Mexican Journal of Behavior Analysis

Editorial

Mario Serrano — 2024-11-28

The Mexican Society for Behavior Analysis (MSBA) and the Mexican Journal of Behavior Analysis (MJBA) are in mourning. On August 25, the most staunch experimental behavior analyst our country has ever had left this world: Dr. Carlos Antonio Bruner e Iturbide. Those of us who knew him know that his teaching and research work within what he himself categorically called scientific Psychology will have no equivalent. The members of MSBA and the editorial team of MJBA wish a prompt resignation to his relatives, especially to his wife: Dr. Laura Acuña Morales, as well as his numerous students and friends.

Carlos A. Bruner Iturbide: In Memoriam

Kennon A. Lattal — 2024-11-28

Carlos A. Bruner Iturbide was a distinguished contributor to the worldwide community of behavior analysts for more than 50 years. After receiving his licenciatura with distinction from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) in 1968, he attained a Ph. D. degree in psychology under one of the leading scholars of behavioral psychology, Nat Schoenfeld, from Queens College of the City University of New York in 1981. By that time, he already had joined the faculty of the School of Psychology at UNAM, where he held the rank of Professor. Carlos was first recognized as a National Researcher in 1984, when the title was established by the National Research System (CONACYT). He subsequently rose through the levels of recognition to the highest, Level III, a recognition that he continued to hold along with his title of Professor at UNAM until his death. From 1996 to 2023, he also held the highest appointment in UNAM’s Program for Academic Performance, a program that recognizes the University’s most productive professors and scholars. Over Carlos’s long academic career, his laboratory was known internationally for its steady stream of high-quality behavioral research. That research, which included over 140 scientific articles and chapters and 17 doctoral dissertations, received extensive government and institutional support through the appointments noted above and a variety of other funding sources.

Obituario: Carlos A. Bruner Iturbide

Jorge Alberto Ruiz Vázquez — 2024-11-28

El 25 de agosto falleció Carlos Bruner y tal cual lo dijo su esposa la Dra. Laura Acuña Morales cuando compartió la fatídica noticia: “La psicología perdió hoy a uno de sus mayores defensores y enamorados”. El curriculum del Dr. Bruner refleja de manera clara y con instancias de sobra, la magnitud de lo que implicaron sus múltiples contribuciones en el desarrollo de la Psicología en México y en el extranjero en las últimas décadas. Tan solo la cantidad de publicaciones en libros y revistas científicas es sobresaliente, pero si se toma en cuenta cada una de las demás actividades académicas en las que tuvo participación su importancia se multiplica.

Individual training in shared tasks with different levels of complexity

Carlos Raúl Zenteno Robledo — 2024-11-28

The functional levels at which individual contingencies are structured within shared ones modify behavioral interactions. This study aimed to identify the effects of individual training at different functional levels on solving shared tasks. Sixty students were organized into six groups, three of which received individual training through the Assembly Task (AT) at varying levels of complexity (contextual, supplementary, and selector), while the remaining groups received no training. Subsequently, in a shared test, all participants solved the AT in dyads. The results indicated that the higher the task complexity, the more trials were required to meet performance criteria. In shared situations, groups that received training had a higher number of correct trials. The conclusions suggest that prior exposure to tasks at different levels of complexity enhances performance in shared situations.

Reinforcement parameters in resistance to extinction in humans

Diana Elisabeth Reza Morales — 2024-11-28

Resistance to extinction refers to the persistence of an operant after discontinuing the reinforcement associated with it. The Behavioral Momentum Theory indicates that an operant is more resistant to change when associated with a component with a greater frequency or magnitude of reinforcement. This has been consistently shown in non-human organisms. However, there are inconsistencies in the results obtained with humans that could be explained methodologically by the type of tasks and the type of reinforcements used in the experiments. The aim of this study was to analyze the effects of varying the frequency and magnitude of reinforcement under a resistance-to-extinction paradigm. Eighteen university students between 18 and 26 years old participated, distributed in three experiments. Results indicated that using a novel experimental task with precise instructions favors individual-level consistency with humans. However, it is important to verify the type of analysis been chosen.

What happens when you write? Interrelation of linguistic modes as a methodological proposal for the study of writing

Alfonso López Corral — 2024-11-28

The intricate nature of the writing phenomenon often creates the appearance of an inscrutable event. Various disciplines dealing with this phenomenon have asked questions such as: what is writing? Why and for what purpose do we write? Psychology has offered answers to such questions, adapting their formulation according to the theoretical position in question. The present work has the purpose of offering an answer to the question "what happens when writing?". For this purpose, writing psychological models (cognitive and behavioral) are reviewed and the concepts that support this paper are detailed: linguistic modes and linguistic enabling. We also discuss the possibility of studying the extent of the writing episode, as well as the connection between different writing episodes, through the concept of alternation of linguistic modes. Finally, we outline some characteristics of a task or experimental situation that allows the empirical evaluation of different degrees of molar-molecularity of writing, as an activity extensible in time and space that can be segmented into multiple interrelated episodes.

Delegation of authority and ask-do correspondence of the delegate in the compliance of university students

Cynthia Contreras Garza — 2024-11-28

Different ways of delegating authority to one of the participants in a group of university students were compared. The influence that the delegate's behavior had on the compliance of the rest of the participants was also analyzed -whether or not the delegate was acting in correspondence with the request that he made during the sessions. A puzzle-assembly task was used, and 32 university students were randomly divided into eight groups exposed to different experimental conditions. After training in authority phase and two diagnostic conditions, groups 1 and 1A, were exposed to a condition in which the experimenter explicitly delegated authority; in groups 2 and 2A, authority was delegated by the group; in groups 3 and 3A, authority was self-delegated; while in groups 4 and 4A, authority was not delegated. Groups 1 to 4 were exposed to correspondence in the delegate's actions concerning his request to the group members, while groups 1A, 2A, 3A, and 4A were exposed to a non-correspondence condition. Results showed that participants in the explicit delegation groups (by the experimenter or by the group) performed more compliance responses. In contrast, participants in the non-delegation groups performed these behaviors in fewer numbers.

Feedback function of the stimulus situation, the response, and the consequence

María Ximena Moreno Yescas — 2024-11-28

This study is framed within the taxonomy for the analysis of descriptions proposed by Ortiz et al. (2008). This study aimed to analyze the acquisition of the feedback function of each component of a situation (i.e. stimulus situation, response, and consequence) presented as informative messages in a first-order matching-to-sample task with geometric figures. Participants were exposed to said messages after each trial and made pre-contact and post-contact descriptions periodically. It was observed that the participants exposed to the informative messages which included the Consequence component followed the correct matching criteria in the task, as opposed to the rest of the groups. This is discussed in terms of the acquisition of the feedback function following the performances in the pre and post-test and the transfer tasks.

Competent participative leadership: A measurement proposal

Isaac Camacho — 2024-11-28

This paper proposes a measurement system of the competence in the organizational practices related to three empirical functions of participative leadership in small business. After a description of the functions of innovation, management feedback and operative exemplar which constitute the organizational practices of small business owners, an example is showed as an illustration of the measurement of such variables. Subsequently, some intervention possibilities and the virtues of such measurements are discussed in terms of continuing with training programs for small business owners. The conclusions outline the utility of the data derived from such measurements in establishing objective goals and performance standards for any behaviorally oriented professional service delivery directed at small business owners.