Quantified Trends in the History of Verbal Behavior Research

The Analysis of Verbal Behavior 1991,9,61-80

Quantified Trends in the History ofVerbal Behavior Research

John W. EshlemanThe Ohio State University

The history of scientific research about verbal behavior research, especially that based onVerbal Behavior (Skinner, 1957), can be assessed on the basis of a frequency and celeration anal-ysis of the published and presented literature. In order to discover these quantified trends, acomprehensive bibliographical database was developed. Based on several literature searches,the bibliographic database included papers pertaining to verbal behavior that were publishedin the Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis,Behaviorism, The Behavior Analyst, and The Analysis of Verbal Behavior. A nonbehavioral journal,the Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior was assessed as a nonexample comparison.The bibliographic database also included a listing of verbal behavior papers presented at themeetings of the Association for Behavior Analysis. Papers were added to the database if they(a) were about verbal behavior, (b) referenced B.F. Skinner's (1957) book Verbal Behavior, or (c)did both. Because the references indicated the year of publication or presentation, a count peryear of them was measured. These yearly frequencies were plotted on Standard CelerationCharts. Once plotted, various celeration trends in the literature became visible, not the least ofwhich was the greater quantity of verbal behavior research than is generally acknowledged.The data clearly show an acceleration of research across the past decade. The data also ques-tion the notion that a "paucity" of research based on Verbal Behavior currently exists.Explanations of the acceleration of verbal behavior research are suggested, and plausible rea-sons are offered as to why a relative lack of verbal behavior research extended through themid 1960s to the latter 1970s.

Ever since B.F. Skinner published VerbalBehavior in 1957 it has been a continuingsource of controversy. One of the manycontroversies concerns the amount andtype of scientific research the book hasengendered. The book is often chided fornot encouraging lines of empiricalresearch. Typically, various authors havenoted a relative lack, or paucity, of suchresearch work (e.g., McPherson, Bonem,Green, & Osborne, 1984; Spradlin, 1985;Hall & Sundberg, 1987; Oah & Dickinson,1989). Indeed, given the attention focusedon this relative lack, its factuality seemsaxiomatic. It has become part of the behav-ior analytic lore to say "Verbal Behavior hasgenerated relatively little empiricalresearch." This, or a similar statement, is

Portions of this paper were presented at the 1991meeting of the Association for Behavior Analysis inAtlanta, Georgia. The author thanks Mary Peters,Ernest A. Vargas, and John 0. Cooper for their help-ful comments on earlier drafts of this paper.Correspondence can be addressed to John W.Eshleman, 143 Blakeford Dr., Dublin, OH 43017.

repeated again and again. We nod andaccept this conclusion, usually withouthesitation, and without examining theactual historical record.

But is the assertion about a relative lackof research true? If so, what is the nature ofthat truth? That is, is it as true now as itwas a decade ago, two decades ago, orthree decades ago? Is it true in any signifi-cant sense from the time of publication ofSkinner's book? That is, how is "relative"defined? In addressing these questions, thepresent research finds that (a) there wasindeed very little of such research at onetime, but that (b) this is no longer so, (c) arelative lack has not been the case for atleast a decade, (d) the notion of "relative"lack is misleading, (e) there are clear rea-sons why the quantity of such research hasaccelerated over time, and (f) the reasonsusually given to explain the early "relativelack" are wrong and do not explain whythere would have been a dearth of suchresearch. The purposes of the present

61

62 JOHN W. ESHLEMAN

paper are to document a more completeassessment of verbal behavior researchconducted by behaviorists by way ofexamining quantitative trends in the litera-ture, and then examining reasons why thetrends would develop as well as explainthe early paucity of research based onVerbal Behavior.

THE VERBAL BEHAVIORRESEARCH DATABASE

Citation Analysis Caveats

A contemporary examination of verbalbehavior research would follow the recentreviews by Oah and Dickinson (1989) andMcPherson et al. (1984). They reviewedmuch of the work that has been conductedunder the auspices of Skinner's analysis.To their credit, they discovered publica-tions outside the behavior analytic main-stream, where behavioral researchersmight not think of investigating. Theyomitted, however, some of the early workpublished in the first several volumes ofthe Journal of the Experimental Analysis ofBehavior (JEAB). Also, they did not con-sider presentations at the conventions ofthe Association for Behavior Analysis(ABA). These omissions may have beenoversights, but they could also have beenthe result of the method used to conductthe analysis.A citation analysis would be one method

of approaching the problem of how muchwork has been based on Verbal Behavior.Oah and Dickinson (1989) formally basetheir assertion about a lack of Skinnerianverbal behavior research on the citationanalysis conducted by McPherson et al.(1984). A citation analysis displays howoften a work has been cited by others. Theusual way of doing this is to consult a com-puter database, which is what McPhersonet al. (1984) did. Yet, computer databasesought to be approached with a healthyskepticism. They often contain errors, omitdata, lack proper keywords, introduce falsekeywords, lack pertinent cross references,and contain other problems. They are use-ful as a starting point for research, but not

as the basis for research, as I have learnedby experience.To their credit, McPherson et al.

acknowledge some of the shortcomings ofthe databases. As they point out, an articleor book that cites Verbal Behavior does notmean it has anything to do with Skinner'sbook. Further, the works containing thecitations might not be scientific research.Some of the citations would be in workscritical of Skinner's science. At best a grossimpact of Skinner's work could be appre-hended, but a computer search will notreveal the actual trends of research thatensued.As part of the present research, PsycLit

and PsycInfo were consulted. These arecomputer databases versions of Psycho-logical Abstracts, an important source of ref-erences. I discovered several egregiousproblems with these computer databases,however. When I recently consultedPsycLit, I discovered that the database didnot contain a single reference to the journalThe Analysis of Verbal Behavior. A keywordsearch under "verbal behavior" failed tofind a number of articles dealing with ver-bal behavior that I had found already inthe Journal of the Experimental Analysis ofBehavior. A search of PsychInfo onCompuserve in December of 1991 alsofailed in these same ways, with the mostnotable absent data again being the omis-sion of The Analysis of Verbal Behavior jour-nal from the database. Thus, the most sig-nificant journal to behaviorists interestedin Skinner's analysis of verbal behavior isnot to be found in the computer databasesof Psychological Abstracts.

I had discovered in the early 1980s thatthese computer databases omit referencesto valuable behavioral research. The com-puter databases of Psychological Abstracts,for example, do not have references to theJournal of Precision Teaching. Thus, theapproach in the present research was tonot rely on the computer databases, butinstead, build up a database by hand, byactually going through the journals andexamining articles directly.

A Reference Search Methodology

THE HISTORY OF VERBAL BEHAVIOR RESEARCH 63

The problems and inadequacies of avail-able computer databases become apparentto anyone who uses them frequently. Thisseems especially the case if the objective isto obtain a precise, accurate, and thoroughaccounting of the literature. Thus, the strat-egy followed here has been to examineevery issue of the principal behavior ana-lytic journals, article by article. An exhaus-tive search was conducted with the Journalof the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, theJournal of Applied Behavior Analysis,Behaviorism, The Behavior Analyst, and TheAnalysis of Verbal Behavior. In addition, theconvention program guides of the meet-ings of the Association for BehaviorAnalysis were examined. Finally, to assessone clear non-example of behaviorism, thesame type of search was conducted withthe Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal

Table 1Keywords used in searching for verbal behavior rele-vant articles in the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis.

Academic behavior PrayerAcademic response Programmed InstructionAdjectival inflections Rate of SpeechAdjectives ReadingArithmetic Reading comprehensionArticulation Reversal behaviorArticulation training SentenceComplimenting behavior Sight wordsConversation SpeechConversational behaviors SpellingConversational skills SutteringDeaf SyntaxDigit reversal Telegraphic speechEducation Verbal behaviorExpressive language Verbal conditioningGenerative Verbal contingenciesGrammar Verbal mediationGreeting Responses Verbal productionHandwriting Verbal trainingImitation VerbsLanguage Vocal pitchMathematics Voice operated relayPicture naming behavior Word emphasisPlurals Writing

Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis. (1977). Cumulativeindex volumes 1-10 (1968-1977). Supplement toWinter, 1977.

Behavior. This is what I did, on again andoff again, over a nearly 10 year period.The basic methodology was quite sim-

ple: I first consulted the indices of thebehavioral journals to find keywords thatrelate to verbal behavior. There are manykeywords that apply, and some of theseare shown in Table 1.The next step was to pull the issues of

the journals off the shelf and begin examin-ing them. The articles containing the appli-cable keywords were found. Theirabstracts were read, and their referencelists scanned for the familiar "Skinner, B.F.(1957)...." Articles were then tallied, withtally marks made on data sheets if the arti-cle cited Skinner's book and if it was aboutverbal behavior. This was the approach inthe first search through the journals.As I searched through the journals I

began realizing that the search procedurewas inadequate. I happened to examinearticles that were not covered by the key-words, and found (1) references to VerbalBehavior and (2) articles that were clearlyabout verbal behavior but had not beenkeyworded in a way that would allowthem to be found. Thus, a second searchthrough the same set of journals was con-ducted, this time with each article in eachissue being examined. This updated searchended in 1984.After a couple of years had passed, I

returned to the earlier searches. The tallysheets did not contain the actual refer-ences. Thus I embarked on a third searchof the behavioral journals, this time writingdown the complete references of the arti-cles that cited Skinner's book or wereabout verbal behavior. The reliability withthe earlier search was over 95%. A list ofverbal behavior references resulted.A couple of years later I began working

on an early version of this paper, based onwhat I had discovered. In the earliersearches I had discovered several classes ofarticles:

(a) many of the articles deal with the subjectmatter of verbal behavior, but do not referenceSkinner's book or use his conceptual frame-work;

(b) many of the articles that reference Skinner's

64 JOHN W. ESHLEMAN

book do not deal in any significant way withverbal behavior;

(c) some of the articles both deal with the subjectof verbal behavior and also cite Skinner's book,but do not use his conceptual framework;

(d) a few of the articles reference the book, dealwith verbal behavior, and do make use ofSkinner's analysis; and

(e) a few articles seemed to not only be aboutverbal behavior and reference and use the anal-ysis in the book, but also seemed to extend thatanalysis in some way.

As a result of these observations, I con-ducted a fourth search through the jour-nals, this time reexamining the reliabilityof the earlier searches, noting which arti-cles used Skinner's analytic framework,and which seemed actually to extend theanalysis. This time, the references wereentered into a Hypercard database of myown creation.' The reliability with the ear-lier search was over 99% agreement.The next step was to sort the Hypercard

database into chronological order. Thispermitted the number of articles publishedper year to be easily counted. A count peryear is a frequency. The yearly frequencieswere next charted on semi-logarithmicStandard Celeration Charts, which are use-ful for showing trends, and from whichcelerations can be projected.2 Celeration isthe next derivative from frequency, and inthe present research celeration is definedas number of articles published per yearper half decade.

Counting Convention Papers

I have counted 772 sessions at the annualmeetings of the Association for BehaviorAnalysis (ABA) dealing with verbal behav-

IThe hypercard stacks comprising the database areavailable from the author as shareware. ASCII textfile versions and hardcopy printouts are also avail-able.

'Data are presented in this paper on semi-logarith-mic charts that are similar to standard celerationcharts. In the Handbook of Graphic Presentations - thedefinitive source for graphs and charts - Schmid(1954) demonstrates that semi-log charts have all theadvantages of add-subtract charts without the disad-vantages. The principal advantage is in the betterillustration of proportional relationships and changesthereto. Note: Though various constraints prohibitpublication of actual standard celeration charts in thisjournal, the actual standard charts are available fromthe author.

ior from 1975 through 1991. Conventionprogram guides were used for the counts.Included in the counts were sessions (a)coded as VRB, (b) sessions clearly aboutverbal behavior (mentioning these key-words in the title), and (c) sessions thatwere de facto about verbal behavior,though not coded as such in the programguides. This latter category includedpapers dealing with a variety of topics,including reading, writing, academicbehavior, conversation skills, echolalia,and language.

Since the only sources for making thecounts were the ABA convention programguides, this was a limitation. Session titlesand key codes should be fairly reliable indi-cators. Sessions that might have been explic-itly based on Skinner's analysis were lesseasy to determine with absolute certainty.Criteria for making the determinationincluded (a) whether the title explicitlyreferred to Verbal Behavior, (b) whether thetitle included terminology from VerbalBehavior (mands, tacts, autoclitics), (c)whether sessions were papers that were laterpublished, or (d) whether sessions and meet-ings were officially sponsored by the VerbalBehavior Special Interest Group. There isevery reason for believing that the total of123 sessions represents an under count.

A Note on Reliability

A review of this paper criticized the lackof "interobserver agreement." There wasno interobserver agreement, though, as Inoted, there was high agreement fromsearch to search. But consider this issue sci-entifically, not dogmatically. Johnston andPennypacker (1980) demolished the absur-dity and illogic that undergirds the neces-sity of interobserver agreement. There is noscientific basis for such a practice, thoughLindsley (1990) noted that the actual rea-son might be to justify hiring more thanone graduate assistant. But these criticismscan be set aside. Consider that the rawdata, the journal articles, are not ephemeralbehavioral events that momentarily existand then vanish. Anyone, at any time, canconsult the exact same database.To be sure, there could be some discrep-


ancies, but these would not result fromfaulty observation. Rather they wouldresult either from (a) a disagreement aboutthe definition of verbal behavior and whatqualifies as such, and (b) the actual lack ofa hard and fast boundary between verbalbehavior and other types of operant behav-ior. As Vargas (1988) notes, verbal behav-ior shares many characteristics with otheroperant behavior.The functional definition of verbal

behavior provided by Skinner (1957)served as one guiding criterion. Formaldefinitions were not excluded, especially ifthey made sense from the basis ofSkinner's definition. Thus, an article about"arithmetic behavior" would be included

because doing arithmetic problems is aform of intraverbal behavior. An article onreading would be included because thebehavior clearly includes textual behavior.The point of the research was to be non-judgmental, and to assess what actuallyapplies. Using the same definitions and thesame database, other researchers should beable to replicate the findings discussedhere, and replication captures the essenceof science (Sidman, 1960).

THE HISTORY OF VERBALBEHAVIOR RESEARCH

Early Verbal Behavior Research

When Verbal Behavior was published in

Table 2

Articles relevant to verbal behavior research in early JEAB (1958-64).

The operant control of verbal behavior:

Keller, (1958) Holland, (1958)

Flanagan, Goldiamond, & Azrin, (1958) Lindsley, (1959)

Hargreaves & Starkweather, (1959) Starkweather, (1960)

Lane, (1960) Azrin, Holz, Ulrich, & Goldiamond, (1961)

Starkweather, & Langsley, (1961) Shearn, Sprague, & Rosenweig, (1%1)

Staats, Staats, Schutz, & Wolf, (1962) Levin, & Shapiro, (1%2)

Goldiamond, (1962) Cross & Lane, (1962)

Lane, & Shinkman, (1963) Kapostins, (1963)

Cassotta, Feldstein, & Jaffe, (1964) Lane (1964)

Staats, Finley, Minke, & Wolfe, (1964)

The operant control of animal vocalizations:

Lane, (1961) Salzinger, Waller, & Jackson (1962)

Molliver, (1963) Kaplan, & Kaplan, (1963)

Programmed instruction:

Ferster, (1960a) Ferster, (1960b)

Holland, (1960) Cook, (1960)

Alexander, & Gilpin, (1961) Barlow, Gilpin, Hedberg, & Palmer, (1961)

Holland, & Porter, (1961) Gilpin, (1962)

Schutz, & Whittemore, (1962) Goldiamond, (1964)

Note: Table 1 represents an exhaustive list of articles.

66 IOHN W. ESHLEMAN

1957 it represented the culmination of over20 years of work by B.F. Skinner. Parts ofthis work were released earlier in theWilliam James Lectures in 1947. And someof the concepts and terminology were pub-lished by Keller and Schoenfeld (1950).Nevertheless, 1957 stands as the watershedyear in which the radical behavioral analy-sis of verbal behavior was formally pre-sented. Commentators address how muchresearch this book has stimulated, not howmuch was based on the earlier presenta-tions.Approximately a year later the Journal of

the Experimental Analysis of Behavior (JEAB)began publishing. From the first issue ver-bal behavior articles appeared. Many ofthese were not within Skinner's paradig-matic framework, but they all were withina basic operant paradigm.As shown in Table 2, this early JEAB

research divided into three main researchthemes: (a) the operant control of verbalbehavior (e.g., Shearn, Sprague, &Rosenweig, 1961), (b) the operant controlof animal vocalizations (e.g., Salzinger,Waller, & Jackson, 1962), and (c) pro-grammed instruction (e.g., Holland, 1960).The articles on programmed instructionapply because instruction is mainly anactivity of shaping and changing verbalrepertoires, primarily intraverbal. As anadditional note, the very first article inissue 1 of volume 1 of JEAB was an articleby Fred Keller on the teaching of Morsecode, behavior which certainly falls withinSkinner's framework as a codic relation.As might be imagined from the identifi-

cation of the three research themes, muchof this early work was not cast within theVerbal Behavior paradigm in any explicitsense. Of the 33 articles dealing with someaspect of verbal behavior, only 6 refer-enced Skinner's book. There were someexceptions, however, most notably the arti-cle by Goldiamond (1962) that dealt withtextual behavior entirely within the VerbalBehavior framework. This article stands asone of the first attempts to follow-upexplicitly on Skinner's analysis. In anycase, all of the early work formed a reason-ably coherent body of literature united into

several distinct research themes, and con-tained both empirical reports and technicalnotes about apparatus. The apparatusappears antiquated by today's standards,but the directions it pointed towardsremain intriguing. What was lacking inthis early set of publications were concep-tual and theoretical analyses, as well asreviews of Skinner's book and Chomsky's(1959) notorious review. Sadly, much ofthis early work is rarely cited (e.g., out ofthe 65 articles published in the first eightvolumes of The Analysis of Verbal Behaviorthere are only two reference citations to theearly JEAB articles).

The Research "Drought"

The early flurry of verbal behaviorresearch in JEAB spanned the years 1958-1964. This activity essentially ended before

1000

1W 2~~X

/- Articles81/ X3

CL "~~~~~Drought"

'Io

1950 1960 1970 1980 199O 2000

Successiue Calendar Years

Fig. 1. Yearly frequencies and celerations of articlesboth (1) about verbal behavior and (2) that referenceVerbal Behavior in the Journal of the ExperimentalAnalysis of Behavior, the Journal of Applied BehaviorAnalysis, and The Analysis of Verbal Behavior, com-bined. Note: On a semi-logarithmic chart, zeros areindicated by discontinuities in the data.

1965. The lack of published work in thesucceeding years probably gave rise to allthe commentary about a relative lack orpaucity. I have labeled this drop off inactivity a "research drought." Evidence ofthe "drought" is readily visible in Figure 1,which displays yearly frequency and celer-ation data. From 1965 and for the next sev-eral years there were no papers in JEABthat dealt with verbal behavior, and veryfew that cited Skinner's book. For example,in 1966 of the 113 articles published inJEAB, none dealt with verbal behavior.One article that year referenced VerbalBehavior, though it was not about verbal


behavior per se (Skinner, 1966). The"drought" lasted into the 1970s.

The Research Acceleration

As with real droughts, the verbal behav-ior research drought eventually ended. Inthe latter half of the 1970s the pace of bothdiscussion and empirical investigationincreased. More scientific work in the areawas being conducted. More outlets forsharing the work, such as journals and con-ferences, came into being. More organizedpromotion of research also appeared. As aresult, research projects came along whichfollowed in the footsteps of the early JEABpioneers. The increase in verbal behaviorresearch is also documented in Figure 1,which displays the overall tabulation ofsuch publications. In subsequent Figures(2-6) the yearly frequencies of articles arebroken down by journal and conventionpresentations, as well as by other criteria.

Figure 2 shows the yearly frequencies of(a) total articles published per year inJEAB, (b) the number of articles per year inJEAB that can be categorized as dealingwith some aspect of verbal behavior(including both those articles that citeSkinner's book and those that do not), and

1000

X2

-Cl- JEAS Total

ux Articles

100~~~~~~~~~~~~0 JEAB Totalverbal behaviorarticles

_6 '"Drought" -- JEAB verbalbehavior

10 Varbacle Behatio.8 reference

1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000


Fig. 2. Yearly frequencies and celerations of (1) totalnumber of articles published per year, (2) number ofarticles per year dealing with verbal behavior, and (3)number of articles per year dealing with verbalbehavior that also reference Verbal Behavior in theJournal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior.

(c) the number of articles dealing with ver-bal behavior and citing the book. Since1978 there has been a definite accelerationtrend in this third category of X1.8 articlesper 5 years (X1.8 is read as "times 1.8"; cel-eration values are symbolized with multi-

plication or division signs). A X1.8 celera-tion approximates doubling. If this overallceleration trend continues, then by themiddle of the 1990s there should be about10 articles per year in JEAB that are aboutverbal behavior and which also citeSkinner's book. A more conservative esti-mate projects that there would be some-where between this value and the currentrate of five per year. Also note that onFigure 2 the "drought" lasting from themid 1960s to the mid 1970s is visible.Figure 3 shows data pertaining to the

Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis (JABA).To a radical behaviorist these data are lessencouraging, because the rate of papersboth dealing with verbal behavior andwhich also cite the book has never strayedhigher than two per year. Curiously, mostof those two-per-year frequencies were in

1000

1.5 --3 JABA Total|

2 Articles

A0-JABA Total100 > tverbal behavior

articles

X. -_- JABA verbalbehavior

10- articles thatO referemce

Yorbal Behavior-1.5

1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000


Fig. 3. Yearly frequencies and celerations of (1) totalnumber of articles published per year, (2) number ofarticles per year dealing with verbal behavior, and (3)number of articles per year dealing with verbalbehavior that also reference Verbal Behavior in theJournal of Applied Behavior Analysis.

the first six years of JABA. Also notewor-thy is the deceleration of articles dealingwith the subject of verbal behavior. From apeak of 19 in 1974 the number deceleratedto a spread of between four to eight peryear over the past half dozen years. If thistrend continues, by the end of the decadeJABA will be publishing only between twoand three articles per year dealing withverbal behavior. As a side note, it shouldbe clear that the ratio of papers dealingwith verbal behavior that also citeSkinner's book compared to the total num-ber of papers dealing with verbal behavioris increasing. But this is an effect of the

68 JOHN W. ESHLEMAN

decelerating trend of the latter quantity,not because authors are citing Skinnermore often.

Figure 4 shows the number of articlespublished per year in the journal TheAnalysis of Verbal Behavior (AVB). Thesedata contain the most dramatic celeration

1000X4

X2

Xl 5 Articles

100 xi- EmpiricalArticles

10

1950 1960 1970 1980 19990 2000


Fig. 4. Yearly frequencies and celerations of (1) totalnumber of articles published per year, and (2) numberof empirical studies published per year in the journalThe Analysis of Verbal Behavior. Note that the celera-tion of this latter quantity is X8 per five years.

trends: X1.2 per five years overall, and X2.5per five years since 1986. Projection of thislatter celeration trend indicates that by theyear 2000 there should be around 100 arti-cles published per year in this journal. Thisestimate probably overshoots what willhappen, however, since at least 10 succes-sive frequencies are needed to make anaccurate projection on a Standard Cele-ration Chart. A more conservative estimateprojects between 20 to 60 articles per yearin the journal by the end of the decade. Theattainment of these outcomes is, of course,contingent on a host of variables, includingproduction costs, number of subscribers,number of articles submitted, and distribu-tion of the editorial responsibilities.

Figure 5 shows data from the Journal ofVerbal Learning and Verbal Behavior(renamed more appropriately as theJournal of Memory and Language in 1985).These data were included as a non-exam-ple of the situation in the primary behav-ioral journals. The total number of refer-ences to any works by B.F. Skinner hasbeen at zero per year for most of the jour-nal's history. Most interesting, however,has been the steep deceleration trend in thenumber of articles per year that reference

works by Noam Chomsky. The frequencyof these articles divided by 2.8 per fiveyears from 1974 through 1984. Authors in aprincipal psychology journal dealing withverbal behavior and language were citingChomsky less and less often.

1000 o

2 ~~~~~~~-O3Total"

4 ~~~~~~~~~~~~Articles100 * References

e. to -anyB.Fa 21 Skinner source

u-L " Referencesz 10 ÷2.8to Noam

28Chomnskt

1950 1960 1970 1980 1990


Fig. 5. Yearly frequencies and celerations of (1) totalnumber of articles published per year, (2) number ofreference citations per year to any works by B.F.Skinner, and (3) number of reference citations peryear to any works by Noam Chomsky in the Journal ofVerbal Learning and Verbal Behavior.

Research Lines and Threads

The existing verbal behavior researchhas been of major scientific significanceregardless of whether one persists interming the whole body of work as scantor not. Oah and Dickinson (1989) point outthat many of the published research papersin JEAB, The Analysis of Verbal Behavior, andoccasionally elsewhere, are direct exten-sions of Skinner's analysis. Accordingly,our understanding of verbal behaviorwithin this context has been modified andextended by this empirical work.

Articles such as those by Boe andWinokur (1978) and by Simic and Bucher(1980) heralded the resumption of empiri-cal work cast within the framework ofVerbal Behavior. These articles and manyothers initiated what can be termed lines ofresearch. An alternate term is researchthreads, which metaphorically describeshow the lines of research "weave in andout," occasionally giving rise to semi-inde-pendent lines.The empirical work now has covered

virtually all of the major categories of ele-mentary verbal operants, as well as otherimportant parts of Skinner's analysis. Table3 lists some of these studies by verbal oper-


Table 3

Some first and second order verbal behavior research.

Verbal Operant Class Extensions

Researchers & Year: Verbal Operant Class:

Boe & Winokur (1978) ECHOICS

Goldiamond (1962) TEXTUALS

Lee & Pegler (1982) TEXTUALS & TRANSCIPTS

Simic & Bucher (1980) MANDS

Yamamoto & Mochizuki (1988) MANDS

Lamarre & Holland (1985) MANDS & TACTS

Watkins, Pack-Teixteira, & Howard (1989) INTRAVERBALS & TACTS

Chase, Johnson, & Sulzer-Azaroff (1985) INTRAVERBALS

Howard & Rice (1988) AUTOCLITICS

Twyman (1991, May) AUTOCLITICS

Other Research Extensions

Researchers & Year: Research Area:

Lee (1981) Speaker and Listener

Lodhi & Greer (1989) Speaker and Listener

Lowe, Beasty, & Bentall (1983) Reinforcement Schedules

Hyten & Chase (1991) Self-editing

Note: The Table is not meant to be an exhaustive listing, but rather to be illustrative of the variety and scope ofrecent verbal behavior research.

ant class or by other research area (theTable is not meant to be exhaustive, butrather illustrates the scope of the research).The studies listed and others can bearranged into various research lines.Researchers now are able to consult thisresearch. They can then pursue problemsand questions identified in the publishedreports rather than rely exclusively onSkinner's book as a source of research. Byfollowing up on the pioneering efforts ofthose who publish research extensions, acoherent body of work ensues. In addition,researchers now have some experimentaldesigns and procedures to emulate andthus to shape into better methodologies.The groundwork for enhancing the sophis-tication of the measurement has been laid.Mands and tacts. An example of an

emerging research thread is the one deal-ing with the relationship between mands

and tacts. As a starting place a researchercould replicate Lamarre and Holland's(1985) findings. One could then extendsuch work parametrically by using differ-ent independent variable values, or evendifferent independent variables. Severalstudies have now followed-up explorationof the mand-tact relationship. For example,Carroll and Hesse (1987) studied the effectsof mand and tact training on the acquisi-tion of tacts, and cited the Lamarre andHolland (1985) study. A study by Stafford,Sundberg, and Braam (1988) followed, andlent more support to the functional inde-pendence of mands and tacts as differentverbal operants. This study in turn was fol-lowed by a research article by Sundberg,San Juan, Dawdy, and Arguelles (1990),which elaborated upon these differencesand considered the relationship tointraverbals. In a somewhat independent

70 JOHN W. ESHLEMAN

Table 4

Recent papers dealing with autoclitics.

Authors & Year:

Catania (1980).

Dloughy (1986, May).

Skutella (1987, May).

Kienlen (1988, May).

Howard & Rice (1988).

Lodhi & Greer (1989)

Exum, Osborne, & Phelps (1990, May).

Vargas, E.A. (1991b).

Twyman (1991, May).

Note: The Table is not necessarily an exhaustive list-ing.

branch of this thread, de Freitas Ribero(1989) and Baer and Detrich (1990) havealso explored the mand-tact relationship.These latter two articles do not cross refer-ence the other work, however.

Autoclitics. Another interesting researchthread has been emerging recently. Thisone deals with autoclitics (see Table 4).Some of these papers are discussion arti-cles (e.g., Vargas, E.A., 1991b), whereasothers are empirical efforts (e.g., Howard& Rice, 1988; Twyman, 1991, May).Collectively, the papers in this thread haveestablished a line of research pertaining toautoclitics.

DISCUSSIONExplaining the Research Acceleration

In the years following the onset of thepublication "drought" several key eventsoccurred that possibly formed some of thenecessary conditions for the growth in theresearch.JABA. The first significant event was the

founding of the Journal of Applied BehaviorAnalysis in 1968 (see Figure 3). Some radi-cal behaviorists might not consider JABAto be a key event in the development ofverbal behavior research. To the extent thatattention is focused only on that researchwithin Skinner's paradigm the considera-tion is warranted. The journal, however,

became a substantial source for reports ofverbal behavior research that were clearlybehavioral, though not radical behavioral.But neither was the work explicitly andtotally cognitive. The focus was on behav-ior, usually that which was socially signifi-cant. The experimental designs weremainly single-subject. From the resultingdata there arises more of a chance of rein-terpreting the research in terms ofSkinner's framework than would be thecase for articles in the Journal of VerbalLearning and Verbal Behavior. In addition,some of the JABA work may have touchedupon problems so as to facilitate laterresearch. That is, the JABA articles mayhave helped frame research problems, clar-ify solutions, and suggest investigatorystrategies. Finally, a large variety of verbalbehavior research threads were developed.These are lines of research that can be fol-lowed by those interested in applyingSkinner's analysis.MacCorquodale reviews. The book reviews

published by Kenneth MacCorquodale inthe Journal of the Experimental Analysis ofBehavior were a second set of events(MacCorquodale, 1969, 1970). These papersprobably hold their greatest value in theirteaching impact. Issues and problems wereclarified, and Chomsky's (1959) objectionsto Skinner's framework deftly handled.More importantly, however, were the alter-native explanations of Skinner's concepts.Verbal Behavior is large, and difficult formany to learn. Further, the book was aninitial foray into the behavioral analysis ofverbal behavior, and thus included unfa-miliar terminology. By addressing theseissues using the somewhat differentapproach of reviews, MacCorquodale'sarticles may have explained Skinner'sframework in a way that was easier formany to understand it. In any event, thereviews restored Verbal Behavior to thelimelight, if only briefly.

Behaviorism. A third significant eventthat helps explain the research accelerationwas the creation of the journal Behaviorismin 1972. The orientation of this journaltoward philosophical discussion broad-ened the forum for conceptual and theoret-


ical analyses (the journal was neverintended to be a repository for empirically-based research reports). Indeed, the veryfirst article in the first issue dealt with ver-bal behavior (Catania, 1972). Some of thecommentary in Behaviorism if nothing elseconsidered the implications of Skinner'sanalysis and possibly suggested someworthwhile research questions and feasiblenew methodologies (e.g., Neuringer, 1981).Skinner's book contains many potentialtopics of research, but these ideas may beembedded in the discussion so as not to beimmediately obvious (although, note thatSundberg (1991) has identified 301research topics from the book). The func-tion of conceptual and theoretical discus-sions, then, could be to expand upon theresearch ideas, to formulate importantresearch questions, clarify problems, andraise new problems and issues about ver-bal behavior. This may foster empiricalinvestigation, although there seems to belittle citation of the Behaviorism commen-tary in the empirical research that hasdeveloped.ABA. A fourth significant event promot-

ing the research acceleration was thefounding of the Association for BehaviorAnalysis (ABA) in 1975 (originally asMABA, the Midwestern Association ofBehavior Analysis; see Peterson (1978) forthe early history of ABA). The importanceof this organization must not be underem-phasized. Indeed, it may have been crucialto the increase in verbal behavior research.A science is always a community of peo-ple; a verbal community to put it inSkinnerian terms. A verbal communitypromotes communication and instruction.3In the case of scientific communities thecommunications that are promoted andshared are about scientific research. ABAprovided an open and hospitable forumfor people interested in verbal behavior tomeet and exchange information. From 1975through 1991 over 770 papers dealing withverbal behavior have been presented at theABA conventions (Figure 6). Of these, atleast 123 (16%) can be identified unam-biguously as sessions coming within theSkinnerian paradigm, or of promoting it.

1000X4

/X2.

CD X Total ABAPapers on

0o vverbal behavior@-ABA PapersDealing withVerbal Behavior

1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000


Fig. 6. Yearly frequencies and celerations of (1) totalnumber of papers and sessions dealing with verbalbehavior and (2) number of papers and sessions deal-ing with verbal behavior and Verbal Behavior pre-sented at conventions of the Association for BehaviorAnalysis.

Are convention presentations illegiti-mate as scholarly resources, as some mightcontend? Is considering them as being partof the archival database of a science unjus-tifiable? Such contentions are probablyspurious. Permanent scientific societieshave been meeting ever since the RoyalSociety (more properly known as the RoyalSociety for the Improvement of NaturalKnowledge) was founded in 1660 (Mason,1962). Since that time papers have beenread at the meetings of that society and amultitude of other scientific societies;papers that in many instances have con-tributed to the development of the sci-ences. The Association for BehaviorAnalysis has qualified, at least partly, as ascientific society. At every conventionmany of the sessions describe experimentalor applied research, or entertain theoreticalconsiderations.Of course, presentations are more

ephemeral than are publications, and oftenare not rigorously screened. Also, presen-tations often are not published for a varietyof reasons. This does not countermandtheir legitimacy for scholarly purposes.Presentations often attain permanency in avariety of ways. Copies of a paper can bekept, notes can be taken by audience mem-bers, sessions can be audio taped or video

3Nearly every year at ABA there have been one ormore workshops teaching Skinner's analysis. Myown first exposure to Verbal Behavior came from a"mini course" taught by Jack Michael, NormPeterson, and A.C. Catania at the 1977 MABA meet-ing (Michael, Peterson, & Catania, 1977, May).

72 JOHN W. ESHLEMAN

taped, and so on. Audio taped sessions canbe transcribed. In all these situations, whatbestows scholarly legitimacy is the effecton the verbal behavior of others.Colloquially we say "information isexchanged." Behaviorally, the verbal stim-uli that comprise a presentation could besufficient to occasion sequelic intraverbalresponses among members of the audi-ence. Informally, we call these "newideas." The verbal responses occasioned bya paper could be about (a) new researchideas, (b) extensions of the research pre-sented, (c) extensions of earlier research,and (d) new problems that may not yethave been addressed in a public forum.Certain presentations also could serve pos-sibly as establishing operations that "moti-vate" others to pursue similar research.For all of these aforementioned reasons

the formation of ABA probably has helpedfoster verbal behavior research and inter-est. We learn how others carried out theirresearch. The scientific communication isvalid. Any complete historical assessmentof the trends in any kind of scientific activ-ity, including verbal behavior research,should consider relevant convention pre-sentations. They must be considered aspart of the archival database of the science,and the yearly frequencies of presentationshelps to indicate the quantity of ongoingresearch.

Verbal Behavior SIG. As mentioned, ABAhas been a scientific and professional orga-nization that assembles the members of thebehavioral verbal community in an annualmeeting. A fifth crucial event that fur-thered the increase in verbal behaviorresearch was the establishment withinABA of the Verbal Behavior SpecialInterest Group in 1977 (Sundberg, 1983).This has been a group that has had as itsmission the promotion of the scientificexploration of verbal behavior and thesharing of methods and findings. Quiteprobably, this formal organization has hada synergistic effect and helped spur suchresearch.

For example, our understanding of whatis studied is affected by how research isconducted. A recurring problem in the

study of verbal behavior, as Oah andDickinson (1989) and others correctly indi-cate, has centered on methodology. Theeffects of single independent variables aredifficult to isolate and study. Earlyattempts toward solving such a problemmight therefore be methodologically crude.As Skinner (1948, p. 275) has related, thiscrudeness in method and measurement isnot necessarily bad. One must begin some-where if one's verbal behavior is to comeunder stimulus control of the particularsubject matter-in this case verbal behav-ior. The initially crude methods and mea-sures provide a starting point from whichsubsequent refinements are selected. Theimportant point is to get started. A. forumsuch as ABA in general, and the VerbalBehavior Special Interest Group in particu-lar, facilitates the exchange of suggestionsabout methodological issues. For example,helpful suggestions can be solicited-thissometimes occurs in the discussions fol-lowing presentations.

The Analysis of Verbal Behavior. A sixthevent significant to the increase in verbalbehavior research was the establishment in1982 of a new behavioral journal devotedexclusively to verbal behavior; namely, TheAnalysis of Verbal Behavior (originally titledas VB News). This journal publishes boththeoretical and empirical articles. Further,it expands the available forums to whichbehaviorists can submit papers. The exis-tence of these forums-journal, conven-tion, and special interest group-cannot bedownplayed as independent variablesaffecting the growth of research. Removingone or more of these forums would likelyresult in a decrease in the frequency ofeither presentations or publications, orboth. This kind of decrease happened toPrecision Teaching when the Journal ofPrecision Teaching suspended publicationfrom 1986 to 1990 (Eshleman, 1990).Teaching verbal behavior. A seventh

important factor affecting growth ofresearch would be the ongoing efforts toteach Skinner's analysis. Several behavioranalysts teach courses one or more times ayear in which Verbal Behavior is used. Notall of these individuals can be named here,


because not everyone is known who actu-ally teaches courses on verbal behaviorusing Skinner's book. Recently, I waspleased to learn that John 0. Cooper at TheOhio State University was teaching such acourse, for example. We all know that JackMichael at Western Michigan Universityhas been teaching verbal behavior formany years. R. Douglas Greer has clearlytaught Skinner's analysis well if the pre-sentations of his students at ABA is anyindication. In my own graduate program Iwas fortunate to have several coursesabout verbal behavior taught by Ernest A.Vargas at West Virginia University.These courses are often a first point of

contact with Skinner's analysis. One mighthear of it in other courses but not study itin depth. In the courses on verbal behavior,however, the problems and issues are laidout, the terminology and frameworklearned, and scientific research and exten-sions studied. In the courses taught byErnest A. Vargas, for example, not onlywas Skinner's book studied in depth, butthe verbal behavior research published inJEAB was learned as well.Not every student who attends a course

on verbal behavior is going to pursue ver-bal behavior research. But it takes only afew individuals to get interested in orderto get a substantial quantity of researchunderway.

Research begets research. Once "ground isbroken," so to speak, others can follow upon previously published research.Procedures can be improved upon. Newindependent variables can be tested. Newvalues of previously tested independentvariables can be manipulated parametri-cally. A common occurrence of all scientificresearch is that new questions and newproblems are raised even while answers toolder questions are found. The earlyresearch sets precedents, lends authenticityto research, and justifies research proposalsthat refer back to it.

Why Was There a "Paucity"?

While a paucity of verbal behaviorresearch no longer exists, clearly there wasa low frequency of publications dealing

with the Verbal Behavior analysis at onetime. Oah and Dickinson (1989, p. 53)rhetorically ask why researchers"neglected" Skinner's book. In attemptingto answer this question they appeal toSkinner's (1978) explanations of (a) the lackof operant analyses among traditional lan-guage researchers, and (b) the sustainedpopularity of mentalistic explanations inthe culture at large. Neither of these expla-nations offer a completely satisfactoryanswer, and a more plausible set of expla-nations comprises a more likely reason.The lack of operant analyses among tra-

ditional language researchers would notexplain the lack of articles dealing withverbal behavior in behaviorist journals. Thelack of such analyses, though, couldexplain such dearth outside of behavioranalysis. Consider that traditional lan-guage researchers are not inclined to readJEAB or JABA or other behavioral journals,let alone submit papers to them. This factbecomes crystal clear in articles publishedin the Journal of Verbal Learning and VerbalBehavior (JVLVB). A principal psychologypublication, this journal covers much of thesame domain as the analyses of verbalbehavior carried out by behaviorists. AsEshleman and Vargas (1988) listed in Table1 of their article, the language researcherswho published in JVLVB referenced VerbalBehavior a mere 5 times out of 1,839 articlespublished from 1962 through 1984. Thisjournal is outside behavior analysis andbarely references Skinner. The articles inJVLVB qualify as "traditional" languageresearch.

But why would there be any expectationthat "traditional" language researcherswould embrace Skinner's analysis? Theyare not likely to be fluent in the science ofhuman behavior that Skinner developed.What little they know is likely to be misin-formed. In any event, they show preciouslittle evidence of knowing Skinner's analy-sis or of being interested in it. We shouldnot expect operant analyses to come fromtraditional language researchers. Languageresearch is a different discipline. To theextent they deal with behavior at all, theydo so from a paradigm other than the

74 JOHN W. ESHLEMAN

selection by consequences paradigm ofSkinner.Some might consider the behavioral lan-

guage research in JABA to qualify as "tra-ditional." This issue is more complicated.Have these researchers been interested inlanguage per se? If their research is anyindication, by all appearances they havebeen interested in human behavior firstand foremost. Their data are behavioral.Their procedures have changed behavior.Their work clearly has originated in anoperant paradigm. A paper in JABA byHaring, Roger, Lee, Breen, and Gaylord-Ross (1986) claims that the "pragmaticanalyses" about language published inJABA are "consistent with Skinner's (1957)theoretical account of verbal behavior inthat it stresses a functional, as opposed to astructural analysis of language use" (p.159).The complicating factor is that many of

the verbal behavior articles in JABA offerexplanations couched in "traditional" ter-minology. Thus, we find "expressive andreceptive language" being discussed.These kinds of explanations and descrip-tions hail from a scientific paradigm muchdifferent from Skinner's. The paradox,then, is a behavioral journal with operantroots using the language and conceptualframework of "traditional" languageresearch. Does this make the JABAresearchers "traditional" language re-searchers? Referring to them as such maynot be fair. Not only is the adjective "tradi-tional" often pejorative when spoken byacademicians and educators, but if itapplies at all it applies to the psychologistsand linguists who publish in psychologyjournals such as the Journal of VerbalLearning and Verbal Behavior. A moreappropriate characterization of the JABAresearch would be to suggest that theirresearch occupies a position somewherebetween cognitivism and radical behavior-ism. Their conceptual framework might becognitive, but their procedures and dataare clearly in the behavioral domain. A bet-ter question, then, might be to ask whybehavioral researchers have studied verbalbehavior but pull in cognitive explana-

tions.The argument about the popularity of

mentalistic explanations in the general cul-ture is somewhat more defensible thanwondering why "traditional" languageresearchers did not adopt Skinner's analy-sis. Members of the behavioral communitygrew up in such a culture. They have beenembedded within it. But they also havebuilt their own scientific verbal commu-nity, one that uses terminology unlikely tobe found in the general culture. They speakof "operants," "contingencies of reinforce-ment," "shaping," "fixed ratio schedules,""response cost," and so on. None of theseterms or explanations are mentalistic. Thequestion begged by the "popularity ofmentalistic explanations" notion is whyoperant researchers by and large failed topursue verbal behavior research withinSkinner's paradigm. Presumably, peopletrained to study operant behavior are lessprone toward accepting explanatory fic-tions, inner causes, homunculi, and freewill than either traditional languageresearchers or members of the general pub-lic.

If the failure of "traditional" languageresearchers to adopt Skinner's analysis isnot an answer, and if the sustained popu-larity of mentalism in the general culture isnot an answer, what might explain thedearth of verbal behavior research fromthe mid 1960s to the latter 1970s? Some ofthe explanations that follow have beendealt with before, at least in part, but nevertogether nor with the same documentation.Briefly, the more likely reasons for apaucity of verbal behavior research are (a)the small number of people who learnedSkinner's analysis, (b) the lack of empiricaldata in the text, (c) the actual philosophicaldispositions of behavioral researchers, (d)the existence of competing research inter-ests, (e) the operation of financial contin-gencies, (f) the size of the radical behav-ioral community, and (g) the nature of timelags whenever scientific innovations occur.

Learning the analysis. As many of us whohave read the book know, Skinner's analy-sis is both innovative and complex. Thebook requires some understanding of the


basic science of human behavior for it to becompletely sensible. Thus, one probablyshould have studied Science and HumanBehavior (Skinner, 1953), The Behavior ofOrganisms (Skinner, 1938), and perhaps anumber of other works beforehand.Ideally, one also would have taken someformal courses in behavior analysis,including laboratory courses, before tack-ling the book. Shaping a rat by hand givesone an "intuitive" feel for selection by con-sequences. One probably needs to under-stand selection by consequences for VerbalBehavior to be fully comprehended.

If people fail to read the book they arenot going to be knowledgeable about it.They are also very unlikely to pursueresearch based on it. If people read onlythe first few chapters they may acquire asuperficial understanding of it, but theyprobably will not acquire fluent intraverbalrepertoires with respect to the analysis.These people also are not likely candidatesfor developing research based on Skinner'sanalysis. Indeed, if the teaching of the bookcontributed to the growth of subsequentresearch, then the lack of such teachingand learning would help explain why therewas not more. In short, we can posit thatsome behavioral researchers never read thebook. Others may have learned somesuperficial aspects of it. If they thus lackthe behavior is it reasonable to expect themto behave? It would be unreasonable toexpect such individuals to conduct theirwork under the auspices of Skinner'sframework.No data in verbal behavior. Skinner's book

is not itself a research and data text. It dif-fers from both The Behavior of Organisms(Skinner, 1938) and Schedules of Reinforce-ment (Ferster & Skinner, 1957) in thiscapacity. No cumulative records are to befound in Verbal Behavior. The conceptualand interpretive nature of the book, andattendant lack of tables and charts, proba-bly steered a few operant researchersaway. This possibility is actually difficultto document. Perhaps behaviorists arewary of revealing this as a reason for notusing Verbal Behavior. Ogden Lindsley(1991), however, has on more than one

occasion criticized Skinner's book for itslack of data. He has characterized the bookas "data void." This is about as close to anadmission as is likely to be found.Lindsley's admission was in a paper thathe submitted to the new Journal ofBehavioral Education. Curiously, it wasedited out of the published version, andexists only in the draft. In a conversationLindsley (personal communication,December, 1991) suggested that this com-mentary had been "censored," not edited.Ironically, therefore, the one writteninstance of Lindsley's reason was not pub-lished and thus remains not easily docu-mented by others.

Actual philosophical dispositions. A thirdreason why operant researchers "ne-glected" Skinner's book may be that someof them were not philosophically disposedtoward the analysis. This relates to thepopularity of mentalistic explanations, andthe persistence of such. The term "behav-iorist" masks some important differencesamong those calling themselves by thatname. As E.A. Vargas (1991a) and J.S.Vargas (1991) identified, different kinds of"behaviorism" default into two completelydifferent paradigms, "transformational"and "selectionistic." Those who stick to atransformational paradigm are probablyless likely to build on the Verbal Behavioranalysis than are, say, radical behavioristswho follow a selectionist paradigm.

Other research interests. The researchersback in the 1960s and 1970s held plenty ofinterests in behavior. They were interestedin schedules of reinforcement, the match-ing law, conditioned reinforcement, aver-sive control, discrimination, generalization,the effects of drugs, and many otheraspects of behavior. In operant researchthere has been no shortage of researchproblems. A person has only so much time,and if one is fascinated more by pursuingimplications of the matching law or ofschedules, for example, it is not clear howthat person is "neglecting" the study ofverbal behavior.

Financial contingencies. The researchinterests of behaviorists are not capricious.Economic contingencies play a big role

76 JOHN W. ESHLEMAN

governing the type of research pursued.Many behavior analysts live from grant togrant, or work for public or private agen-cies mandated to provide service. Thefunding agencies are not particularly inter-ested in promoting Skinner's analysis.They have no investment in it, nor any spe-cial commitment to it.A review of the articles in JEAB in the

1960's reveals a majority of the researchprojects to be grant sponsored. The princi-pal granting agencies were the NationalScience Foundation, NIMH, NIH, the U.S.Public Health Service, the military (e.g., theOffice of Naval Research), NASA, and var-ious other funding sources. Many projectswere also funded by pharmaceutical com-panies. In 1962, for example, 46 publica-tions specified grant support, whereas 31did not (and of those 31, some of theresearchers worked for pharmaceuticalcompanies or for the military directly). In1963, 71 articles were grant supported,while 34 were not.The importance of these data ought to be

clear. At the very least a grant restricts aresearcher's freedom. The funding agen-cies have the money that researchers needto survive. The funding agencies with themoney are sought out. Grants are pro-posed in a way to increase the odds offunding, which means the proposal willcorrespond to the agency's interests andagenda. Once funded, the researcher willpursue the research as stipulated in thegrant. Only a foolish operant researcherwould have taken money from a pharma-ceutical company, for example, and spentit instead on exploring the relationshipbetween mands and tacts.The controlling nature of sponsored

research has yet to be fully apprehended,though Lindsley (1992) has demonstratedhow such funding can lead to the demiseof behavioral research and technology.What has yet to be studied is the extent towhich the financial contingencies put sci-entists into contact with contingencies thatalter the verbal behavior of those scientists.More than likely, the operative selectionprinciple controlling the verbal behavior ofthe researcher, then, is to speak the lan-

guage of those who dispense the funds.That language is the mentalistic vernacularcharacteristic of the culture, and refinedsomewhat by cognitive psychology. Butconsider how this differs from the "popu-larity of mentalistic explanations" explana-tion: Verbal communities reinforce approx-imations to their language and punishdeviations.

It may be difficult enough to get some-thing "behavioral" funded, let alone some-thing that is totally incomprehensible tothe larger culture. In short, if there is nomoney for verbal behavior research it willnot get done. What money is made avail-able may be dispensed contingent uponresearch terminology and procedures thatmatch the language and agendas of thefunding agencies.

Size of the radical behavioral community.The people most likely to generate researchbased on Skinner's analysis are radicalbehaviorists. Perhaps we can wonder whymore of them did not develop suchresearch. But that makes sense only if thereare many radical behaviorists. There arenot many. Radical behaviorists are becom-ing a minority viewpoint within theAssociation for Behavior Analysis. Verbalcommunities maintain themselves andgrow only as long as the members are suc-cessful in replicating their verbal reper-toires in the repertoires of their students.The radical behavioral community hasgrown, but remains small. As of 1992, itmay still be feasible for one radical behav-iorist to be personally acquainted with allother radical behaviorists alive. If the"paucity" of verbal behavior research isconsidered in light of the size of the radicalbehavioral community, then perhaps itstands less as a paucity than as a majorachievement. In short, it may be a wonderthat so much verbal behavior researchexists!

Cultural time lags. A time lag does notexplain anything. It does describe, how-ever. The history of science is replete withthem. R. Buckminster Fuller (1981) has dis-cussed the time lags between inventionsand their adoption, some of which can bequite long. Kuhn (1962) has observed that


whenever there are paradigm shifts inscience the resulting time lags in shifting tothe new paradigm are not unusual. Platetectonics was introduced as an explanationfor geological phenomena decades beforethe science of geology shifted over to it.Kuhn (1962) also observed that the

history of paradigm shifts suggests thatthe older verbal communities never arethe likely ones to pursue research on thebasis of the new paradigm. In this consid-eration, then, expecting "traditional" lan-guage researchers to conduct research outof Verbal Behavior is rather akin to expect-ing theologically-oriented natural philoso-phers to act as Darwinians and study biol-ogy from the paradigm of naturalselection. Skinner's analysis of verbalbehavior represents a paradigm shift, andwe should have expected some time lag tooccur.

SUMMARYClearly, research in verbal behavior

using and extending B.F. Skinner's selec-tionist paradigm is growing. New growthbuilds on previous efforts. The fieldexpands. New areas of research interestand exciting new methodologies holdpromise of expanding the quantity ofresearch even further.We promote mythology if we continue

to assert that Skinner's analysis hasprompted a lack of research. Assessingthe quantity of research from such a "rel-ativistic" perspective is the wrongapproach. Perhaps such a "relativistic"viewpoint comes from the same contin-gencies that move behavior analysts tomeasure behavior using percent and toeschew and forget about frequency. If weactually plot the frequency and celerationof verbal behavior research, without mak-ing meaningless comparisons of it toother kinds of behavioral research, wefind a solid acceleration trend upward.Enough frequency data exists so that reli-able projections of that trend can be com-puted. If the present trend continues, inanother decade or two the complaintmight be that there is too much verbalbehavior research for one person to get a

handle on!In any case, looking only at the amount

of research done ignores a much more sub-stantial point. The significance of researchis not determined solely by quantity, butalso by quality. A single research projectcould hold far more significance than adozen "studies" conducted under the pub-lish-or-perish contingency.

Finally, in looking back at verbal behav-ior research and declaring that a paucityexists, we reveal our prejudices and frus-trations. We would like to see more. Wewould like to have our colleagues pick upand read Skinner's book, get excited by it,and plunge into analyses of mands, tacts,intraverbals, and autoclitics. Realistically,however, they are unlikely ever to do that.We may have to realize that only behav-iorally trained people who have readVerbal Behavior are going to assume themantle and move the field forward. Thismeans us, not "traditional" languageresearchers. This also means that we needto continue to teach radical behaviorismand Verbal Behavior, and how the analysisreally is a paradigm shift. Beyond this,moving the field forward means appre-hending the actual pace of growth inresearch, and appreciating what develop-ing a science means. We can examine andbuild upon the growth in the field as it hasunfolded over the past decade, or we cancontinue to trouble ourselves about pauci-ties. As they say, to a pessimist the glass ofwater is half empty, but to an optimist it ishalf full. In our case, the glass surely con-tains water and the drops are beginning torain into it.

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