 38, 39, Paragrammatism, 219 Parody, 243, 307 Parrot, 59 Parry, Milman, 201 Pater, Walter, 282 Name-calling, 216 Namesake, 103 Naming, 53, 82 (See Nomination) Napoleon III, 288 Nash, Ogden, 287, 306, 395 Need, 32 Negative audience, 178, 234 Negation, 322^ Neologisms, 304 New combinations of fragmentary sponses, 293*f Newman,} R., 112 Newton, I., 45 Nicknames, 104 No, Pathetic fallacy, 137 Pearson, A C., 241 Pepys, Samuel, 376 Perelman, S J., 306, 395 Periodic sentence, 282, 333 Permission, 40 Permutation and combination of verbal re- responses, 407 Perseveration, 68 Personal epilogues, 453^ Personality (self), 390 Phanopoeia, 285 Phoneme, 150*., 63, 123 Phonetic alphabet, 15 INDEX 476 Reader, 169 (See Listener) Reading, learning to, 66f Plagiarism, 387 Plato, 446 Platonic dialogue, 398 Pliny the elder, 370 Recall, 143 Recantation, 370 Reductio ad absurdum, 281 Reduplication, 25, 56, 64, 126 Reference, 9, 44, 82f., 114*?.; (of abstractions), logf.; (in ideal language), 123; of verbal operants), (in different types Plutarch, 370 Poe, E A., 408 Poincare', H., 413 Pointing, 14 Polyptoton, 276 128 Pope, Alexander, 283 Pound, Ezra, 285, 307 Power, Eileen, 211 Reinforcement of verbal behavior, agf.; (educational) 84f., 210 Rejection of verbal behavior, 369! Release (in therapy), 168; (in humor), 289; Praise, 41 Prayer, 39 Predication, (in literature), 399 Repertoire, verbal, Repetition, 24, 65, 276; (in bringing verbal behavior to an end), 221 Representational art, 126 3341" Prejudice, 147 Prescott, F C., 240, 392 Prescriptions, medical, 2311! Prestige, 43, 365 Prince, Morton, 393 Private events in a natural science, 130 Private stimuli, verbal behavior under the Request, 38 control of, isoff Probability of response, 22, 28 Probes, 255 Retraction, 370 Revocation of verbal behavior, 369 Rhetoric, 4, 99 Rhetorical devices (See each device), 161, Problem solving, 442 Production of verbal behavior, Part V, tests, 263 Prolepsis, 280 Prompt, 255 Proper names, 103; (forgetting of), 104, 208 Riddle, 288 Ridley, Proper nouns, Psychology, Psychosomatic symptoms, 401 Psychotherapy, 179, 224, 395, 399 Pun, 240 Punctuation, as autoclitic, 321, 355f Punishment, 33, i66f.; (negative audience), (literature as escape), R., 369 Ritournelle, 65 Psychoanalysis, 202, 273, 398 (See Freud) 234ff.; M Right responses, 157 Rimsky-Korsakov, 287 13 Prophets, 407 Proposition, 8, 78, 82, 174, 451 Proust, Marcel, 98, 157, 356, 387 178, 276 Rhyme, 56, 247f., 282f Rhyming argot, 245! Rhythm, 247!, 28af Richards, I A., 4, in, 240, 271 Riding, Laura, and Graves, Robert, 240 Projection, 137 Projective Respondent conditioning, 357 Restoration drama, 105 274; (pigeon demonstration), 372 Purpose, 144 Puzzles, verbal, 288; (as punishment), 167 Remains, Rorshach Jules, 414 test, 266 Rosenzweig, $., and Shakow, D., 264 Rosett, J., 390 Rousseau, J J., 223 Russell, B., 13, 18, 87, 314, 320, 322, 327, Russell, George (AE), 391 Rylands, George, 245 Ryle, Gilbert, 141 Sapir, E., 342 Question, 39 Quine, W Quotation V., 18, 324, 342 (direct), 170%, 125; (indirect), 19 Random numbers, Sarcasm, 154, 281 233 Schedules of Reinforcement, 204, 380 Schesis, 280 Science and literature, 99, 127, 429 Scientific verbal behavior, Ch 18, 432!? Satire, 238 Rationalization, 443; (as effect of punishment), 168 Secret language, 23 if "Sedulous ape," 73, 307 INDEX 477 See, 50 Self -echoic, 64 Self-editing, Ch 15, 36gff Self -probes, 406 Self-prompts, 406 Self-reinforcement, 438f Self -strengthening of verbal behavior, 403 Sells, S B., 421 Semantics, 4, 91, Sentence, 344ff ii4ff., Subornation, 153 Subvocal reading, 66, 141 Suetonius, 141 Summation, 260 Summator, verbal, 260 Superstition, 47, 209 Supplementary stimulation, Ch 10, asgff Surprise ending, 281 Surrealistic art, 97 174 Swift, J., 86, 173, 233 Shakespeare, 105, 156, sasf., 232, 238, 239, 2406?., 248f., 284, 295, 339, 350, 370, 387, 447 450 Swinburne, 248f Symbol, 81, 396; (as substitute for Shakow, D., 264 Shelley, Percy Bysshe, 446 Shepard, Odell, 351 Sheridan, R B., 102, 300 Synecdoche, ggf Sign, 81, (See Syntax, 120, 186, 33 iff Synthetic languages, 117 Synthetic statements, 129 Synonomy, 118 Symbol) Sign (omen), 407 Silence, as punishment, 167; a thing), 87!; (Freudian), 97 Symploce, 276 Syncope, 211 (as aversive condition), 200 Simile, 96 Sinclair, Upton, 271 Singing, 68 Size of unit of verbal behavior, 21 Slip, 294f Smith, L P., 334 Snub, 167 Socrates, 232 Softened mand, 41 Solecisms, 102 Soliloquy, 180, 439 Somnambulism, 392 Sour grapes, 99 Souriau, 414 Speech sounds, i4f., if., 67f Speed of responding, 24, 205; (importance for listener), 273, 367 Spooner, W A., 304 Spurgeon, C., 95 cle Stael, Madame, 398^ Stage fright, 230, 380 Stalling, 57, 201 Stammering, 168, 380 Statement composition, 422 Stating, 82 Stein, Gertrude, 238, 307, 349!, 389, 410 Stendhal, 98, 136, 177, 202, 367, 396 Stenographer, 71 Stevenson, R L., 73, 308, 382, 393 Stimulus, controlling, 31, 89; (conditions affecting control by), 147*!.; (control sharpened), 419 Stream-of -consciousness, 397, 439 Stuttering, 168, 380 Style, effect of, 281 Subjective verbal behavior, 147 Subjunctive, 44 Tacitus, 382 Tact, Ch 5, iff., (impure), Talleyrand, 382 Tarski, 319 Taylor, Archer, 288 Teakettle (game), 291 -Tea-leaves as textual probes, 407 Textual, 653.; (textual probes), 264; (textual prompts), 257 Thackeray, W M., 365 Apperception Test, 266 Thematic Thematic Thematic Thematic Themes contribution of strength, 234ff probes, 265 prompts, 258 of literature, 398 Theriotypes, 98, 112 Think, i42f.; (as autoclitic), 315, 435!, 448 Thinking, Ch 19, 432 ff Thirst, 32 Thoreau, Henry David, 351 Thorndike, E L., 77, 436 Thought, as behavior, 449! (See Thinking) Threat, 54 Tinbergen, N., 462 Titivillus, 211 Titles, book, 243 Tmesis, 340 Tolstoy, L., 56, 98, 159, 236, 246, 260 Tongue twister, 302 Tooke, J H., 98, 217, 340, 446, 469 Topography of verbal behavior, 10 Traditional formulations, Transcription, 69 Transfer of response, 92 Translation, 77; (interlinear), 36 Travesty, 159, 243 INDEX 478 Trollope, Anthony, 105, 182, 297, 375, 378, 386, 409 Tropes, 340, 354 Troubadour, True Wahrheit, 418 Warning, 40 Watson, J B., 86 Webster, John, 240 Wells, F L., 98, 299 Whimsy, 82, 109 Whining, 297 Whispering, 370, 376 Whitehead, A N,, 456f Wilbur, Gregory, 138 Wilde, Jonathan, 305 Wilde, Oscar, 281,408 149, 201 verbal behavior, 147, 453!? "Truth serum," 213, 390 "Twenty Questions," 291 Understanding, 277ff Understatement, 287 Unit of behavior, igff Universals, 127 Wilstach's Dictionary of Similes, 95 "Use of words," Wish, 49 Wishful verbal behavior, 147 if Wishing as magical mand, 49 Validity of verbal behavior, 148, 4531", Verbal behavior under control of verbal Wit, 286f (See also stimuli, 52ff Verbal community, Appendix, 46 iff Verbal humor, 285^ Verbal operant as a unit of analysis, Ch i8 ff Verbal report, 139 Verbal stimuli, 52** Verbal summator, 26of Verbigeration, 65 Visual verbal summator, 264 Vocabulary, 22,361 Vocal behavior, 13, Humor) Wittgenstein, Ludwig, 409 Woodhouse, 391 Woodworth, R S., 251 Word, igL; (same word in 8, of operant), 187 Word Word association, 55, 73f ladder, 292 Wordsworth, W., 242, 248 Would, 49 Wrong responses, 157 Yes, 26f 14^ Vocative, 40 Von Frisch, K., 402 Zenoglottophobia, 167 different types THE CENTURY PSYCHOLOGY Richard ML Elliott, Kenneth MacCorquodale, Social Psychology, Learning More SERIES Editor Assistant Editor by Charles Bird by Effective Study, by Charles and Dorothy Bird Edward Psychological Counseling, by S Bordin A History of Experimental Psychology, ad ed., by Edwin G Boring Sensation and Perception in the History of Experimental Psychology, by Edwin G Boring Readings in Modern Methods of Counseling, edited by Arthur H Brayfield A Casebook of Counseling, by Robert Callis, Paul C Polmantier, and Edward C Roeber Beauty and Human Nature, by Albert R Chandler Readings in the History of Psychology, edited by Wayne Dennis Modern Learning Theory, by William K Estes, Sigmund Koch, Kenneth Paul G Mueller, Jr., William N E Conrad Meehl, MacCorquodale, and William S Schoenfeld, Verplanck Schedules of Reinforcement, by C B Ferster and B F Skinner Social Relations and Morale in Small Groups, by Eric F George G Thompson Great Experiments in Psychology, gd ed., Gardner and by Henry E Garrett Developmental Psychology, sd ed., by Florence L Goodenough Exceptional Children, by Florence L Goodenough Physiological Psychology, by Starke R Hathaway Seven Psychologies, by Edna Heidbreder Theories of Learning, sd ed., by Ernest R Hilgard Conditioning and Learning, by Ernest R Hilgard and Donald G Marquis Hypnosis and Suggestibility, by Clark L Hull Principles of Behavior, by Clark L Hull Development in Adolescence, by Harold E Jones The Definition of Psychology, by Fred S Keller Principles of Psychology, by Fred S Keller and William N Schoenfeld G Kuhlen Psychological Studies of Human Development, by Raymond and George G Thompson The Cultural Background of Personality, by Ralph Linton Vocational Counseling with the Physically Handicapped, by Lloyd H Lofquist Studies in Motivation, edited by David C McClelland The Achievement Motive, by David Russell A Clark, C McClelland, John W Atkinson, and Edgar L Lowell Principles of Applied Psychology, by A T Poffenberger The Behavior An Experimental Analysis, by B Verbal Behavior, by B F Skinner Diagnosing Personality and Conduct, by Percival M Symonds of Organisms: F Skinner Dynamic Psychology, by Percival M Symonds The Dynamics of Human Adjustment, by Percival M Symonds The Ego and the Self, by Percival M Symonds The Psychology of Parent-Child Relationships, by Percival M Symonds Selected Writings from a Connections fs Psychology, by Edward L Thorndike Introduction to Methods in Experimental Psychology, A Tinker s>d ed., The Psychology of Human Differences, 3d ed., by Leona The Work of the Counselor, by Leona E Tyler E Tyler Experimental Psychology: by Miles An Introduction, by Benton J Underwood Psychological Research, by Benton by Benton J Underwood P Duncan, Janet A J Cotton and W Also Taylor, John accompanying Workbook by the same authors Elementary Statistics, Underwood, Carl Persons and Personality, by Sister Annette Walters and Sister Kevin O'Hara ...BY THE SAME AUTHOR The Behavior of Organisms Walden Two Science and Human Behavior Schedules of Reinforcement (with C B Ferster) B F SKINNER Verbal Behavior APPLETON-CENTURY-CROFTS, New... in fact, be distinguished from behavior, in general, and an adequate account of verbal behavior need cover only as much of the behavior of the listener as is needed to explain thfe behavior of... this is only the beginning Once a repertoire of verbal behavior has been set up, a host of new problems arise from the interaction of parts Verbal behavior is usually the effect of multiple causes