THE S-R ISSUE - ITS STATUS IN BEHAVIOR ANALYSIS AND IN DONAHOE AND PALMERS LEARNING AND COMPLEX BEHAVIOR

The central focus of this essay is whether the effect of reinforcement is best viewed as the strengthening of responding or the strengthenin g of the environmental control of responding. We make the argument tha t adherence to Skinner's goal of achieving a moment-to-moment analysis of behavior compels acceptance of the latter view. Moreover, a thorou ghgoing commitment to a moment-to-moment analysis undermines the funda mental distinction between the conditioning processes instantiated by operant and respondent contingencies while buttressing the crucially i mportant differences in their cumulative outcomes. Computer simulation s informed by experimental analyses of behavior and neuroscience are u sed to illustrate these points.