Abstract
The current paper provides an overview of behavior-analytic approaches to self-awareness. Skinner (1974) argued that the phenomenon of self-awareness is produced, in large part, by those social contingencies that reinforce discrimination of the organism’s own behavior. This view of self-awareness is supported by a range of empirical studies that successfully established self-discrimination performances in both nonhuman and human subjects. Recent developments in basic, applied, and conceptual analyses are currently extending Skinner’s behavior-analytic definition of self-awareness. The current paper focuses on a relational frame interpretation of human self-discrimination.
Article PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
Avoid common mistakes on your manuscript.
References
BARNES, D. (1994). Stimulus equivalence and relational frame theory. The Psychological Record, 44, 91–124.
BARNES, D. (1996). Naming as a technical term: Sacrificing behavior analysis at the altar of popularity. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 65, 264–267.
BARNES, D., BROWNE, M., SMEETS, P., & ROCHE, B. (1995). A transfer of functions and a conditional transfer of functions through equivalence relations in three- to six-year-old children. The Psychological Record, 45, 405–430.
BARNES, D., & HOLMES, Y. (1991). Radical behaviorism, stimulus equivalence, and human cognition. The Psychological Record, 41, 19–31.
BARNES, D., & KEENAN, M. (1993a). Concurrent activities and instructed human fixed-interval performance. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 59, 501–520.
BARNES, D., & KEENAN, M. (1993b). A transfer of functions through derived arbitrary and nonarbitrary stimulus relations. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 59, 61–82.
BARNES, D., & ROCHE, B. (1996). Relational frame theory and stimulus equivalence are fundamentally different: A reply to Saunders. The Psychological Record, 46, 489–508.
CATANIA, A. C., MATTHEWS, B. A., & SHIMOFF, E. (1982). Instructed versus shaped human verbal behavior: Interactions with nonverbal responding. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 38, 233–248.
CHIESA, M. (1994). Radical behaviorism: The philosophy and the science. Boston: Authors Cooperative.
CRITCHFIELD, T. S. (1993). Signal detection properties of verbal self-reports. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 60, 495–514.
CRITCHFIELD, T. S. (1994). Bias in self-evaluation: Signal probability effects. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 62, 235–250.
CRITCHFIELD, T. S., & PERONE, M. (1990a). Verbal self-reports as a function of speed, accuracy, and reinforcement of the reported performance. The Psychological Record, 40, 541–554.
CRITCHFIELD, T. S., & PERONE, M. (1990b). Verbal self-reports of delayed matching-to-sample by humans. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 53, 321–344.
CRITCHFIELD, T. S., & PERONE, M. (1993). Verbal self-reports about matching-to-sample: Effects of the number of elements in a compound sample stimulus. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 59, 193–214.
DOUGHER, M. J., AUGUSTON, E., MARKHAM, M. R., GREENWAY, D. E., & WULFERT, E. (1994). The transfer of respondent eliciting and extinction functions through stimulus equivalence classes. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 62, 331–352.
DE FREITAS RIBEIRO, A. (1989). Correspondence in children’s self-report: Tacting and manding aspects. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 51, 361–367.
DE ROSE, J. C., MCILVANE, W. J., DUBE, W. V., GALPIN, V. C., & STODDARD, L. T. (1988). Emergent simple discrimination established by indirect relation to differential consequences. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 50, 1–20.
DYMOND, S., & BARNES, D. (1994). A transfer of self-discrimination response functions through equivalence relations. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 62, 251–267.
DYMOND, S., & BARNES, D. (1995). A transformation of self-discrimination response functions in accordance with the arbitrarily applicable relations of sameness, more-than, and less-than. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 64, 163–184.
DYMOND, S., & BARNES, D. (1996). A transformation of self-discrimination response functions in accordance with the arbitrarily applicable relations of sameness and opposition. The Psychological Record, 46, 271–300.
EPSTEIN, R. (1985a). On the Columban simulations: A reply to Gallup. Contemporary Psychology, 30, 417–418.
EPSTEIN, R. (1985b). Further comments on the Columban simulations. Contemporary Psychology, 30, 418–419.
EPSTEIN, R., LANZA, R. P., & SKINNER, B. F. (1981). “Self-awareness” in the pigeon. Science, 212, 695–696.
GALLUP, G. G. (1977). Absence of self-recognition in a monkey (Macca fascicularis) following prolonged exposure to a mirror. Developmental Psychobiology 10, 281–284.
GALLUP, G. G. (1982). Self-awareness and the emergence of mind in primates. American Journal of Primatology, 2, 237–248.
GALLUP, G. G. (1985). Superficial simulations: A reply to Epstein. Contemporary Psychology, 30,418.
GATCH, M. B., & OSBORNE, J. G. (1989). Transfer of contextual stimulus function via equivalence class development. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 51,369–378.
GUERIN, B. (1992). Behavior analysis and the social construction of knowledge. American Psychologist, 47, 1423–1432.
GUERIN, B. (1994). Attitudes and beliefs as verbal behavior. The Behavior Analyst, 17,155–163.
GREEN, D. M., & SWETS, J. A. (1966). Signal detection theory and psychophysics. New York: Wiley.
HAYES, S. C. (1984). Making sense of spirituality. Behaviorism, 12, 99–110.
HAYES, S. C. (1986). The case of the silent dog - Verbal reports and the analysis of rules: A review of Ericsson and Simon’s Protocol Analysis: Verbal reports as data. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 45, 351–363.
HAYES, S. C. (1991). A relational control theory of stimulus equivalence. In L. J. Hayes & P. N. Chase (Eds.), Dialogues on verbal behavior: The first international institute on verbal relations (pp. 19–40). Reno, NV: Context Press.
HAYES, S. C. (1994). Relational frame theory: A functional approach to verbal events. In S. C. Hayes, L. J. Hayes, M. Sato, & K. Ono (Eds.), Behavior analysis of language and cognition (pp. 9–30). Reno, NV: Context Press.
HAYES, S. C. (1995). Knowing selves. The Behavior Therapist, 18 (No. 3), 94–96.
HAYES, S. C., DEVANY, J. M., KOHLENBERG, B. S., BROWNSTEIN, A. J., & SHELBY, J. (1987). Stimulus equivalence and the symbolic control of behavior. Revista Mexicana de Analisis de la Conducta, 13, 361–374.
HAYES, S. C., & HAYES, L. J. (1989). The verbal action of the listener as a basis for rule-governance. In S. C. Hayes (Ed.), Rule-governed behavior: Cognition, contingencies, and instructional control (pp. 153–190). New York: Plenum.
HAYES, S. C., & HAYES, L. J. (1992). Verbal relations and the evolution of behavior analysis. American Psychologist, 47, 1383–1395.
HAYES, S. C., KOHLENBERG, B. S., & HAYES, L. J. (1991). The transfer of specific and general consequential functions through simple and conditional equivalence relations. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 56, 119–137.
HAYES, S. C., STROSAHL, K., & WILSON, K. G. (in press). Acceptance and commitment therapy. New York: Guilford.
HAYES, S. C., & WILSON, K. G. (1993). Some applied implications of a contemporary behavior-analytic view of verbal events. The Behavior Analyst, 16,283–301.
HAYES, S. C., & WILSON, K. G. (1994). Acceptance and commitment therapy: Altering the verbal support for experiential avoidance. The Behavior Analyst, 17, 289–303.
HAYES, S. C., & WILSON, K. (1996). Criticisms of relational frame theory: Implications for a behavior-analytic account of derived stimulus relations. The Psychological Record, 46, 221–236.
HINELINE, P. N. (1983). When we speak of knowing. The Behavior Analyst, 6, 183–186.
HINELINE, P. N. (1992). A self-interpretative behavior analysis. American Psychologist, 47, 1274–1286.
HINELINE, P. N., & WANCHISEN, B. A. (1989). Correlated hypothesizing and the distinction between contingency-shaped and rule-governed behavior. In S. C. Hayes (Ed.), Rule-governed behavior: Cognition, contingencies, and instructional control (pp. 221–268). New York: Plenum.
ISRAEL, A. C., & O’LEARY, K. D. (1973). Developing correspondence between children’s words and deeds. Child Development, 44, 575–581.
KOHLENBERG, B. S., HAYES, S. C., & HAYES, L. J. (1991). The transfer of contextual control over equivalence classes through equivalence classes: A possible model of social stereotyping. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 56, 505–518.
LANE, S. D., & CRITCHFIELD, T. S. (1996). Verbal self-reports of emergent relations in a stimulus equivalence procedure. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 65, 355–374.
LATTAL, K. A. (1975). Reinforcement contingencies as discriminative stimuli. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 23, 241–246.
LIPKENS, R., HAYES, S. C., & HAYES, L. J. (1993). Longitudinal study of the development of derived relations in an infant. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 56, 201–239.
LLOYD, K. E. (1994a). Do as I say, not as I do. The Behavior Analyst, 17, 131–139. [reprinted from the New Zealand Psychologist, 9, 1–8.]
LLOYD, K. E. (1994b). Addenda. The Behavior Analyst, 17, 141–144.
MATTHEWS, B. A., CATANIA, A. C., & SHIMOFF, E. (1985). Effects of uninstructed verbal behavior on nonverbal responding: Contingency descriptions. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 43,155–164.
MITCHELL, R. W. (1993). Mental models of mirror-self-recognition: Two theories. New Ideas in Psychology, 11, 295–325.
NATSOULAS, T. (1978). Consciousness. American Psychologist, 33, 906–914.
NELSON, T. O. (1984). A comparison of current measures of the accuracy of feeling-of-knowing predictions. Psychological Bulletin, 95, 109–133.
OVERTON, D. A. (1987). Applications and limitations of the drug discrimination method for the study of drug abuse. In M. A. Bozarth (Ed.), Methods of assessing the reinforcing properties of abused drugs (pp. 291–340). New York: Springer-Verlag.
PANIAGUA, F. A. (1990). A procedural analysis of correspondence training techniques. The Behavior Analyst, 13, 107–119.
PANIAGUA, F. A., & BAER, D. M. (1982). The analysis of correspondence training as a chain reinforceable at any point. Child Development, 53, 786–798.
PERONE, M. (1988). Laboratory lore and research practices in the experimental analysis of behavior: Use and abuse of subjects’ verbal reports. The Behavior Analyst, 11, 71–75.
PLISKOFF, S. S., & GOLDIAMOND, I. (1966). Some discriminative properties of fixed ratio performance in the pigeon. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 9, 1–9.
REYNOLDS, G. S. (1966). Discrimination and emission of temporal intervals by pigeons. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 9, 65–68.
REYNOLDS, G. S., & CATANIA, A. C. (1962). Temporal discrimination in pigeons. Science, 135,314–315.
RISLEY, T. R., & HART, B. (1968). Developing correspondence between the nonverbal and verbal behavior of preschool children. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 1, 267–281.
ROCHE, B., & BARNES, D. (in press). A transformation of respondently conditioned sexual arousal functions in accordance with arbitrarily applicable relations. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior.
SCHENK, J. J. (1995). Complex stimuli in nonreinforced simple discrimination tasks: Emergent simple and conditional discriminations. The Psychological Record, 45, 477–494.
SHIMP, C. P. (1982). On metaknowledge in the pigeon: An organism’s knowledge about its own behavior. Animal Learning and Behavior, 10, 358–364.
SHIMP, C. P. (1983). The local organization of behavior: Dissociations between a pigeon’s behavior and self-reports of that behavior. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 39, 61–68.
SIDMAN, M., & TAILBY, W. (1982). Conditional discrimination vs. matching to sample: An expansion of the testing paradigm. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 37, 5–22.
SKINNER, B. F. (1953). Science and human behavior. New York: Free Press.
SKINNER, B. F. (1957). Verbal behavior. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.
SKINNER, B. F. (1974, reprinted 1993). About behaviorism. London: Penguin.
STEELE, D., & HAYES, S. C. (1991). Stimulus equivalence and arbitrarily applicable relational responding. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 56, 519–555.
STEVENSON, H. W., CHEN, C., & LEE, S. (1993). Mathematics achievement of Chinese, Japanese, and American children: Ten years later. Science, 259, 53–58.
STREET, W. R. (1994). Attitude-behavior congruity, mindfulness, and self-focused attention: A behavior-analytic reconstruction. The Behavior Analyst, 17, 145–153.
THOMPSON, R. K. R., & CONTIE, C. L. (1994). Further reflections on mirror usage by pigeons: Lessons from Winnie-the-Pooh and Pinocchio too. In S. T. Parker, R. W. Mitchell, & M. L. Boccia (Eds.), Self-awareness in animals and humans: Developmental perspectives (pp. 392–409). Cambridge, MA: University Press.
WARD, W. D., & STARE, S. W. (1990). The role of subject verbalization in generalized correspondence. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 23, 129–136.
WILSON, P. G., RUSCH, F. R., & LEE, S. (1992). Strategies to increase exercise-report correspondence by boys with moderate mental retardation: Collateral changes in intention-exercise correspondence. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 25, 681–690.
WULFERT, E., & HAYES, S. C. (1988). Transfer of a conditional ordering response through conditional equivalence classes. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 50, 125–144.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Additional information
We thank Steve Hayes, and an anonymous reviewer for constructive comments on an earlier version of the manuscript. We also thank Pip and Niamh for transforming our verbal relations.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Dymond, S., Barnes, D. Behavior-analytic approaches to self-awareness. Psychol Rec 47, 181–200 (1997). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03395219
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03395219