Toward Consistent Terminology in a Behaviorist Approach to Cultural Analysis

Abstract

This article represents an attempt to reach consensus on terms frequently used by its authors, who share an interest in extending a behaviorist worldview to cultural phenomena. Definitions of metacontingency, macrobehavior, macrocontingency, culturo-behavioral lineage, and cultural cusp were 1 A meeting ultimately resulting in this paper was held as part of a regional conference of the Brazilian Society of Psychology, partially supported by FAPESP (grant# 2015/00662-9) and CAPES (grant# 23038.000149/2015-51), which included funding for Marcelo Frota Lobato Benvenuti (University of São Paulo). The meeting discussions were contributed equally by all the authors. In addition, contributions were made by Molli Luke (representing Mark Mattaini) and Julio de Rose. Meeting participants requested Sigrid Glenn to write this article based on meeting discussions. Several drafts were sent to all meeting participants and those who responded with comments, references or suggestions are included as authors of the paper. Maria Malott and Sigrid Glenn met to formulate examples of key concepts and develop the content of figures, which Malott created. In addition, Malott generously got the paper into APA format. Further tinkering resulted in the current version. After Glenn and Malott, authors are listed in alphabetical order. The authors thank