Behavior analysis and the growth of behavioral pharmacology

Drug dependence as a split object: Trajectories of neuroscientification and behavioralization at the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry

Today, drug dependence is often understood as a "brain disease" and as an indication for behavioral therapy. In this article, I trace the historical development of the notions of drug dependence as a neuronal and behavioral problem in the local research context of the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry in Munich, Germany. Focusing on the period from the 1950s to the 1980s, I argue that the neuroscientific and behaviorist understanding of "dependence" had two different trajectories that were yoked together under the same institution of self-proclaimed basic research: (a) the neuroscientific notion derived from an older toxicological approach to drug effects that was then accompanied by biochemical methods from the 1950s onwards, and neurochemical approaches from the 1960s and 1970s; and (b) the behaviorist notion had predecessors in psychotherapeutic approaches to addiction that emerged in the 1950s and took a psychodynamic orientation at the Institute. When the Institute positioned itself as a basic research establishment and developed a unified structure during the 1960s, these psychodynamic approaches were excluded for being "too applied." Soon afterward, behaviorist psychotherapeutic approaches to drug dependence emerged in the 1970s, emphasizing their foundation in basic research. Even though neuroscientific and behaviorist notions had some overlaps through the use of animal experimentation and by referring to basic research, researchers using the two approaches remained separate in their respective units during the time period under analysis. When conceptualizing the local scientific occupation with "drug dependence," I apply here the history of science concept of a "split object." Like the "boundary object," the split object is plastic enough to adapt to local conditions and robust enough to maintain its genuine identity. Compared with the boundary object, however, the split object does not invite scientific collaboration. It does, nonetheless, enable epistemic coexistence under a common institutional goal.

Applied Quantitative Analysis of Behavior: What It Is, and Why We Care-Introduction to the Special Section

Science evolves from prior approximations of its current form. Interest in changes in species over time was not a new concept when Darwin made his famous voyage to the Galapagos Islands; concern with speciation stretches back throughout the history of modern thought. Behavioral science also does and must evolve. Such change can be difficult, but it can also yield great dividends. The focus of the current special section is on a common mutation that appears to have emerged across these areas and the critical features that define an emerging research area-applied quantitative analysis of behavior (AQAB). In this introduction to the "Special Issue on Applications of Quantitative Methods," we will outline some of the common characteristics of research in this area, an exercise that will surely be outdated as the research area continues to progress. In doing so, we also describe how AQAB is relevant to theory, behavioral pharmacology, applied behavior analysis, and health behaviors. Finally, we provide a summary for the articles that appear in this special issue. The authors of these papers are all thinking outside the Skinner box, creating new tools and approaches, and testing them against relevant data. If we can keep up this evolution of methods and ideas, behavior analysis will regain its place at the head of the table!

Nicotine self-administration research: the legacy of Steven R. Goldberg and implications for regulation, health policy, and research

BACKGROUND AND RATIONALE

Steven R. Goldberg was a pioneering behavioral pharmacologist whose intravenous drug self-administration studies advanced the understanding of conditioned stimuli and schedules of reinforcement as determinants of pattern and persistence of drug-seeking behavior, and in particular, the importance of nicotine in tobacco use. His passing in 2014 led to invitations to contribute articles to psychopharmacology dedicated to his work.

OBJECTIVES

The objectives of this review are to summarize and put into historical perspective Goldberg's contributions to elucidate the reinforcing effects of nicotine and to summarize the implications of his research for medication development, tobacco regulation, and potential tobacco control policy options. This includes a review of intravenous nicotine self-administration research from the 1960s to 2016.

RESULTS

Goldberg's application of behavioral pharmacology methods to investigate nicotine reinforcement and the influence of schedule of reinforcement and conditioned stimuli on nicotine administration contributed to the conclusions of the US National Institute on Drug Abuse, and the Surgeon General, that nicotine met the criteria as a dependence-producing drug and cigarette smoking as a prototypic drug dependency or "addiction." Equally important, this work has been systematically extended to other species and applied to address a range of factors relevant to tobacco use, medication development, regulation, and public health policy.

CONCLUSIONS

Steven R. Goldberg was a pioneering scientist whose systematic application of the science of behavioral pharmacology advanced the understanding of tobacco and nicotine use and contributed to the scientific foundation for tobacco product regulation and potential public health tobacco control policy development.

Operant psychology makes a splash--in marine mammal training (1955-1965)

Despite the wide spread use of operant conditioning within marine animal training, relatively little is known about this unique application of behavioral technology. This article explores the expansion of operant psychology to commercial marine animal training from 1955 to 1965, specifically at marine parks such as Marine Studios Florida, Marineland of the Pacific, Sea Life Park, and SeaWorld. The contributions of Keller and Marian Breland and their business Animal Behavior Enterprises (ABE) as well as other early practitioners of behavioral technology are reviewed. We also describe how operant technology was introduced and formalized into procedures that have become the cornerstone of marine animal training and entertainment. The rapid growth of the marine park industry during this time was closely linked to the spread of behavioral technology. The expansion of operant training methods within marine animal training is a unique success story of behavioral technology.

Translational contributions of the experimental analysis of behavior

It has been argued that to increase societal impact behavioral researchers must do more to address problems of obvious practical importance. The basic science wing of behavior analysis has been described as especially detached from this goal, but is it really necessary that basic science demonstrate social relevance? If so, why hasn't this occurred more often, and what can be done to improve the status quo? To address these questions and to stimulate discussion about the future of basic behavior science, I describe two widely embraced arguments in favor of pure basic science (that which is undertaken without concern for practical applications); explain why a translational research agenda is likely to better recruit tangible support for basic science; propose that addressing practical problems does not require basic science to abandon its focus on fundamental principles; and identify some possible impediments to translational innovation that may need to be addressed for basic behavior science to increase its translational footprint.

B. F. Skinner's contributions to applied behavior analysis

Our paper reviews and analyzes B. F. Skinner's contributions to applied behavior analysis in order to assess his role as the field's originator and founder. We found, first, that his contributions fall into five categorizes: the style and content of his science, his interpretations of typical and atypical human behavior, the implications he drew from his science for application, his descriptions of possible applications, and his own applications to nonhuman and human behavior. Second, we found that he explicitly or implicitly addressed all seven dimensions of applied behavior analysis. These contributions and the dimensions notwithstanding, he neither incorporated the field's scientific (e.g., analytic) and social dimensions (e.g., applied) into any program of published research such that he was its originator, nor did he systematically integrate, advance, and promote the dimensions so to have been its founder. As the founder of behavior analysis, however, he was the father of applied behavior analysis.

Comments on the 1950s applications and extensions of Skinner's operant psychology

These comments address Laties', Dewsbury's, and Rutherford's papers on the extension and application of Skinner's operant psychology during the 1950s. I begin by reflecting on the papers' overall theme-that the success of behavior analysis lies in its practical applications-and add some comments on Planck's principle. I then turn to the three papers and address such topics as (a) other applications and extensions (e.g., the U.S. space program), (b) relations between the research and researchers at the Yerkes Laboratories of Primate Biology (e.g., a Yerkes' researcher in Skinner's laboratory), and (c) human schedule performance (e.g., continuity and discontinuity with nonhuman behavior). I end with a discussion of the fundamental reason for the success of the extensions and applications of behavior analysis-the experimental analysis of behavior.

Skinner boxes for psychotics: operant conditioning at Metropolitan State Hospital

Between 1953 and 1965, Ogden Lindsley and his associates conducted free-operant research with psychiatric inpatients and normal volunteers at Metropolitan State Hospital in Waltham, Massachusetts. Their project, originally named "Studies in Behavior Therapy," was renamed "Harvard Medical School Behavior Research Laboratory" in 1955. This name change and its implications were significant. The role of the laboratory in the history of the relationship between the experimental analysis of behavior and applied behavior analysis is discussed. A case is made for viewing Lindsley's early work as foundational for the subfield of the experimental analysis of human behavior that formally coalesced in the early 1980s. The laboratory's work is also contextualized with reference to the psychopharmacological revolution of the 1950s. Finally, a four-stage framework for studying the historical and conceptual development of behavior analysis is proposed.

A bibliometric analysis of research in psychopharmacology by psychology departments (1987-2007)

From the very outset of scientific Psychology, psychologists have shown interest for drugs and their effects on behavior. This has given rise to numerous contributions, mostly in the form of Psychopharmacology publications. The aim of this study was to quantitatively evaluate these contributions and compare them with other academic disciplines related to Psychopharmacology. Using the PubMed database, we retrieved information about articles from 15 journals included in the Pharmacology and Pharmacy category of the Journal Citation Reports database for a 21-year period (1987 to 2007). There were 37540 articles which about 52% were represented by 3 journals. About 70% of psychology publications were represented by 2 of these journals. Psychology departments accounted for the 11% of the published papers, which places Psychology third behind Psychiatry and Pharmacology, which contributed to 22.69 and 13% respectively. Psychology contributed to the greatest number of studies in 3 journals, second in 3 and third in 8. This report represents the first effort to explore the contribution of academic Psychology to the multidisciplinary science of psychopharmacology. Although leaders of production of psychopharmacology research were from Psychiatry and Pharmacology, Psychology departments are an important source of studies and thus of knowledge in the field of Psychopharmacology.

The Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior at fifty

The Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior was founded in 1958 by a group of male psychologists, mainly from the northeastern USA and connected with either Harvard or Columbia. Fifty years later about 20% of both editors and authors reside outside this country and almost the same proportion is made up of women. Other changes in the journal include having its own website for more than a decade and now publishing online as well as on paper. A recent connection with PubMed Central of the National Library of Medicine has made possible the completely free electronic presentation of the entire archive of about 3,800 articles.