Association for Behavior Analysis International

This symposium will summarize critical conceptual issues in the emerging study of culturo-behavior science. In addressing the most challenging social and cultural issues facing our world today, there is a need to discuss the underlying conceptual foundations. Presenters will provide a better understanding and a behavior-analytic framework for addressing critical conceptual issues in culturo-behavior science.

Classification is at the heart of all science and the power of highly generalized classification systems is evident in physics, chemistry and biology. Classification in the social sciences depends on the specific phenomena being studied. Each discipline has its own classification based on the specific phenomena of interest: Bands and tribes; cities and states; governments and corporations; families, gangs, and schools, and so on. All of these classes are defined in terms of the relations among the behavior of people. This commonality suggests that a unifying system of classification, that could apply to all of those phenomena, might be possible. Perhaps the nascent classifications of culturo-behavior science are a step in that direction.

Sigrid Glenn is Regents Professor Emeritus at the University of North Texas. She was the founding chair of UNT’s Department of Behavior Analysis and the founder and former director of UNT’s Behavior Analysis Online program. Her published research includes work in conceptual, experimental and applied areas; current interests are primarily conceptual and philosophical. Her work is currently focused on culturo-behavioral science, a specialty area in behavior analysis whose origins include her work. Dr. Glenn is past president of ABAI and a founding fellow of the Association. She was the 2015 recipient of the Award for Distinguished Service to Behavior Analysis. Other awards include TxABA Award for Career Contributions to Behavior Analysis in Texas; CalABA’s Award for Outstanding Contributions to Behavior Analysis; the Michael Hemingway Award for Advancement of Behavior Analysis; the Cambridge Center for Behavioral Studies Ellen P. Reese Award in Recognition for Significant Contributions to Communication of Behavioral Concepts; and--most important to her--the ABAI 2008 Student Committee Award for Outstanding Mentorship of students.

Culturo-behavioral science is a rapidly developing field within behavior analysis. A number of indicators point to this fact. For example, Mattaini (2006) questioned whether or not cultural analysis would ever become a science, focusing particularly on the concept of the metacontingency (Glenn 1988: 1991), which had been proposed as an emergent level of selection. Thirteen years later, ABAI is publishing a book on culturo-behavioral analysis and is hosting a conference dedicated exclusively to culturo-behavioral considerations. While progress has been made, there remains much work to be done. One of Mattaini’s (2006) biggest criticisms of the metacontingency stemmed from the fact that, at that time, almost no research had been done that focused on metacontingencies. Since that time, there has been a significant increase in the amount of published research articles focusing on metacontingencies (see Zilio, 2019), but there is still a question as to the efficacy of the metacontingency, at least as a process of cultural selection (Couto & Sandaker, 2016, Krispin 2016, Zilio, 2019). Additionally, application of these ideas has remained limited, however (see Zilio, 2019) and remains a daunting challenge (see Mattaini, in press). One area that has lagged behind the conceptual development in culture-behavioral analyses is the development of standardized tools for analyzing and understanding the selective dynamics that are at work in a given situation. In an effort to begin to address this short-coming, a new framework and corresponding tool for analyzing interactions between individual contingencies, metacontingencies, and the selection contingencies that stem from the selection of an Aggregate Product by a Selecting Environment/Receiving System. This framework begins to extend the ABC analysis that is commonly used in applied behavior analysis to include aspects of rule-governed behavior (pliance rules versus tracking rules, pliance consequences versus tracking consequences), as well as compare the types of systems-dynamics feedback (positive feedback loops versus negative feedback loops) that stem from metacontingencies that compete for organizational resources. This framework and tool will be illustrated using organizational contingencies typical of a behavioral systems approach, with some attention given to its potential application in wider culturo-behavioral settings.

Jonathan Krispin is Associate Professor of Management at the Langdale College of Business at Valdosta State University;  he returned to academics in January 2013, after a 17-year career in the private sector. His research interests are primarily in the areas of organizational culture, business process improvement, organizational change, and leadership development. Since returning to academics, Jonathan has focused his writing and research efforts on joining concepts from behavior analysis with concepts from systems analysis, particularly from theory related to self-organizing systems. This has led to several publications in Behavior and Social Issues and Perspectives on Behavior Science. He has presented at numerous conferences including the numerous ABAI Annual Conventions, the ABAI International Conferences in Paris and Stockholm, and as an invited speaker at the 12th Annual European Conference on Behavior-Based Safety and Performance Management hosted by AARBA (the Italian Chapter of ABAI) in Como, Italy in 2018. He has also been a guest lecturer at Oslo Metropolitan University in 2018 and 2019.

This presentation will provide an overview of the elaborated account of metacontingency with the primary focus on ways this perspective offers points of entry to alter contextual factors influencing cultural practices. The concepts of metacontingency and macro contingency are emphasized as foundational concepts in the behavior scientific analysis of the interaction between organizational practices producing products and behaviors of their consumers. Moreover, the role of cultural milieu as a mediating factor in this interaction will be highlighted. The discussion of cultural phenomena also acknowledges the behaviors of verbally sophisticated consumers interacting with the many aggregate products of cultural entities as well as the verbal contexts within which members of organized groups operate. The presentation will also highlight the recent experimental and conceptual analyses associated with the role of context in the selection of cooperation and resilience.

Dr. Ramona A. Houmanfar is Professor of Psychology and the Director of the Behavior Analysis Program at the University of Nevada, Reno (UNR). She currently serves as the trustee of the Cambridge Center for Behavioral Studies, Chair of the Organizational Behavior Management Section of Cambridge Center for Behavioral Studies, and editorial board members of the Journal of Organizational Behavior Management, and Behavior & Social Issues. Dr. Houmanfar recently completed her seven-year term as the editor of Journal of Organizational Behavior Management. She has served as the former senior co-chair of the Association for Behavior Analysis International, Director of the Organizational Behavior Management Network and President of the Nevada Association for Behavior Analysis. Dr. Houmanfar has published over seventy peer reviewed articles and chapters, delivered more than 100 presentations at regional, national, and international conferences in the areas of behavioral systems analysis, cultural behavior analysis, leadership in organizations, rule governance, communication networks, instructional design, and bilingual repertoire analysis and learning. Her expertise in behavioral systems analysis and cultural behavior analysis have also guided her research associated with implicit bias, cooperation, situational awareness, decision making, and value based governance. Dr. Houmanfar has published three co-edited books titled “Organizational Change” (Context Press), "Understanding Complexity in Organizations", and “Leadership & Cultural Change (Taylor & Francis Group).

The set of conditional relationships (contingencies and metacontingencies) that regulate behavioral interactions in a society characterizes its culture. These conditional relationships may encompass society as a whole or parts of society, with evolving complexity. The increasing complexity of sets of conditional relationships can be mapped by identifying and describing changes in the external environment of a specific cultural system that affects demands upon it, population size, function specialization of its members, hierarchical layers, conflicts between contingencies that affect different individuals and groups, and disparity of consequences for the individual and for the group. Following the increasing specialization of individual behavioral repertoire, specialized societal behavioral interactions can emerge. One such are control agencies, which regulate sets of conditional relationships and are specialized by type of interaction or various other performance criteria. Although experimental studies of large-scale changes in cultural practices are all but impossible, natural experiments and quasi-experimentation available methods to observe the effects of independent variables as theoretically predicted. The present paper analyzes a few cases of large-scale changes in cultural practices at a societal level, mainly involving public policies, in an attempt to identify behavioral and cultural processes that occurred and associating these with elements of cultural complexity which they affected or that were manipulated.