Skinner: a cultura como um compromisso da ciéncia

Abstract

From 1930 to 1953 Skinner published fifty articles and three books. Most of the fundamental concepts of his system were elaborated during this period. The basis for a science of behavior were laid by 1953, and a trend within Psychology existed with certain force by the middle of the fifties, which has been called, since 1945, radical behaviorism, What is of interest here is to follow up the development of Skinner's work during this period emphasizing that:
1- From Its beginning Skinner intended to build a science of human behavior, which would enable man to predict and control his own behavior.
2- This construction, constrained by a set of principles, can he viewed as a process with three major periods, two of them characterized by three movements: the proposal of a program of investigation, the data gathering, and the systematization of results on a theoretical proposal. The first period enclosed the lime span from 1930 to 1938, the second the interval between 1938 and 1947, and the third is the period that goes from 1947 lo 1953.
3- The first period leads to the proposal of a conceptual system that intends lo explain the behavior of all organisms; the second is viewed as a transition period when the extension of the scope of a science of behavior is prepared; and the third is the period when a more mature system is presented explicitly as a science that can describe all human behavior and solve human problems through the control and manipulation of culture. 4- Such a science of behavior, informed by radical behaviorisrn, is presented as the only tool, opposed not only to other "human sciences'', but also to politics, ethics and history, that would enable the survival of the human species. Such survival could be obtained only through the construction and survival of culture, which becomes, therefore, the privileged object of a science of human behavior.
5- But, what is of great relevance, a science of human behavior will guarantee, because it contains on its basic program the appropriate postulates for it, the attainance of some fundamental "values", for each and every man: equality, happiness, the sensation of freedom, and an impulse tor the future. Such "values" become goals of a science of behavior – results to be obtained by such science, measures against which lo evaluate the social planner and the scientist's behavior, and characteristics of the individual under contingencies of reinforcement planned by a science of behavior.
6- For all this, it becomes a necessary feature of the science of behavior its commitment to culture and its transformation, which will become the only real test to the truth of its principles and concepts.