VB Ch. 3 Mand Flashcards
How is a mand defined
A verbal operant in which the response is reinforced by a characteristic consequence and is therefore under the functional control of relevant conditions of deprivation or aversive stimulation.
It is a convenient name for the type of verbal operant in which a response of given form is characteristically followed by a given consequence in a verbal community.
A mand is a convenient name for what
How does Skinner define the term “language,”
The reinforcing practices of a verbal community
The listener is independently motivated to reinforce the speaker
Request
When the listener’s behavior is thus reinforced by reducing a threat
Command
Promotes reinforcement by generating a emotional dispostion
Prayer/Entreaty
specifies verbal action, and the behavior of the listener permits us to classify it as a request, a command , or a prayer, as the case may be.
Questions
What “several other classes of mands may be distinguished based on the behavior of the listener” (advice, warning, permission, offer, and call)
a. Advice: In mediating the reinforcement of the speaker, the listener will occasionally enjoy consequences in which the speaker does not otherwise participate but which are nevertheless reinforcing.
b. Warning: When by carrying out the behavior specified by the speaker the listener escapes from aversive stimulation.
c. Permission: When the listener is already inclined to act in a given way but is restrained by, for example, a threat, the mand which cancels the threat is called permission.
d. Offer: When gratuitous reinforcement of the behavior of the listener is extended by the speaker.
e. Call: When the speaker characteristically goes on to emit other behavior which may serve as reinforcement for the listener
to what may intention be reduced?
reduced to contingencies of reinforcement
What is a softened and concealed mand
Specify a verbal response.
Any response used in conjunction with different mands specifying different reinforcements comes under the control of different deprivations and acquires certain general properties.
What is please the best known example of
It is strengthened by almost any state of deprivation, and is often emitted without further specification of the behavior of the reinforcer.
How please is strengthened
Mands which cannot be explained by arguing that responses of the same form have been reinforced under similar circumstances (Saying, “Come Seven,” when playing craps).
Superstitious mands
Mands which cannot be accounted for by showing that they have ever had the effect specified or any similar effect upon similar occasions.
Magical mands
