hi I'm Michelle Zube be a board certified
behavior analyst at Brett DiNovi and
associates discussion around private
events where they fit into the scope of
our practice and how we address them as
clinicians is still to be determined I'm
going to highlight an article from
nearly 20 years ago that explored the
role of private events within the
paradigm of human behavior this relates
to tasks list items
III East six and g7 in 2000 the behavior
analyst published an article by Anderson
Hawkins Freeman and Scotty titled
private events did they belong in the
science of human behavior I'm going to
focus on this article in particular
however I will also highlight more
current research and opposing viewpoint
the work of Anderson and colleagues
introduces papers from a symposium that
reviewed the roles of private events in
the science of human behavior
the authors examine how the role of
private events are assigned in several
behavioral orientations and discussed
how private events may be conceptualized
within a behavior analytic framework
private events covert behaviors
physiological responses and feelings
these instances of behavior that are not
readily available or observable for data
collection or often appear as being
mentalistic and are the source of much
to be when it comes to the fields of
behavior analysis Anderson and
colleagues point out that few would
argue that these events do not occur
however their role in the science of
behavior has yet to be clearly defined
they posture that there are three main
points of focus number one should
private events be included in the
science of human behavior at least on a
philosophical or theoretical level to do
these private events affect our over
behavior in any significant way and
third should the analysis and attempted
modification of private events be
included in the applied part of our
science the authors respond to these
questions by offering different
perspectives for us as behavior analysts
to explore and by evaluating how the
different schools of behaviorism deal
with private events describing how
behavior analysis has attempted to
address this behavior and by examining
different approaches for conceptualizing
the role a private events in human
behavior the authors define thoughts and
feelings as English language names for
events that are at least partly
unobservable by the usual kinds of
interactions between people
this definition is meant to refer to
behaviors for example such as thinking
that occur within a person they suggest
that the terms should be considered
separate from the actual events or
phenomenon we certainly do not wish to
imply that they are necessarily best
considered as two distinct classes of
events or especially that feelings are
best considered as falling into the
socially defines classes named by the
popular terms for various emotions such
as remorse guilt anger resentment or joy
any classification of private events
should be based on the natural science
evidence available Anderson and
colleagues present questions for us to
consider with regards to private events
does behavior include only events that
are observable by more than one
individual or does it include other
events as well in psychology as a study
of behavior should private events and
other events that occur at the
neurological level constitute as
behavior in the absence of muscular
movement they then present an overview
of the three types of behaviorism
methodological behaviorism cognitive
behavior ISM and radical behaviorism
from the methodological behaviorism
perspective psychology is the study of
behaviors that are observable by others
this was a shift away from the
mentalistic interferences of a
psychology to move towards observable
responses and the role of environmental
influences in determining those
responses by this account private events
are not denied from existence but rather
are eliminated from the study because
they are not observable by people other
than those who emit them
conversely cognitive behavior ISM does
include the study of unobservable events
and processes and holds that cognitive
events exist and that they mediate overt
behavior and learning some cognitive
behavior researchers have found people
respond to cognitive representations of
their environment rather than to the
actual environment cognitive processes
are said to play a role in producing
predicting and understanding behavior
cognitive events and processes include
thinking and feeling in addition to
hypothetical structures memories and
information processing networks the
third wave of behaviorism is radical
behaviorism also known as behavior
analysis which differs in methodology
regarding to the role of environment on
behavior the distinction of the radical
perspective of private events made by
the authors is that radical behaviorism
is based on a monastic view of behavior
no distinction is
between external physical responses and
those responses that occur within the
body instead all responses public or
private are viewed as natural physical
events many of which are observable even
if only by the person emitting them in
other words there need not be an
agreement between two or more people
that the event has occurred and the
private events must only be observable
to the person experiencing them for
example thoughts or headache
Skinner offered that these events are
distinguishable from the hypothesized
structures and processes of the
non-physical world that have been called
mentalism private responses are
inclusive of verbal thoughts private
perceptions such as visual and auditory
images and the private aspects of
emotional responding and not include
hypothetical structures such as a fear
network within the phobic stimuli and
responses are organized for many of us
in practice we focus strictly on the
over observable and measurable aspects
of behavior without taking into account
behaviors that are unseen Skinner along
with other researchers have suggested
private events to be an integral part of
our behavioral science but the research
on what the role should be is scant and
little has been done to bring us closer
to an answer now this is not to say that
nothing has been done some work has been
done in more recent times to examine
this phenomenon for instance calculon's
2002 paper on inner behavior empirical
investigations of private events Baum's
2011 behaviorism private events and the
molar view of behavior which presented
an opposing view to Anderson and
colleagues it can be understood by this
statement the real solution to the
problem of privacy is to see that
private events are unnecessary to
understanding behavior they might or
might not exist they are irrelevant a
complete account of behavior can be had
without them Palmers 2011 consideration
of private events is required in a
comprehensive science of behavior where
he suggests that Baum misunderstood the
role of private events and offered also
added to this body of research our
Leland's 2014 s paper contingency
horizon on private events and the
analysis of behavior stock O Thompson
and Hart 2014 teaching taxing of private
events based on public accompaniments
effects of contingencies audience
control and stimulus complexity teaching
metaphorical extensions of private
events through rival model observation
to children with autism
by Dickson and colleagues 2017 and even
a publication in the Journal of
experimental behavior analysis in 2017
by Rockland titled is talking to
yourself thinking this is by no means an
exhaustive review of the literature
however in comparison to other aspects
of our science the body of research on
private events is meager at best
Anderson and colleagues pointed out in
major flaw in our field that still holds
true today behavior analysts almost
totally ignore all private events not
even differentiating between private
responses and private stimuli they came
to this conclusion upon reviewing
subject indices of texts on the basic
principles of behavior he's included
Catania 1998 Donohue and Palmer 1994
grant and Evans 1994 Milad Whaley
amelotte 1997 and Pierson Epling 1995
these texts were reviewed to search for
concepts on either thinking or remoting
what they found was that only Catania
1998 had any discussion on thinking well
some of the others made mention about
private or covert behavior or cognition
a similar review of text on human
behavior which included chance 1998
Kasdan 1994 Martin impair 1996
miltenberger 1997 and Serafino 1996
yielded similar results
the authors illustrate a clear
discrepancy both in the basic and
applied approach to private events again
this article is from 2000 but I used
several of these textbooks in my
coursework only a few years ago by now
you may see that there is a discrepancy
here to further illustrate anderson and
colleagues has spanned on this point
with the discussion on emotions and
particulars ayat' ii and how it's a
commonly treated disorder within
clinical psychology in review of those
same texts they found that only Catania
1998 contained anything on emotion and
it was limited upon a review of those
same five books on behavior modification
it was found that emotion is covered
from zero to six pages with the most
being found in Martin impair 1996
based on the scarcity of information on
private events the authors asked if
behavior analysts do not consider
emotional behavior important and
questioned further if it is because the
topic is too difficult for behavior
analysis at present or is it because
behavior analysts generally take little
interest in respondent relation
which certainly are involved in
emotional behavior or is there some
other reason Anderson and colleagues
stressed that regardless of the reasons
why we are neglecting a major area of
study in theory while also limiting the
scope of our practice they discerned
that even veteran behavior analysts
struggle using a behavior analytic
perspective to describe the relations
between private events and overt
behaviors Anderson and colleagues
summize that the confusion about private
events has led to an avoidance of them
this avoidance in their opinion has
limited both the theoretical and
conceptual underpinnings of our work and
has given the impression that our field
is unwilling or incapable of dealing
with these behaviors again there have
been and continue to be behavior
analysts who do research the
implications of private events their
role and their influence on overt
behavior but it is merely not enough it
has been recommended that research be
conducted with a focus on delineating
the relations between private responses
and overt responses and on how private
responses and their stimulus properties
might be dealt with and applied work
perhaps this can be more clearly
understood through the example Anderson
provides us about a couple in marital
counseling a couple goes to see a
therapist and based on the clinicians
assessment he suggests that the wife
needs to voice her opinions and
preferences more this recommendation was
based on the premise of their being
numerous situations where the wife's
interests would be better served if she
spoke up and ultimately her husband's
interests as well in turn the clinician
teaches the wife to privately rehearse
what she will say before she says it so
that she can not only practice saying
things in promising ways but can also
sense as private simulate the likely
consequences of alternative things to
say and we used to say them the author's
support that this is a sensible
intervention for a clinical behavior
analyst but behavior analytic literature
does not discuss the roles of private
events which in turn makes it difficult
to describe such an intervention or its
effects to the behavior analytic
community in looking for the roles that
private events may play the author's
offer the following first private
responses sometimes might be viewed as
merely collateral to overt behavior and
of no functional significance second
private responses is stimuli sometimes
may be best viewed as causal events as
discriminative antecedents and third
which they suggest as a middle ground
private events might be viewed
usefully a simile that at times are
functionally related to the occurrence
of overt behavior let's for a moment
entertain the hypothesis that private
responses occur but have no functional
role in the couple example the wife who
privately rehearses what she wants to
say before engaging in overt behavior we
could say that the overt stimuli of the
therapists instruction set the occasion
for both her talking to her husband and
her private rehearsal but that the
rehearsal had no effect on her overt
talk and even though the private
behavior of rehearsing occurred before
the overt vocal verbal behavior it did
not have an impact on her overt behavior
Anderson suggests that this position is
the one that is more compatible with the
behavior methodology and one would have
to further evaluate the private events
as they appear to only be dependent
variables and this provides no
explanation for why we think she goes on
to say it seems unlikely that humans
would acquire private behavior at all if
it were not functional another
hypothesis from the psychology paradigm
is that private events are a primary
cause of overt behavior but the authors
state that this notion has implications
as well behavior analytically speaking
this perspective does not identify
environmental variables of which the
overt behavior is a function furthermore
they offer that this is problematic as
well because it does not specify the
external measurable and potentially
manipulable environmental variables that
affects both the woman's over and covert
behavior the third alternative is to
consider private responses as dependent
variables for example when we hear
ourselves talk or see images through
visualization they suggest that these
private responses may affect overt
behavior they maintain the stance that
if private behavior were not
functionally important then humans would
not acquire it and continue to emit it
so they continue to search for the
answer to what role these private
responses play by exploring the
following perspectives one is that
private responses exert discriminative
stimulus control over subsequent
responses and the other is that private
responses might be best accounted for as
contingency specifying stimulate let's
take a look at private events as
discriminative stimuli it seems possible
that a private event may set the
occasion for another response which
could be public or private
however the authors only focus on over
sponses in this paper they suggest that
control develops either through direct
training where a particular overt
response was more likely to be
reinforced in the presence but not in
the absence of that private response or
as a result of the private response
participating in equivalence relation
with an external stimulus that exerted
discriminant role over the overt
response going back to the wife example
it could be argued that these private
responses exerted stimulus control over
her overt behavior this may be an
incomplete explanation for behavior
analysts unless the relation between the
therapists instructions and the woman's
private behavior and some direct
influence on the instructions on her
overt behavior are accounted for the
authors highlight that several behavior
analysts have suggested private events
might acquire discriminative control
over some responses but not others such
as self instructions if one strictly
adheres to the definition of a
discriminative stimulus which is defined
as an antecedent stimulus that sets the
occasion for a response because in the
past reinforcement was likely to occur
in the presence but not the absence of
that stimulus so for the wife if private
rehearsing is the discriminative
stimulus then it must signal the
availability of reinforcement which must
be available when rehearsal occurs but
not when it does not it could be said
that if she vocalizes more behavior will
result in reinforcements but the bigger
point here is that reinforcement is
available for omitting that response
whether she reverses or not this does
not then make sense that a
discriminative stimuli would be
appropriate here but what about private
events as contingency specifying
stimulate contingency specifying
stimulate or rules or simile that effect
the function of other stimuli and do so
by describing at least two components of
a contingency they describe the relation
between antecedent stimuli behavior and
consequences between antecedent stimuli
and behavior between behavior and
consequences or between two or more
stimuli slinger and Blakely 1987
discussed how contingency specifying
stimuli alter the function of other
stimuli in multiple ways one of which is
by altering discriminative relations
which may establish a new relation
between a response and a previously
neutral stimulus resulting in that
stimulus acquiring evocative functions
so the rehearsal
would alter the discriminative effect of
a previously neutral stimulus under this
discriminative control the reversal is
acted like a rule which indicates what
behavior should be evoke by her
husband's action to yield the most
favorable consequence the authors
conclude that there are several in
differing positions on how private
events might be conceptualized within a
behavior analytic framework and they
state that these positions are not
mutually exclusive they are in agreement
with private events at times serving as
discriminative stimuli by directly
evoking other behavior but posture that
a more accurate account of the role of
private events is to be understood
through contingency specifying stimuli
in closing they remind us that this
paper was intended to inspire the
conversation about private events and
that they only offered mere suggestions
on the roles of these events research on
private events continues to emerge and
we can continue to be inspired by the
work of Andersen and colleagues Skinner
1957 wrote there is no reason why
methods of thinking and of the teaching
of thinking cannot be analyzed and made
more effective
