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On the Social Acceptability of Behavior-Analytic Terms:
Crowdsourced Comparisons of Lay and Technical
Language
Amel Becirevic
1
&Thomas S. Critchfield
2
&
Derek D. Reed
1
#Association for Behavior Analysis International 2016
Abstract Behavior analysis has a marketing problem. Although behavior analysts
have speculated about the problems regarding our technical behavior-analytic termi-
nology and how our terminology has hindered the dissemination of behavior analysis to
outsiders, few have investigated the social acceptability of the terminology. The present
paper reports the general public’s reactions to technical behavioral jargon versus non-
technical substitute terms that refer to applied behavior-analytic techniques. Two-
hundred participants, all non-behavior analysts, were recruited from Amazon Mechan-
ical Turk and completed a survey on the social acceptability of behavioral jargon and
non-technical terms. Specifically, participants rated the acceptability of how the six
pairs of terms (technical and non-technical) sounded if the treatments were to be
implemented for each of 10 potential populations of clients that behavior analysts
typically work with. The results show that, overall, members of the general public
found non-technical substitute terms more acceptable than technical behavior-analytic
terms. The finding suggests that specialized vocabulary of behavior analysis may create
hurdles to the acceptability of applied behavior-analytic services. The implication of
these findings suggest the importance of a systematic investigation of listener behavior
with respect to behavior analysis terms.
Keywords Amazon mechanical turk .Behavior analysis .Dissemination .Jargon .
Ter min olo gy .Public perception .Social acceptability
BEHAV ANALYST
DOI 10.1007/s40614-016-0067-4
*Derek D. Reed
dreed@ku.edu
1
University of Kansas, 4048 Dole Human Development Center, 1000 Sunnyside Avenue,
Lawrence, KS 66045-7555, USA
2
Illinois State University, Normal, IL, USA
Whatever words we utter should be chosen with care for people will hear them
and be influenced by them for good or ill.∼Buddha
By many accounts, behavior analysis has a marketing problem (Doughty, Holloway,
Shields, and Kennedy 2012; Freedman 2015; Smith 2015). Despite all of the good that
behavior analysts accomplish in research and practice, their contributions remain
relatively unappreciated by the general public compared to those of mainstream
psychology. Normand, (2014) has suggested that the marketing problem stems in part
from a deliberate effort by behavior analysts to distance themselves from the practices
of laypersons and mainstream psychologists: BWe redefined the subject matter of
psychology and redesigned the experiments used to study that subject matter. We
renamed almost every part of the world pertaining to that subject matter. We created
our own organizations and our own journals.^(p. 67).
Skinner e.g., (1953,1974) of course, was an early champion of this distancing,
suggesting even prior to his formal training in psychology that the discipline required a
makeover (see Skinner 1975), and frequently pointed to lay language as inaccurately
characterizing the control of behavior. The point of distancing, therefore, was to avoid
repeating sins of the past and thereby develop better ways of understanding and
controlling behavior—and the many accomplishments of behavior analysis stand in
testament to the importance of this effort.
In recent years concerns have been raised about a potential undesirable side effect of
distancing. The specific worry is that interacting mainly with like-minded individuals
has left behavior analysts unproductively isolated (Friman 2014a; Madden 2013;
Morris 2014; Pietras, Reilly, and Jacobs 2013; Podlesnik 2013;Reed2014;Schlinger
2014; St. Peter 2013; Vyse 2013,2014), both topically (by addressing too few of the
problems that concern the broader population) and linguistically (by discussing impor-
tant problems with language that fails to inspire, inform, or motivate non-behavior
analysts). The present report focuses on the latter concern, which Hineline, (1990)
neatly summarized when he remarked that, BPerhaps the resistance to behavioral
interpretations and techniques arises from our forbidding terms, from the misunder-
stood language of control, or from our eschewal of mentalistic phrasing.^
A critical property of verbal behavior is its influence on the listener. Although in
Verbal Behavior, Skinner, (1957) focused primarily on composition (i.e., dynamics of
speaker behavior), never far from the surface was a concern for audience effects.
Consistent with this influence, over the years, many behavior analysts have commented
on the importance of communicating effectively (e.g., Bailey 1991; Foxx 1996;Morris
1985) and in some cases have attempted to translate the technical jargon of behavior
analysis for a general audience (see Lindsley 1991). Unfortunately, however, it appears
that few behavior analysts have succeeded in the translation (e.g., see Friman 2014b).
Even Skinner experienced difficulties disseminating the science of behavior
1
to non-
behaviorists (e.g., note the sometimes blistering reactions to Verbal Behavior [1957]
and Beyond Freedom and Dignity [1971]; e.g., MacCorquodale 1970).
Ogden Lindsley (1991), who appreciated the marketing problem long before it was
popular to discuss, registered two objections to the technical jargon of behavior
analysis. The first problem is that Bsome jargon, like ‘negative reinforcement’and
1
We us e the t erm behavior analysis here and throughout the manuscript.
BEHAV ANALYST
‘radical behaviorism,’imply [sic] to most people the exact opposite of their technical
meaning^(p. 449). This, Lindsley believed, results in people acting ineffectively when
attempting to measure or change behavior. The second problem is that, BSkinner…
never checked what his technical words meant to most people. It was left for those of us
who applied his free operant principles and methods to struggle with abrasive jargon
like ‘manipulate,’‘control,’‘subject,’and ‘intervene,’which turned users away^(p.
449). The second problem, we submit, is more general and pernicious than the first,
because no one is likely to attempt to intervene using behavior-analytic approaches if
the very language of behavior analysis makes those approaches seem objectionable.
Maurice (1993) colorfully describes this very phenomenon as part of her account of
a lengthy search for services for her daughter. Her initial reaction to behavior-analytic
services was to regard them as Bharsh^(p. 102), Bunnatural^(p. 88), and as a
Busurpation…of will^(p. 89). Compare this initial trepidation to Maurice’s more
positive reaction to the purveyor of an alternative therapy:
Charming, charismatic, Dr. Welch was full of hugs and gentle spontaneous
caresses. Without shyness or reserve, she would reach out and stroke my hair,
or clasp my hand in hers.... BWhat a beautiful mommy Anne-Marie has,^she
murmured, smiling into my eyes, holding my gaze. And then, with a look of
sadness, BWhat a terrible, terrible time this has been for you.^…How caring she
was, how natural, unaffected, how unbelievably concerned (p. 94).
One moral of Maurice’s(1993) story concerns the amount of time that was wasted
on ineffective approaches that seemed attractive based on the persuasive ways in which
they were marketed. In particular, Maurice’s fascination with Dr. Welch delayed her
embrace of behavior-analytic services. The lesson for applied behavior analysts should
be clear: In the marketplace of human services, anything that makes them seem less
warm and approachable—including the use of presumably unpleasant technical
terms—might put them at a disadvantage compared to other kinds of service providers.
We do not suggest that behavior analysts have been completely oblivious to the
marketability problem. A number of studies have examined consumer reactions to
specific interventions, either after they were completed (e.g., Minkin et al. 1976; Wolf
1978) or as they were described prospectively to potential adopters (e.g., Kazdin 1980;
Witt and Martens 1983; Witt, Martens, and Elliott 1984). But this is quite different from
examining how the words of behavior analysis register with listeners. In most previous
studies, behavioral jargon was intermingled with contextual information that also might
influence responding. For instance, Witt et al., (1984) described factors for potential
interventions such as how long they would require to implement, and in traditional
social validity assessment, the consumer has already experienced the benefits of an
intervention.
As part of a general quest to understand the scope and magnitude of the market-
ability problem, we advocate a program of research that will empirically evaluate the
general reactions of non-behavior-analysts to behavior-analytic terms (and, consistent
with Lindsley’s early marketing efforts, substitute terms that might be more acceptable).
To illustrate the approach, we surveyed members of the general population using the
popular crowdsourcing platform Amazon Mechanical Turk (mTurk; see Buhrmester,
Kwang, and Gosling 2011; Mason and Suri 2012; Paolacci and Chandler 2014; Rand
BEHAV ANALYST
2012), which is an online labor market comprised of Bworkers^whose demographic
variability is far more representative of U.S. national diversity than the samples of
typical university-based research studies (Paolacci and Chandler 2014).
2
These workers
can complete brief tasks for financial remuneration (including academic surveys), and
at any given time, over 500,000 workers may be online. The purpose of this investi-
gation was to use a sample of mTurk workers to estimate the general public’sreactions
to technical versus non-technical terms that refer to applied behavior-analytic
techniques.
Method
Participants
Participants were recruited from mTurk and completed the survey as what the mTurk
system refers to as a Human Intelligence Task (HIT). The survey was accessible only to
those mTurk workers in the USA who had completed at least 100 approved HITs and
for whom previous requesters had designated 95 % or more of their previous HITs as
reflecting acceptable quality of work. Workers were paid $0.30 if, within 20 min of
accessing the survey, they completed it and submitted a unique completion code. On
average, workers took 8.32 min (SD = 3.60 min) to do this. Workers who submitted the
survey according to these dictates qualified as participants.
We received data from 204 participants; of the 204, 4 incomplete datasets were
removed. All remaining datasets were considered complete and systematic. Among the
200 participants (M
age
= 37.72, SD
age
= 12.8 years), 50.5 % were male (n= 101) and 80 %
self-identified as Caucasian, with remaining individuals self-identifying as African Amer-
ican (8.5 %), Asian/Asian American (7.0 %), Hispanic/Latino (3.5 %), and Native
Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander, and Other (∼1.0 % combined). Highest completed
level of education consisted of high school/GED (10.0 %), some college (24.5 %), 2-year
college degree (8.5 %), 4-year college degree (38.5 %), Master’s degree (14.0 %),
professional degree (2.5 %), and doctoral degree (2.0 %); 71.5 % reported being
employed, 22.5 % unemployed, and 6.0 % retired. Median total income during the past
year was $40,000 to $44,999 (range under $5,000 to $100,000). Of the participants, most
(87.0 %) reported being unfamiliar with the field of behavior analysis. One individual
reported having a family member who is a Board Certified Behavior Analyst. None of the
participants reported having used behavior-analytic services in the past.
Materials and Procedure
The survey was administered via a survey link which directed participants to a survey
presented using Qualtrics Online Survey Software (http://www.qualtrics.com/). The survey
2
We note that behavior analysts are beginning to use mTurk for behavioral studies on choice and decision
making, and are publishing suchfindings in behavioral journals (Bechler, Green, and Myerson 2015;Bickelet
al. 2014; Jarmolowicz, Bickel, Carter, Franck, and Mueller 2012; Johnson, Herrmann, and Johnson 2015;
Myerson, Baumann, and Green 2014; Roma, Hursh, and Hudja 2016).
BEHAV ANALYST
contained general demographic questions (e.g., gender, age, ethnicity), and six pairs of terms
(six technical behavior-analytic terms and six non-technical substitutes). The six technical
behavior-analytic terms (non-technical su bstitute in parentheses) included: escape extinct ion
(follow-through training), negative reinforcement (relieving consequences), negative pun-
ishment (penalty), chaining (teaching a sequence of responses), operant conditioning (learn-
ing from consequences), and reinforcement (incentivizing). The inspiration for the specific
word pairs came from Lindsley’s, (1991) translations from technical jargon to plain English,
although modifications were made to reflect contemporary usage of the terms.
Each of the 12 terms was presented with the following instruction:
Assume that a behavior analyst has conducted an appropriate battery of behav-
ioral assessments and has recommended a treatment for a socially important
behavior/performance issue. How acceptable does the recommended treatment
sound for each population of treatment clients?
A specific treatment was presented in large, boldface letters (e.g., BRecommended
treatment:Escape Extinction^), followed by 10 visual analog scales (VAS), each
representing a type of population with which a behavior analyst might work: infants/
toddlers, preschool children, children with special needs, elementary-aged students,
high school students, college students, athletes, employees, adults with special needs,
and senior citizens. Each VAS consisted of a 100-mm horizontal line with ends labeled
as BCompletely Unacceptable^and BCompletely Acceptable.^On each line, a slider
could be moved with the mouse to any location on this scale.
Results
Analyses focused on comparing ratings given to a technical term and its non-technical
substitute. For economy of expression, we will refer to these comparisons as participant
preferences (although, technically speaking, participants did not select between terms,
but instead rated them separately). Because the D’Agostino-Pearson omnibus normality
test indicated that VAS responses were not normally distributed, workers’responses to
the behavior analysis and substitute term in each pair were compared using the two-
tailed Wilcoxon matched-pairs signed rank test. All rating differences were statistically
significant except for those labeled as BNS^(non-significant) in Fig. 1.
Figure 1shows the mean participant ratings for each term for each of the 10
populations of clients. Substitute terms were reliably rated as more acceptable than
technical terms for all 10 populations for five out of the six pairs of terms. The
behavior-analytic term Breinforcement^as rated more favorably than the substitute,
Bincentivizing^for every category of client except Bemployees^and Bcollege
students,^though in all of the instances the mean difference was of modest magnitude.
Discussion
Overall, members of the general public who were not behavior analysts found non-
technical substitute terms, based on those suggested by Lindsley, (1991), to be more
BEHAV ANALYST
acceptable than technical behavior-analytic terms. There are many ways to construct
survey items, and item construction can influence survey responding (e.g., Couper,
Traugott, and Lamias 2001; Moser and Kalton 1971), so we extrapolate from these
results only cautiously and while acknowledging a need for additional studies to
evaluate the generality of the effects. For now, it may be observed that the effects are
consistent with the suggestion that behavior analysis has a marketing problem
(Doughty et al. 2012;Freedman2015;Smith2015), and these effects suggest that
the specialized vocabulary of behavior analysis may create hurdles to the acceptability
of applied behavior-analytic services.
0 25 50 75 100
0255075100
Infants/Toddlers
Preschool Children
Children with Special Needs
Elemen tary-Age d Studen ts
High School Students
College Students
Athletes
Employees
Adults with Special Needs
Senior Citizens
0 2550751000 25 50 75 100
0 2550751000 25 50 75 1000 255075100
0255075100
Infants/Toddlers
Preschool Children
Children with Special Needs
Elemen tary-Age d Studen ts
High School Students
College Students
Athletes
Employees
Adults with Special Needs
Senior Citizens
75 100
0255075100
Infants/Toddlers
Preschool Children
Children with Special Needs
Elemen tary-Age d Stude nts
High School Students
College Students
Athletes
Employees
Adults with Special Needs
Senior Citizens
0255075100
Follow -Thro ugh T raining
Escape Extinction
Acceptability Rating for Use with Treatment Population
(0 = Completel
y
Unacceptable; 100 = Completel
y
Acceptable)
Relieving Consequences
Negative Reinforcement
Penalty
Negative Punishment
Teaching a Sequence of Responses
Chaining
Learning from Consequences
Operant Conditioning
Incentiv izing
Reinforcement
NS
NS
Potential Treatment Population
Fig. 1 Means and 95 % CI for participants’rating for technical behavior-analytic terms (closed circles)and
lay terms (open circles). NS depicts non-significant statistical differences
BEHAV ANALYST
Unaddressed in our survey is exactly why members of the general public found
behavior-analytic terms to be problematic. One possibility is simply that technical terms
are unfamiliar. A sizeable literature on dissemination indicates that innovations are
most likely to be adopted when they are compatible with existing cultural practices
(e.g., Rogers 2003), especially considering that communication largely dominates
cultural practices (e.g., Aune, Hunter, Kim, and Kim 2001; Infante and Rancer
1996).
3
It follows that people who Btalk funny^are unlikely to be well-regarded
(e.g., Wright and Bougie 2007). A more specific possible interpretation of our results
was communicated by one participant who spontaneously wrote to us that, BSome of
the behavior approaches sounded cruel, even medieval.^This reaction is consistent
with Lindsley’s, (1991) observation that, in his experience, non-behavior analysts find
technical terms to be Babrasive^(p. 449); with Maurice’s, (1993) observation that
consumers may initially view behavioral interventions as Bharsh^(p. 102); and with the
view, sometimes propagated by non-behavior-analytic professionals, that behavioral
interventions are psychologically damaging (Maurice 1993; see also Kohn 1993).
To paraphrase Skinner, (1957,1977), the listener is always right, or, as Lindsley,
(1991)observed:BYou should select words for their impact on the listener, not on the
speaker^(p. 449). Although Lindsley claimed to have developed non-technical substi-
tute terms by vetting them with non-specialists, he presented no data to support his
proposition that such people respond more positively to the substitute terms than their
technical equivalents. Similarly, contextual behavioral psychologists have argued for
the use of middle level functional terms that Bserve as shortcuts for applying basic
principles and theories to complex situations^(Villardaga et al. 2009, p. 115), but we
have not seen any data validating their superiority over technical terms. The present
findings might be largely predictable, but that does not diminish their standing as an
empirical demonstration of an effect that numerous observers have thought to be
important to the dissemination and societal support of behavior analysis.
Although behavior analysts have speculated about the linguistic basis of their
marketability problem more often than they have examined it empirically, the present
findings do have some precedent in the literature. Witt, Moe, Gutkin, and Andrews
(1984) found that classroom teachers responded more negatively to interventions that
were described using behavioral terms (e.g., time out) versus everyday language
(having a quiet time). Interestingly, acceptability of behaviorally described interven-
tions declined as a function of years of teaching experience, suggesting that the more
entrenched an alternative vocabulary, the more objectionable behavior-analytic lan-
guage will be (Witt, Martens, et al. 1984. More generally, it appears that people respond
negatively to jargon, behavioral or otherwise, in part because it promotes awkward
phrasing and tends to lack human-interest narrative features (Klare, Mabry, and
Gustafson 1955a,1955b). For example, Witt, Moe, et al. (1984) found that, like
behavior-analytic jargon, humanistic psychology jargon also contributed to negative
evaluation of some interventions.
3
Although it is beyond the scope of this paper to address the extent to which people, particularly those in
Western cultures, understand behavioral phenomena, including verbal and social behavior, we refer interested
readers to Field and Hineline (2008) for a systematic discussion on the ubiquity of dispositional causes (i.e.,
traditional interpretations) for complex, temporally extended behavioral phenomena; namely, the verbal
community may be uncomfortable with behavioral interpretations and prose that are distinct from their
particular terms.
BEHAV ANALYST
Behavior analysts might take some comfort in the fact that one of the six targeted
technical terms in our survey, Breinforcement,^was not reliably judged as less accept-
able than a possible substitute term, Bincentivizing.^One interpretation of this finding
is that Breinforcement,^complete with relatively accurate connotations, has made its
way into the lay vocabulary, thereby representing a rare success in the quest to
behavioralize the culture. It is equally possible, of course, that Breinforcement^was
deemed acceptable precisely because the term is widely misunderstood (e.g., people
sometimes use it to mean Bbeing nice^in a non-contingent fashion). Our survey was
not intended to parse precisely what the target terms meant to participants, but of course
that could be a productive focus of future studies.
Close inspection of Fig. 1shows that, in a majority of cases (41 out of 60 instances)
across the six pairs of terms, the absolute mean ratings of behavioral terms were in the
negative range of the BCompletely Unacceptable^to BComplete Acceptable^rating
scale. This is noteworthy in light of research documenting a general positivity bias in
language, that is, a tendency for people to use words with pleasant connotations more
often than words with unpleasant connotations (Dodds et al. 2015;Kloumann,
Danforth, Harris, Bliss, and Dodds 2012). If, as the present modest survey may suggest,
behavioral terms tend to be regarded as unpleasant, one wonders about the effects on
listeners when behavior analysts use the terms. It is reasonable to suggest that con-
sumers may seek out professionals whose behavior they find to be pleasant, and avoid
those whose behavior they find to be unpleasant.
Of course, the adverse effects of poorly chosen language are not limited to con-
sumers of therapy services. College students, for instance, typically enter a first
behavior analysis course with little to no understanding of behavioral principles and
interventions, and as Lindsley, (1991) pointed out they may decide whether to pursue
further study of behavior analysis partly based on the quality of their experience in the
course. Because students emerge from the general population, they are likely to regard
jargon with the same disfavor as our participants, and therefore a too-early, too-intense
immersion in technical vocabulary may contribute to an unfavorable experience. As
Lindsley argued, there is a need for substitute terms that bring novice’s behavior under
control of the functional relations of behavior without being off-putting.
Also noteworthy is the demand on behavior analysts who work in multidisciplinary
settings to maintain good relations with other kinds of professionals. As Friman
(2014b) has described, unfortunately, few behavior analysts appear to have developed
sophisticated repertoires for recruiting non-behavior analysts into productive collabo-
ration (see also Hearst 1967). A colorful example of this problem was offered by
Berger, (1973), who observed that:
When the behaviorists …begin to discuss conjunctive schedules and respondent
discrimination, the social workers turn pale and begin to leave the room…The
avoidance behavior of the social worker is understandable. Nowhere in the
archives of psychology is there more esoteric nomenclature and mathematical
formulation than in the behaviorist’s repertoire (p. 106).
It is reasonable to suggest that productive collaboration requires conversation, a core
prerequisite of which would seem to be reliance on mutually acceptable and under-
standable terms.
BEHAV ANALYST
The most obvious implication of the present study is to suggest the importance of a
systematic investigation of listener behavior with respect to behavior analysis terms.
Knowing the ways in which various listeners respond to various terms—as a matter of
empirical demonstration rather than speculation—provides a basis for deciding which
existing terms to retain, and which to supplement, for which purposes. For example,
according to one interpretation, our results are consistent with the assumption that
Breinforcement^is adequate for use with laypersons, but Bescape extinction^and
Bchaining^probably are not. The results might, however, be different with other kinds
of respondents (e.g., speech-language therapists who have been exposed to behavioral
concepts and technology). Empirical approaches also are recommended for determin-
ing which specific substitute terms to embrace.
Some behavior analysts may regard the methodology that we employed with
suspicion due to the dismissal of verbal-report methods by Skinner, (1953)andby
some pioneering applied behavior analysts. As Baer, Wolf, and Risley (1968) observed,
in most analyses of a person’sbehavior,Bthe relevant question is not what he can say,
but what he can do^(p. 93). When the topic of interest is verbal behavior, however,
what a person can say is one important thing that the person can do, and there is plenty
of precedent for assuming that that what people say about intervention acceptability
correlates with their practical responses (e.g., Kazdin 1980; Rapucci and Saunders
1974; Witt and Martens 1983; Wolf 1978; for a more general discussion of the potential
utility of verbal-report methods, see Critchfield and Epting 1998; Critchfield, Tucker,
and Vuchinich 1998). We suggest, therefore, that survey responses can provide a
valuable preliminary glimpse into the impact that behavioral jargon has on the behavior
of non-behavior analysts.
Consider the example from Rolider, Axelrod, and Van Houten (1998) who surveyed
behavior analysts and non-behavior analysts about their perceived understanding of
behavior-analytic procedures, the extent to which they deemed the procedure as
legitimate and compassionate, and the extent to which the hypothetical client was
viewed as a participant in the treatment. Their results suggest that the heavy use of
technical jargon decreased the non-behavior analysts’understanding of the behavioral
procedures and evoked unfavorable emotional reactions (Rolider et al. 1998). Of
course, a thoroughgoing program of research on jargon and its substitutes will include
non-survey methods that examine what people actually do after encountering behav-
ioral jargon (e.g., whether consumers accept or reject a given type of intervention; and
whether or not non-experts are led to they effectively pinpoint, measure, and intervene
to change behavior).
Notwithstanding the nature of the verbal-report method employed in this study,
some limitations remain, particularly regarding the representativeness of respondents
obtained from mTurk and the use of a relatively small number of behavior-analytic
terms and lay terms. Although this is the first study to examine social acceptability of
behavior-analytic terms using mTurk, a number of recent studies have employed
similar crowdsourcing methods, particularly within psychology and linguistics (see
Lengel and Mullins-Sweatt 2016 and Sprouse 2011, respectively). However, the
skeptical reader ought to question the generality of results obtained from people
completing computerized tasks (i.e., mTurkers); we remind the reader, however, to
consider the benefits of using mTurk (ease of use, low cost, broad sample of the
American public; see Paolacci and Chandler 2014) relative to traditional survey-based
BEHAV ANALYST
methods relying primarily on small samples of undergraduate students. Regardless,
future studies should attempt to compare the acceptability of terms across various
populations and settings, especially in the service field (i.e., behavior analysts working
with clients). The inspiration for the specific word pairs in our study came from
Lindsley’s, (1991) translations from technical jargon to plain English, although mod-
ifications were made to reflect more modern usage of the terms. We invite future
studies to investigate social acceptability of other popular behavior-analytic terms and
their presumed lay counterparts.
In conclusion, it may be said that the incentive for studying the impact of behavior
analysis jargon on listener behavior is twofold. One thrust is to promote dissemination
by identifying terms that do not create listener responses that interfere with dissemina-
tion. Lindsley, (1991) went so far as to regard this as the hallmark of a successfully
disseminated science. Science promotes the development of technology, and conse-
quently, as happened in behavior analysis, technology often inherits the language of its
progenitor science. An often-overlooked next step, according Lindsley (see also Fixsen,
Naoom, Blase, Friedman, and Wallace 2005; Rogers 2003), is to divorce technology
from the native scientific vocabulary and embed it in a way of speaking that is
consistent with the existing practices of potential adopters:
A technology has only a technical jargon, but…a profession has both a technical
jargon and a set of plain English equivalents.... The development of accurate,
comfortable application names may be one of the most important steps in moving
from a technology to a profession. (p. 450).
In a human-services marketplace full of non-behavioral approaches, it is a reason-
able bet that competitor models of service delivery have observed the need to adopt
user-friendly language (e.g., see Green 1996), calling to mind Wolf’s, (1978)seminal
statement about the importance of social validity in behavior analysis:
It is clear that a number of the most important concepts in our culture are
subjective, perhaps even the most important. Martin Luther, as the story goes,
was severely criticized for setting Protestant hymns to the popular melodies of
songs and dances of the time. He replied, BWhy should we let the devil have all
the best tunes?^(p. 210).
A very direct means of discovering what Btunes^(terms) are most acceptable to
members of the general public is to ask them.
A second reason to study the effects of jargon on listener behavior is to
achieve conceptual consistency in how terminology is regarded. Rorty, (1991)
cautioned against assuming that a technical scientific vocabulary accurately
represents a Btrue reality^whereas a lay vocabulary does not. The only valid
measure of vocabulary is heuristic—its effectiveness in promoting the prediction
and control of behavior (Leigland 2010), one aspect of which concerns the
willingness of the public to engage with behavior-analytic services. If the
marketing problem in behavior analysis is real, and if inflexible allegiance to
jargon is one of its origins, then to date, behavior analysts have done a poor
job of applying their own functional perspective on verbal behavior to problems
BEHAV ANALYST
regarding their own societal acceptance, and new data are needed to guide a
solution to this problem.
Acknowledgments We thank Gideon Naudé and Rachel Jackson for valuable feedback on drafts of the
manuscript and Ed Morris for the many insightful conversations about the importance of using language for its
effect on the specific audience. We also acknowledge Patrick Friman for inspiring us to examine our own
levels of jargon.
All reviews and editorial decisions for this manuscript were handled independently by Guest Associate
Editor Philip N. Hineline.
Compliance with Ethical Standards
Funding The authors used no grant funding in this study.
Ethical Approval All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance
with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki
declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.
Informed Consent Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.
Conflict of Interest The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
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