October, 2020

The Myriads of Behavior Science

A.P. Rabanal. †

Much like Earth or Life sciences, behavioral sciences cover a gamut of disciplines
concerning the study of behavior. They are defined as an attempt to study and understand
human behavior, institutions, and actions (Kerlinger, 1981). The term is deemed as more
global and inclusive than “social sciences” as many scientists research on non-human
animals in laboratory settings too. Disciplines such as education, ethics, and law are not
considered as they are properly social technologies rather than basic or applied sciences.
The range of sciences covered leads to consider them an interdisciplinary hub or collective
term for disciplines focused on the description, explanation, and prediction of behavioral
phenomena.
A full account of behavior must understand the role of inheritance, development, and
learning over time. Through the biological-based disciplines there are shared assumptions
and a common rationale based on evolution and physiology with widely accepted concepts
such as levels of organization, mechanisms, adaptative traits, or survival values. The most
relevant branch appears to be “organismic biology” as behavioral processes are properties
1
of organisms (Colmenares, 2015) although it may integrate data from other levels with
special reference to nervous, endocrine, and muscular activities.
Concerning behavior as a central subject matter, one can consider the following as
biological-based behavioral sciences:
- Behavioral biology (including behavioral genetics, pharmacology, immunology,
endocrinology, and neuroscience)
- Behavioral ecology/Ethology
- Comparative psychology
- Physiological psychology/Psychobiology
- Neuropsychology/Psychophysiology
- Evolutionary psychology/Sociobiology
With peripheral disciplines such as:
- Neurochemistry
- Evolutionary and developmental biology
- Neuroanatomy and neurophysiology
Behavioral neuroscience or physiological psychology are interested in the biological basis
of learning and development whereas ethology or behavioral ecology are more concerned
with trait inheritance and evolutionary patterns albeit with thematic overlaps between both.
The fascination with neural plasticity and the role of experience seems to distinguish
psychology from the other biological disciplines (Breedlove, Rosenzweig, & Watson, 2007).
Yet this relative convergence is not that common in the human and social areas. Broadly
speaking, the following are to be considered:
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- Experimental analysis of behavior

- Psychology
- Behavioral economics
And techniques or methods for understanding and measuring behavior have been devised
for both divisions such as:
- Structural and functional imaging
- Behavioral and physiological assays
- Psychometrics
Although there is no unified framework among the human- or social-based behavioral
sciences, it is to notice that they all are disciplines for approaching distinct kinds of
phenomena. However, that does not remove the need for attain external consistence
insofar a comprehensive account of behavior requires the integration of relevant theoretical
fields. I will discuss onwards whether behavior analysis can be a promising candidate for
becoming a “core network” for the behavioral sciences.
Within experimental psychology, behavior analysis is the most consistently selectionist
perspective and remains as naturalistic as its founders sought. Donahoe and Palmer (2004)
define it as the process whereby the environmental antecedents of a phenomenon are
manipulated or controlled for measuring their effects. Although unobservable variables
that preclude control may be induced from experimental analyses, they are not inferred.
This can be considered a pivotal distinction with cognitive psychology since it averts a
dependence on hypothetical constructs and theoretical entities. This should not be seen as
a limitation, but rather a restriction to experimental conditions. There is no doubt that
there are intraorganismic variables that can even pose as internal mechanisms, but they
belong to another independent level of analysis. The problem is how these internal state
2
variables or theoretical concepts are conceived regarding the functional relations of an
organism with its environment. Thereby I am not considering cognitive psychology,
cognitive neuroscience, nor cognitive sciences for ensuing argumentation.
Behaviorism can actually be seen as a general approach for psychology as a science of
behavior (Montgomery, 2014). As behavior can be approached in a number of ways, there
are enough proposals such as mentalism, cognitivism, or biologism that leaves us wondering
whether psychology is entirely tributary to behaviorist assumptions. Since this is not the
case, the separation between fields is as yet justified but does not prevent to consider a
possible integration as a realization of the behaviorist program. Behavioral psychology
differs from other perspectives to the extent that authors like Ribes (2000) or Ardila (1992)
have argued that we are facing intellectual traditions at odds with each other or even
incommensurable paradigms. The fragmentation of the discipline is an old topic but some
postulates or methods are partially commensurable although a unification program remains
pending (see also Ardila, 2006). It must be however considered that some assumptions of
behaviorism as a philosophy of science are no more tenable than others (Tonneau, 2013).
One must not forget that even applied branches such as ABA or CBS do not fully identify
witch each other, much less a derivation like CBT.
As a research program, behavior analysis has provided many undeniable empirical findings,
methods, and conceptual models. But neither are easily dismissible some findings from
cognitive psychology or psychometrics. Nevertheless, their philosophical underpinnings are
not entirely compatible. While a unified framework would solve this inconsistency, the
existence of independent research programs leads to nowhere. It is rather a matter of a
philosophical foundation of behavioral sciences what is needed. Therefore, some
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assumptions of behavioral science will be questionable although its scientific practice can
remain fertile.
Behaviorism is regarded as the philosophy that illuminates the experimental analysis of
behavior. Yet what gives substance to a science is not a philosophy whatsoever but the facts
enriched with data it addresses. Certainly, these have meaning in the light of theoretical
postulates so the question is whether behavior analysis can be enlightened by another
framework. This suggestion should not surprise as there are variants of behaviorism
(O’Donohue & Kitchener, 1999; Zuriff, 1985). Nevertheless, the main approaches are
radical behaviorism (Skinner), functional contextualism (Hayes), and interbehaviorism
(Kantor, Ribes). All share familiar resemblances regarding the concept of behavior and the
role of experimental procedures. And following the reading guide proposed by Pérez-Acosta
et al. (2002), they are also the ones who most disregard cognitivist and biologist accounts
of behavior.
However, Skinner did not reject neurosciences nor criticized other fields which could also
present means for achieving effective ways of prediction and control of behavior (Zilio,
2016). It was the misuse of physiology or organism-centered accounts of behavior which
was rejected and it could not be otherwise coming from an author who argued that behavior
analysis was a natural science and the “behaving organism” will eventually be explained by
anatomy and physiology (Skinner, 1975). Without detracting its contributions to
understanding language and cognition, contextualism is the furthest branch from
neurosciences and is not necessarily a novelty compared to research on verbal behavior and
stimulus equivalence. And interbehaviorism continues to be a relatively closed tradition,
not to mention its esoteric language, and there are difficulties for transferring its theoretical
concepts to empirical settings (Hayes, Barnes-Holmes, & Roche, 2002) albeit an interesting
analysis on the functions of behavior is proposed by Ribes and López (1985). 3
It would be enough to indicate that any attempt of integration needs to appeal to the
biological-based sciences even if they are regarded as other levels of analysis. An entirely
“independent tradition” is rather a sign of pseudoscientism that does not keep at pace with
intertheoretical relations precluding convergence (see Bunge, 2003). Less-known
approaches such as selectionism (Donahoe), theoretical behaviorism (Staddon), and
psychological behaviorism (Staats) favor this kind of integration. The latter constitutes not
so much a divergence from radical behaviorism, but a unification of psychology through
behaviorism (Pérez-Acosta et al., 2002). Ortu and Vaidya (2017), Schlinger (2014),
Donahoe and Palmer (2004), and Moore (2002) have instead stressed the relations between
both fields from a behavioral standpoint (see also Rabanal, 2020). In all these cases, it is
possible to develop an environment-based behavioral within a selectionist philosophy.
But what would motivate a behaviorist to change his theoretical framework? Radical
behaviorism is a rationale for behavior analysis that proposes interactions between the
animal and its surroundings as an explanation of behavior instead of relying on internal
(mental) states. Even when responses are mediated by some neurophysiological mechanism,
only functional relations across time constitutes psychological phenomena (although this
does not imply that they are less biological). However, behaviorism is not restricted to
setting up a subject matter (as this can be settled by other means) but includes assumptions
about the nature of psychological events and scientific practice.
Tonneau (2013) identifies several aspects of behaviorism as a philosophy of science such as
the rejection of a realistic account of causality, a strong inductivist bent with a concomitant
rejection of hypothetical constructs, and a technological stance towards science (pp. 13-14)
to which we can include the insistence on subordinating explanation to control and a
disregard for state variables. These positions are usually taken for granted by behaviorists
 October, 2020

although they are unrelated to current philosophy of science (for a thematic survey see
Cover, Curd & Pincock, 2012; Rosenberg, 2012; Rescher, 2000; Bunge, 1998; and
Moulines, 1993. For an alternative view, Hayes et al., 1993). The hypothetical-deductive
model of science prevents to derive high-level theoretical statements from data, but
behaviorists still endorse a kind of operationism to the detriment of realism (Tonneau and
Tamayo, 2001). Although denied, this is manifest in their attempt of reducing theoretical
to observational terms, an unsuccessful endeavor as blending time with clocks and watches.
It is rather a pledge to behaviorism that makes behaviorists, not the commitment to the
practice of experimental analysis of behavior as such. Aspects of behavioristic psychology
in the context of the philosophy of science are not a novelty (see Turner, 1965). If its core
postulates are no longer tenable nor constitutive, it would be possible to modify them
without putting at risk an environment-based program through a philosophical framework
be it selectionist or just behaviorist without identifying it with the philosophy of science
proposed by Skinner (not for nothing Staddon labelled its own proposal as a “new”
behaviorism). Or simply moving on. Adaptative behavior is already studied as an
interaction of nervous system, body, and the environment (Chiel and Beer, 1997). This
proposal stresses how insufficient is an exclusive focus on the nervous system without a
reference to the surrounding environment. Accordingly, a science of learning and
adaptation can be given a realist interpretation if dissociated with the current philosophy
which underlies behavioral analysis (Tonneau, 2013). This does not imply leaving adrift
the concepts, methods, or findings provided by behavioral analysis, but rather developing
a better articulation for it within the rest of behavioral sciences.
Yet considering ourselves neuroscientists would be a mistake as we do not necessarily have
the formal instruction on neurosciences and may even risk the identity of psychology.
(Unless, of course, one has credentials on behavioral neurosciences or psychobiology). And 4
psychologists are usually confused with therapists, counselors, or cognitive scientists. A
third alternative is to be called behavior analysts only if we accept that behaviorism is one
philosophy among others. But the name usually has a doctrinal or institutional load. (Do
not forget that ABA identifies people with a specific instruction in the no-more-no-less
seven dimensions of behavior modification). Although too broad, it may not hurt to
introduce oneself at social gatherings simply as a part of the behavioral sciences that seek
to understand in what conditions an organism behaves in such a way related to its situation.
 October, 2020

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