Despite the central status of avoidance in explaining the etiology and maintenance of anxiety disorders, surprisingly little behavioral research has been conducted on human avoidance. In the present paper, first we provide a brief review of the empirical literature on avoidance. Next, we describe the implications of research on derived relational…

The successful application of functional analysis to problem behavior suggests the need to examine: additional functional properties of behavior involving social avoidance, biological reinforcement, and respondent conditioning; the role of context (including social factors and biological factors); and the multidimensional character of assessment…

Alcoholics Anonymous was founded in 1935 and observed its 50th anniversary in 1985. This document discusses the changes that have taken place in knowledge about alcoholism. Specifically, this booklet compares what behavioral scientists knew about alcohol abuse and alcoholism in 1935 and what they knew and could do about them in 1985. Contributions…

Recent theoretical and empirical work suggests that precipitating and individual susceptibility factors are involved in the development of depression. This etiological issue was reexamined within a college population. A comprehensive assessment technique, the behavioral-analytic methodology, was used to collect over 1,000 written descriptions of…

This article examines the status of behavioral research on genetic mental retardation syndromes and finds that the field continues to struggle with three methodological issues: (1) how to think about control or contrast groups, (2) the interplay of behavioral phenotypes with development and other within-group variations, and (3) the efficacy of…