Can Beh. Analysts Behave Ethically?
GWF 2023, UP ABA 2022, FABA 2021, & CCBS Ethics Conf. 2021
aka: A Nonlinear Consideration of Ethical Behavior
Abstract
Ethics is said to represent the moral code that guides one's choices and behaviors; a moral code that often extends beyond one person to include what is right or wrong for groups, organizations, or society at large. Most humans share a common belief that we all should behave ethically, both personally and professionally. Inherent in the idea of ethics or morality is the perception of free choice. Given a conflicting situation one should choose to behave ethically. Yet in a deterministic science such as behavior analysis, behavior is viewed as a product of the intersection of genetic inheritance, learning history, current conditions, and available alternative contingencies. Can a behavior analyst (or anyone) choose to behave ethically? When behavior tacted as unethical occurs, is it right to blame or punish the individual? As B.F. Skinner famously noted, "the rat is always right." Given the stance that behavior is lawful, how should we as a field view and respond to unethical professional behavior? These issues will be analyzed from a non-linear perspective which will lead to suggestions towards a more systemic, contingency-analytic approach to ethical behavior.
Is unethical behavior absolute or conditional?
In the 1960s Stanford psychologist Walter Mischel and his colleagues administered something now popularly called the "Marshmallow Test." About 30 young children (4- to 5-years-old) were offered a choice of a small but immediate reward, or two small rewards if they waited 15 minutes, during which the researcher left the room. Children were determined waiters (those who waited for the experimenter to return and who then received a second treat) or non-waiters (those who ate the small treat before the experimenter returned) and were tracked how well they went on to fare later in life. The results were described in a 1990 study, which suggested that delayed gratification (waiting) had huge life benefits, including higher scores on standardized-test scores.
Watts, T. W., Duncan, G. J., & Quan, H. (2018). Revisiting the marshmallow test: A conceptual replication investigating links between early delay of gratification and later outcomes. Psychological science, 29(7), 1159-1177.
Summary in The Atlantic: https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/06/marshmallow-test/561779/
An example: An employee spends to much time away from her desk; doesn't get much work done.
Worksheet Used in Formative activity
Don Baer's response:
I don’t think that has to be an either-or. It’s a complicated question. Let me take it apart a little. First, I don’t know that all behavior is a product of its environmental history or its genetic history. Those are two major sources of causation that I’ve seen experimental demonstrations of, and it’s clear that they’re powerful and that they have a lot of generality.I don’t know what else is possible. It would be a logical error to assume that the only two things I know about are the only two things there are. I’d rather take a wait-and-see attitude
about that.
But, even so, if as a working hypothesis, I say that people do what they do because of their history, experiential and genetic, and therefore how can I hold them accountable for
their behavior? There are two levels of answers. Morally, I can’t hold them accountable. But, pragmatically, holding people accountable for their behavior is one of the ways of changing
it. Essentially, that is what we do when we create contingencies. We create environments in which if you behave in certain ways, there will be a certain consequence. And if you behave otherwise, there will be a different consequence. And that, I think, is what it comes down to…to say that we’re holding the organism responsible for its behavior. We’re programming consequences differentially for that behavior.I think I helped to raise my children, in effect, by knowing very well that what they did was very largely determined by the kind of environment that my wife and I created for them. But, at the same time, I spoke to them as if they were responsible for their behavior because that was part of creating an environment
Thanks Izzy and Joe, for teaching us to look not only at the current prevailing contingencies, but also the alternative sets.
Janet S. Twyman, Ph.D., BCBA, LBA-NY
Dr. Janet Twyman is an education innovator, thought leader, and founder of blast: A Learning Sciences Company. Her numerous publications and presentations address behavior analysis, instructional design, technology, and educational systems, and includes co-editing three books on educational innovation, personalized learning, and equity. Always passionate about education, Janet been a pre-school and public school teacher, education administrator, researcher, and university professor. She currently holds a faculty appointment as Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, and formerly served as Director of Innovation and Technology for the U.S. Dept of Education funded Center on Innovations in Learning and as Vice President of Instructional Development, Research, & Implementation at Headsprout. She has presented to and worked with education systems, organizations, and institutions over 50 states and countries, including speaking about technologies for diverse learners and settings at the United Nations. While consulting for numerous organizations and serving on several boards and committees, she provides support in research, education innovation, and system refinement. In 2007-08 she served as the President of the Association for Behavior Analysis and in 2014 was named an ABAI Fellow. For her distinguished contributions to educational research and practice she received the 2015 Wing Award for Evidence-based Education and the 2017 American Psychological Association Division 25 Fred S. Keller Behavioral Education Award.