Psycho-Babble Social | for general support | Framed
This thread | Show all | Post follow-up | Start new thread | List of forums | Search | FAQ

Re: Extinction of behavior----tangent » alexandra_k

Posted by gardenergirl on November 23, 2004, at 21:07:35

In reply to Re: Extinction of behavior, posted by alexandra_k on November 23, 2004, at 19:10:31

> Actually extinction might not work in this case as there could be other, or even internal reinforcers that are beyond our control...

Yes, you can never exactly get at all reinforcers when there are internal ones. One of the reasons I am not a behaviorist. And my dog is living proof of that. She has US trained very well.

> Behaviourism doesn't work so well anymore as people become verbal, because then they can follow 'inner' or 'covert' rules. (I am not sure how behaviourists are allowed to talk about 'inner' rules - but anyway, they do...)
>
> On a lighter note one of the die hard behaviourists from varsity who I argue with all the time told me something really funny today...
>
> He said that it is currently a hot topic in JEABA, or maybe the other one - whether it might be legitimate in some cases to postulate the existance of inner, mental states. William Baum (revered writer of "Understanding Behaviourism") was one of the authors. Apparantly it is at the response to the response to the response to the response stage...
>
> Anyway, he said that he was starting to think it might be okay in some cases.
>
> I said 'well, some think that that debate was fairly conclusively settled in the 60's' and he asked what I meant. I replied 'well, many think that OF COURSE it is okay, and that was when the majority turned to cognitive science and abandoned behaviourism. It is pretty funny that the debate has come up again now! You do realise Bill, that if you change your mind now then there is about 40 years of cognitive science research that you are going to have to catch up on!'
>
> I think I offended him (you should have seen the look on his face!).
>
> I dare say he mightn't write me a reference now, however, it was worth it!
>
> This has been giving me chuckles all day :-)

Oh, that's too funny. Good for you! I love debating theory with faculty. It's stimulating, and it helps me to articulate why I believe what I do when debating it with someone else.

Of course my current supervisor is not interested in debating it. He barely tolerates anything I say about when I conceptualize someone dynamically. In fact, today he jumped on me when I said something about someone's CSA being related to insecure attachment she has with her husband. It's getting old, his jumping on that. I KNOW that I have to treat them in a short-term problem solving model. It's just that I conceptualize the whole person in context, and I don't think that's bad. You can't treat a single problem in a vacuum. I'm sure he could tell I was getting upset with him. Heck, I almost started to cry, cause it was a rotten, very busy day. But good for me, I held it together. AAnd I sucked up and said, "maybe I'm not articulating well how I conceptualize one way, but treat your way." And he said, "Maybe I'm primed to jump on references to childhood." (Ya think?)

Anyway, never a dull moment, eh?

How is the "T-word" coming? I can't take a laptop with me to Florida tomorrow, so I am trying organize my "D-word" materials to make maximum use of my time off. Sad, I know.

Take care,
gg

 

Thread

 

Post a new follow-up

Your message only Include above post


Notify the administrators

They will then review this post with the posting guidelines in mind.

To contact them about something other than this post, please use this form instead.

 

Start a new thread

 
Google
dr-bob.org www
Search options and examples
[amazon] for
in

This thread | Show all | Post follow-up | Start new thread | FAQ
Psycho-Babble Social | Framed

poster:gardenergirl thread:417968
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20041122/msgs/419504.html