Information, Norms, and Adherence 1
Running Head: Information, Norms, and Adherence
Evaluating Theory-based Evaluation: Information, Norms, and Adherence
W. Jake Jacobs a,*, Melissa Sisco a, Dawn Hill a,
Frederic Malter a, b, & Aurelio José Figueredo a
aDepartment
of Psychology
1503 E University Blvd.
PO Box 210068
Psychology Bldg. Rm. 312
Tucson AZ 85721
bEvaluation,
Research, and Development Unit (ERDU)
2030 E. Speedway Blvd.
Tucson, AZ, 85719
*Address
correspondence to
W. Jake Jacobs
Department of Psychology
1503 E University Blvd.
PO Box 210068
Psychology Bldg. Rm. 312
Tucson AZ 85721
Phone: +1 (520) 626-4825
Fax: +1 (520) 621-9306
email addresses: wjj@u.arizona.edu; sisco@u.arizona.edu, dawnh@email.arizona.edu,
fredericmalter@WEB.DE, ajf@u.arizona.edu respectively.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 2
Abstract
Programmatic social interventions attempt to produce appropriate social-norm-guided
behavior in an open environment. A marriage of applicable psychological theory,
appropriate program evaluation theory, and integration of the outcome of evaluations of
a coherent corpus of social interventions assures the acquisition of cumulative theory
and the production of successful social interventions – the marriage permits us to
advance knowledge by making use of both successes and failures. We briefly review
well-established principles within the field of program evaluation, well-established
processes involved in changing social norms and social-norm adherence, the outcome
of several program evaluations focusing on smoking prevention, pro-environmental
behavior, and rape prevention and, using the principle of learning from our failures,
examine why these programs often do not perform as expected. Finally, we discuss the
promise of learning from our collective experiences to develop a cumulative science of
program evaluation and to improve the performance of extant and future interventions.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 3
Information, Norms, and Adherence 4
Keywords
Program evaluation;
Experimenting society;
Psycho-educational intervention;
Social norms;
Norm adherence;
Instrumental verbiage;
Instrumental behavior;
Rule;
Governance;
Altruistic punishment;
Automaticity;
Declarative routines;
Procedural routines;
Smoking prevention programs;
Pro-environmental programs;
Sexual violence prevention programs;
Information, Norms, and Adherence 5
Abstract
Programmatic social interventions attempt to produce appropriate social-norm-guided
behavior in an open environment. A marriage of applicable psychological theory,
appropriate program evaluation theory, and integration of the outcome of evaluations of
a coherent corpus of social interventions assures the acquisition of cumulative theory
and the production of successful social interventions – the marriage permits us to
advance knowledge by making use of both successes and failures. We briefly review
well-established principles within the field of program evaluation, well-established
processes involved in changing social norms and social-norm adherence, the outcome
of several program evaluations focusing on smoking prevention, pro-environmental
behavior, and rape prevention and, using the principle of learning from our failures,
examine why these programs often do not perform as expected. Finally, we discuss the
promise of learning from our collective experiences to develop a cumulative science of
program evaluation and to improve the performance of extant and future interventions.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 6
Keywords
Program evaluation;
Experimenting society;
Psycho-educational intervention;
Social norms;
Norm adherence;
Instrumental verbiage;
Instrumental behavior;
Rule;
Altruistic punishment;
Automaticity;
Declarative routines;
Procedural routines;
Smoking prevention programs;
Pro-environmental programs;
Sexual violence prevention programs
Information, Norms, and Adherence 7
Evaluating Theory-based Evaluation: Information, Norms, and Adherence
1. General introduction
The central purpose of this paper is to illustrate how program evaluation can be
used to generate cumulative scientific knowledge. Such knowledge may be useful to
policy makers when developing social programs and to program evaluators when
evaluating intervention programs containing certain ineffective common elements but
omitting other more effective elements. To accomplish this, we review three distinct
kinds of information-only or psycho-educational interventions in the fields of rape
prevention, pro-environmental behavior, and smoking prevention. We review the
program theory underlying these information-only interventions and critique those
interventions from the perspective of Pragmatic Behavioral theory. We then review the
results of several program evaluations in the three domains and compare the empirical
results to theoretical predictions.
We begin by discussing the promise for this kind of program-theoretical review and
analysis for the prospect of creating cumulative evaluation theory. The basic point of the
exercise is that, as long as we approach evaluations in a piecemeal program-byprogram fashion, we cannot create a cumulative body of knowledge, and we will
continue to implement ineffective social interventions. On the other hand, by learning
from our collective experiences and developing a cumulative science of program
evaluation, we can implement effective methods that improve the performance of extant
and future interventions. Fortunately, there have been great strides made in recent
years in accomplishing that goal in several areas of evaluation research. Our immediate
goal is therefore to apply these promising approaches to the problem of evaluating
Information, Norms, and Adherence 8
psycho-educational interventions. To accomplish these objectives, we need to match
program evaluation theory and applicable psychological theories governing
mechanisms that produce open-environment social-norm-guided behaviors targeted by
psycho-educational interventions.
We therefore begin this integration by describing a need to develop cumulative
theory in program evaluation, based on relevant principles developed within the field of
program evaluation, and citing contemporary examples where this ongoing endeavor
meets with provisional success. Based on these principles, we then reconstruct and
articulate a general theory, based on some well-known examples from environmental
education, that we assert underpins virtually all psycho-educational programs. We then
propose an alternative model that describes several properties and operating
characteristics of well-established learning mechanisms and psychological processes
involved in changing social norms and social-norm adherence targeted by many
psycho-educational interventions.
Our immediate goals are therefore not to critique or somehow redirect program
evaluation but to merely practice it ourselves, as numerous program evaluation theorists
cited below strongly recommend, by gleaning cumulative knowledge regarding the
performance (or lack thereof) of psycho-educational interventions across several
domains and proposing a body of relevant behavioral theory to account for these
results. For the sake of brevity within the present work, we refer the interested reader to
a book chapter in the Oxford Handbook of Quantitative Methods, containing numerous
critiques and recommendations for the practice of program evaluation, now in press, for
a fuller treatment of that subject matter (Figueredo, Wolf, Olderbak, Schlomer, & Garcia,
Information, Norms, and Adherence 9
2011). For now, our immediate intent is not so much to draw implications for program
evaluation, as to draw implications from program evaluation for present and future
public policy. In so doing, however, we outline a heuristic model that other program
evaluators might find useful in the evaluation of psycho-educational interventions.
2. Cumulative theory in program evaluation
Campbell’s (1971/1991) famous paper, “Methods for the Experimenting Society”,
outlined how society can use the results from program evaluations to increase its
knowledge of the kinds of social interventions that do and do not work. Campbell
envisioned a perpetually experimenting society that uses its collective experiences to
assess the results of different social programs, and then revises and improves those
programs in light of the results of previous assessments. The outcome of formal
program evaluation provides critical feedback based on those results.
Lipsey (1993) elaborated this basic idea, proposing that we learn the most from
program evaluations that test specific causal theories of process mediation rather than
treat programs as black boxes: “Treatment theory is a set of propositions regarding
what goes on in the black box during the transformation of input to output” (p. 11).
According to Weiss (1998), program theory (for present purposes synonymous with
treatment theory) “…refers to the mechanisms that mediate between delivery and
receipt of the program and the emergence of outcomes of interest” (p. 57). Similarly,
Rogers, Petrosino, Huebner, and Hacsi’s (2000) Program Theory Evaluation (PTE),
“…consists of an explicit theory or model of how the program causes the intended or
observed outcomes and an evaluation that is at least partly guided by this model” (p. 5).
Weiss (1997), however, noted that testing treatment theory is not trivial:
Another example would be efforts to change such behaviors as low school grades, delinquency,
Information, Norms, and Adherence 10
and domestic violence through programs that seek to raise self-esteem and self-confidence.
Theory-based evaluation could be directed at investigating the viability of such central theoretical
premises. Evaluations that test such macro-theoretical assumptions will require multiple cases and
will be difficult to do. The quest will probably be more appropriate for meta-analysis than for single
studies. (p. 52)
This theory-testing enterprise presupposes an experimenting society that derives
cumulative knowledge from a history of social programs and principled evaluation
outcomes -- rather than from a history of program-by-program “trial-and-error” learning
(Campbell 1971/1991; Lipsey, 1993). Similarly, Brownson, Gurney, and Land (1999)
proposed that accumulating this type of evidence leads to recommendations for more
specific programs of action and that ”…the impetus for action is strengthened by
consistent findings from a series of well-conducted studies” (p. 90).
A serious problem impeding the creation of program theory, however, is that those
designing or implementing the program(s) often do not articulate such theory a priori.
Leeuw (2003) described methods for reconstructing often imprecise and only implicit
theories underlying programs and policies, articulating them a posteriori. This
imprecision frequently necessitates an “inductive hunt” for the causes implicitly
assumed to produce intended changes. Because this process of program theory
reconstruction is fallible, evaluators may incorrectly reconstruct the basal theories
guiding a program. Leeuw’s paper therefore focuses on several alternative methods for
reconstructing and articulating implicit program theory.
Despite these problems:
…there are three possible responses to the challenge of causal attribution. One is to give up the
attempt to use program theory evaluation for this purpose, deciding to use it only “to improve, not to
prove.” Another option is to combine program theory with other methods for causal attribution…
Alternatively, a Popperian approach can be taken, and program theory can be used to develop
“testable hypotheses,” which are then investigated using nonexperimental methods... Using the
variations among different levels of implementation and different social contexts for implementation
not as “noise” to be screened out but rather as opportunities to test hypotheses, one can build a
stronger case that the program not only contributes to the observed outcomes but also to
explaining how. (Rogers, 2007, pp. 55-56)
Information, Norms, and Adherence 11
Indeed, there are now at least some ongoing major meta-analytic initiatives
directed toward accomplishing these worthy, longer-term, and ambitious objectives. For
example, The Campbell Collaboration (www.campbellcollaboration.org) is an
international research network that produces systematic reviews of the effects of social
interventions based on voluntary cooperation among a diverse array of researchers
from different fields. Also, there is the What Works Clearinghouse
(http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/wwc/), established as an initiative of the U.S. Department of
Education's Institute of Education Sciences, which serves as a central source of
scientific evidence for what works (and presumably what doesn’t work) in education.
The WWC lists their major services as follows:
 Produces user-friendly practice guides for educators that address instructional challenges
with research-based recommendations for schools and classrooms;
 Assesses the rigor of research evidence on the effectiveness of interventions (programs,
products, practices, and policies), giving educators the tools to make informed decisions;
 Develops and implements standards for reviewing and synthesizing education research;
and
 Provides a public and easily accessible registry of education evaluation researchers to
assist schools, school districts, and program developers with designing and carrying out
rigorous evaluations.
We therefore begin our review with a reconstruction of the program theory
presumably underlying psycho-educational interventions, then articulate a functional
appraisal of psychosocial mechanisms governing adherence to social norms and
compare the basic assumptions of the general theory presumably underlying psychoeducational programs to these fundamental principles.
3. A Reconstructed General Theory of Psycho-Educational Programs
We begin our reconstruction of the underlying program theory using Environmental
Education (EE) as an example of a representative psycho-educational intervention.
In 1975, the United Nations adopted the “Belgrade Charter” as a goal statement
Information, Norms, and Adherence 12
for environmental education. According to this document, the single ultimate goal of EE
was as follows:
To develop a world population that is aware of, and concerned about, the environment
and its associated problems, and which has the knowledge, skills, attitudes, motivations
and commitment to work individually and collectively toward solutions of current
problems and the prevention of new ones (UNESCO, 1975).
In 1977, the Intergovernmental Conference on Environmental Education
(organized by UNESCO in co-operation with UNEP) subsequently adopted the “Tbilisi
Declaration”, which, built upon these goals, provides the foundation for much of what
has been done in EE since that time. This document updated the ultimate goals of EE
as follows:



To foster clear awareness of and concern about economic, social, political,
and ecological interdependence in urban and rural areas;
To provide every person with opportunities to acquire the knowledge,
values, attitudes, commitment, and skills needed to protect and improve the
environment;
To create new patterns of behavior of individuals, groups, and society as a
whole towards the environment (UNESCO, 1978).
The third point in the “Tbilisi Declaration” is worthy of note, in that it goes beyond
the purely internal and psychological states of awareness, knowledge, values, attitudes,
and skills as objects of change and, instead, identifies the creation of new patterns of
behavior as a goal for EE.
Thus, according to both the Belgrade Charter and the Tbilisi Declaration, the
specific objectives of EE included helping individuals and social groups acquire proenvironmental awareness, knowledge, values, attitudes, and skills, defined in nearly
identical terms. The “Belgrade Charter” also included evaluation ability, which was
subsequently removed from the “Tbilisi Declaration”, for unexplained reasons.
The last item on this list of objectives, participation, contained some interesting
Information, Norms, and Adherence 13
differences in wording between the two successive documents. As the final objective of
EE, the “Belgrade Charter” defined participation as:
… to help individuals and social groups develop a sense of responsibility and urgency
regarding environmental problems to ensure appropriate action to solve those problems
(UNESCO, 1975).
In contrast, the “Tbilisi Declaration” defined participation as:
... to provide social groups and individuals with an opportunity to be actively involved at
all levels in working toward resolution of environmental problems (UNESCO, 1978).
What is most interesting about this difference in phrasing is that the first
document targets a sense of responsibility and urgency as putatively causal to
appropriate action, whereas the second targets an opportunity to be actively involved as
a potential contribution to working towards the resolution of environmental problems.
Nevertheless, it is evident that both documents credit internal psychological states, such
as awareness, knowledge, values, and attitudes, as necessary and possibly sufficient
for promoting changes in behavior.
In our view, this reasoning is a representative example of the general theory that,
we argue, underpins virtually all psycho-educational programs. The idea is that the
information provided by an educational intervention will somehow alter internal
psychological states, and that changes in these internal cognitive and affective states
will translate into changes in overt behavior.
4. The ABCs of social norms and norm adherence
Most evaluation researchers assume that social norms play a key role in guiding
pro- and anti-social behavior (e.g., Krug, Mercy, Dahlberg, & Zwi, 2002). Such
behaviors include those related to intimate partner violence, health, the environment,
Information, Norms, and Adherence 14
voting, drug and alcohol use to name a few. Moreover, a number of studies conducted
over the past fifty years or so demonstrate that attitudes, taken in the context of
subjective norms, predict intent to act -- and that intentions are good predictors of
behavior (see Fishbein & Ajzen, 2010 for a review). Some programs, based on carefully
articulated lab-based principles, seem to work, but some purely information-based
programs may backfire (e.g., Fishbein, Hall-Jamieson, Zimmer, von Haeften, & Nabi,
2002).
Nevertheless, many claim that a key to changing behavior is to change social
norms. For example, a report dated 2000 from the US Department of Health and
Human Services concluded:
…comprehensive approaches combining community interventions, mass media campaigns, and
program policy and regulation are most effective in changing social norms and reducing tobacco
use.
While acknowledging the notion that changing social norms may affect
behavioral change, many, if not most information-based intervention programs target
changes in personally held normative rules guiding the lives of these individuals rather
than socially held normative rules guiding the lives of most of us. These programs often
target the individual, without considering the various social contexts within which these
individuals live. We assert these social contexts, consisting of socially held norms, often
at variance with broader social norms, matter.
There are two major types of social norms: (1) Descriptive Norms, which are
statements of fact regarding what is typical within a society, and (2) Injunctive Norms,
which are normative rules or beliefs regarding what constitutes morally approved or
disapproved conduct. In philosophical terms, descriptive norms specify what actually is,
whereas injunctive (prescriptive) norms instead specify what ought to be (Cialdini,
Information, Norms, and Adherence 15
Reno, & Kallgren, 1990; Deutch & Gerard, 1955; Schaffer, 1983). In the ensuing
discussion, we limit ourselves to the role of injunctive social norms in psychoeducational interventions and behavioral change.
We shall assume that a tendency to give and follow social norms guides our
moment-by-moment interaction between the physical environment and us (“Watch out
for low-hanging branches!”) and among ourselves (“Stop on red, go on green, exert
caution on yellow”). Such norm giving and following keeps us civil, permits civilized
cooperation, and lets us reap the benefits of the experience of others without the costs
of trial-and-error learning.
We also assume that social norms, and the fact that humans in general follow
them, not only guide personal interactions, they form the fabric of our societies.
Although what is normative varies among cultures, cooperation within human groups
(group cohesion) depends upon following appropriate – often poorly stated but
reasonably well understood – social norms and moral principles.
These facts lead us to several questions. Among those questions, the most
important are, “What are injunctive social norms?”, “What is the nature of adherence to
injunctive social norms?”, and “How can appropriate social programs promote
adherence to injunctive social norms?”
Social norms, as used in the present manuscript, are a product of actions (e.g.,
verbiage /gestures, signs/symbols/symptoms, etc.) that functionally guide behavior. We
can often describe or transmit norms, defined in this way, with a verbal statement in the
form of a syllogism: “if A – and – if B – then C” which specify or point to contingent
relations among Antecedent conditions, target Behaviors, and probabilistic
Information, Norms, and Adherence 16
Consequences of the target Behavior.1 A norm may occur as a single “if - if – then”
statement or as a set of such statements. A norm may be explicit or implicit and,
because it is a part of a verbal community, written, spoken, or signed. Importantly, these
statements may specify social norms to various degrees, ranging from partial to full
specification (see the Glossary for theoretically driven definitions of these terms).
Take, for example, a recent interaction between the senior author (WJ) and his
then five-year old son (Adam). WJ came home from work to find the living room strewn
with toys and Adam sitting on a chair watching television. WJ said, “Son, please pick up
these toys.” Adam replied, “Just a minute Daddy, let me finish watching this show.” WJ
replied, “Adam, please pick up these toys or I will throw them out.” Adam replied, “Okay
Daddy”, turned on the TiVo (a device that records television programs), picked up the
toys, and put them away in his room.
We will use this example for other purposes later in the manuscript, but for now
focus on WJ’s first statement. It is an example of a partially specified culturally bound
normative rule: Keep clean. Unpacked, the normative rule applied to this case reads, “if
Daddy is home, grumpy, and says, “Son, please pick up these toys” (A1), toys are
strewn about the living room (A2), and if you (Adam) adhere to the rule (B1) and pick up
the toys (B2), then no aversive consequences will ensue (C1) and the toys will be picked
up (C2).”2 Although Adam required WJ to unpack the normative rule more completely,
Adam’s behavior came under the influence of the instantiated norm; he placed his toys
We may think of these rules within the confines of conditional logic – which permits linking many ‘if’
statement through set intersection.
2 Notice there are two sets of ABC contingencies here. The first A - B1 - C concerns conditional relations
1
1
among rule (the norm itself), the behavior (adherence) and the consequent (what happens if adherence
fails. The second A2 B2 - C2 concerns conditional relations among the state of the room (strewn toys), the
specified behavior (pick up the toys), and the consequences (the room will be clean – and Daddy will be
off of your back). See the “Adherence as Action” section below for a more complete explanation.
1
Information, Norms, and Adherence 17
in the toy box, and returned to his show. There was a small personal cost to Adam, time
away from an interesting show, but the cost was far less than the perceived
consequences of adherence failure.
4.1. Empirical demonstrations
A long-standing experimental literature provides a number of laboratory-based
demonstrations of the phenomena we just described. Under some circumstances, adult
humans blindly follow verbally stated social norms – even to their own personal
detriment (e.g., Galizio, 1979; Hayes, Brownstein, Zettle, Rosenfarb, & Korn, 1986;
Lippman & Meyer, 1967; Hayes, 1993; Kaufman, Baron, & Kopp, 1966). A number of
models describe the phenomenon (e.g., Doll, Jacobs, Sanfey, & Frank, 2009; Miller &
Cohen, 2001).
Kaufman, Baron, and Kopp (1966), for example, brought 20 undergraduates to
their laboratory individually, asked each to give up their watches, pencils, pens, books,
etc., and gave one of five sets of instructions before the undergraduates entered an
actual experimental task. Although Kaufman et al. (1966) ran five groups, only three are
of interest here. The individuals in these groups received common instructions followed
by instructions specific to the group.
Those in the first group received accurate instructions claiming that, once in the
experimental chamber, pressing a ‘choice button’ would payout every minute on the
average. This instruction implied that the most efficient response strategy was to press
the button slowly and steadily because, although the timing of the payout was
unpredictable, it would occur, contingent upon a certain behavior, with the mere
passage of time. Those in the second group received inaccurate instructions claiming
Information, Norms, and Adherence 18
that, once in the experimental chamber, pressing a ‘choice button’ would payout only
after the undergraduate pressed the button 150 times on the average. This instruction
implied that the most efficient response strategy was to press the button rapidly and
steadily because, although the timing of the payout was unpredictable; how often it
happened depended on how many button presses occurred. Those in the third group
received inaccurate instructions claiming that responses on a ‘choice button’ would
payout once and only once every 60 seconds, no matter how often the subject pressed
the choice button. This set of instructions implied that the most efficient response
strategy was to wait for sixty seconds and then press the button once for a payout.
After receiving these instructions, all of these undergraduates entered an
experimental chamber and pressed a ‘choice key’ that illuminated a green ‘choice light’
on the following schedule: (1) Once the green light was illuminated, the undergraduate
pressed one of two buttons immediately below it, which produced points indicating a
‘correct’ choice on an increasingly dense probability schedule; (2) Pressing either of the
two buttons turned the green ‘choice light” off and reinstated illumination of the ‘choice
button’; (3) The undergraduate then pressed the ‘choice button’ until the green choice
light illuminated; (4) The undergraduate then pressed one of the two buttons
immediately below it, received points according to the predetermined schedule, and the
procedure recycled; and, finally, (5) The undergraduates repeated this cycle for threehours and then exchanged the points for monetary compensation.
Those given an accurate normative rule (the first group) pressed the key as
predicted, immediately and at a steady and constant rate. Those given an inaccurate
normative rule pressed the key in patterns appropriate to the inaccurate normative rule
Information, Norms, and Adherence 19
rather than the actual payoff schedule. That is, when told that the payoff was on a
variable ratio schedule (the second group), the people pressed the key at high and
constant rates. When told the payoff schedule was on a fixed-interval schedule (the
third group), the people pressed slowly shortly after receiving payoff and more quickly
as the interval progressed – even though everyone was on exactly the same payoff
schedule.
As this example illustrates, normative rules can and under some circumstances,
do override obvious environmental contingencies, a relation documented many times
(e.g., Barush, Kanter, Busch, Richardson, & Barnes-Holmes, 2007; Catania, Shimoff, &
Matthews, 1989; Galizio, 1979; Joyce, & Chase, 1990; Hackenberg & Joker, 1994;
Hojo, 2002; LeFrancois, Chase, & Joyce, 1988; Lippman & Meyer, 1967; O'Hora,
Barnes-Holmes, Roche, & Smeets, 2004; Smeets, Dymond, & Barnes-Homes, 2000)
To understand, at least partially, conditions under which such normative rules
govern behavior, we briefly turn to a well-established view of the influence of situations
and consequences on behavioral organization, and then return to the example.
Traditionally, those interested in descriptive models of performance accept that a
three-term contingency lies at its core. This set consists of Antecedent conditions (A),
target Behavior (B), and behavioral Consequences (C) – hence, an ABC view of
behavioral organization. During recent years, methodological behaviorists (including
many cognitive psychologists, cognitive neuroscientists, and some linguists) focused on
the mechanics of Antecedent conditions (e.g., central processes such as Attention,
Executive Function, various forms of Memory and the like) as descriptors that may help
us understand the conditions immediately antecedent to any given behavioral class.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 20
Those interested in norm adherence, however, focused on relations between normative
statements (rule specification) and the consequences of adherence failure.
Those interested in norm adherence tell us that a norm specifies a set of
Antecedent conditions (“if these conditions obtain”), a set of Behavioral strategies (“and
if you do this”), a Consequent (“then that will or will not happen”), and conditional
relations among the Antecedent, Behavior, and Consequences to various degrees of
specificity. They also tell us that, as a descriptive model, it is not necessary to specify
the internal causal dynamics involved in each “if” or “then” statement (e.g., that the first
‘if’ changes the brain in such a way that particular cognitive resource become active
whereas others become inactive). Instead, it is enough to observe, record, and report
systematic relations among each of these variables (A, B, and C).
As described above, it is an empirical fact that, under certain conditions, stating a
normative rule dramatically reorganizes the relations among observable A, B, and C
(e.g., Doll et al., 2009;). The interaction between Adam and WJ illustrated this point as
do many of the more dramatic examples provided by the social psychologists (e.g.,
Milgram, 1963; Sherif, Harvey, White, Hood, & Sherif, 1961; Zimbardo, 2006, 2007) and
others (e.g., Bloom, 2005). The example of the interaction between Adam and WJ,
however, offers a unique point; norm adherence appears to be a malleable (docile)
behavior or action (e.g., Cerutti, 1989).
Adherence as Action
Thus far, we have used the theoretical construct “behavior” intuitively. If,
however, we are to use ‘behavior’ as a theoretical construct, it is best to have at least a
rough idea of what that construct is, thereby avoiding confusion and unnecessary
Information, Norms, and Adherence 21
debate. For folk psychology, the term ‘behavior’ implies little more than directly
observable (in the moment) activities of organisms. For those trained in
(Pragmatic/Functional) behavioral psychology, however, the construct ‘behavior’ implies
much more and much less (e.g., Jacobs, et al., 1988; Pfaus et al., 1988).
We begin with ‘more’. The technical meanings of the construct ‘behavior’ come in
at least two flavors (e.g., Kantor, 1970). The first, organismic behavior, references
variables or factors observable mainly in the movements or acts of organisms, without
considering situational features. This is similar to the folk psychological conception of
behavior.3 The second construct, behavioral fields (action), includes constraints
imposed by situational factors (that is, social affordances, enabling and impeding
organismic responses) and the impact of organismic behavior (not the organismic
behavior itself) on associated environmental objects (e.g., Kantor, 1970; Jacobs et al.,
1988)4. It is in the second sense that we use the construct ‘behavior’, as a class of
events defined by function, in the present context.
Now consider the ‘less’. Behavior, as used by folk psychology, for example,
involves (at least for vertebrates) a complex causal, observable, and measureable
interplay among a large number of muscles and interconnected bones (e.g., Eschkol &
Wachman, 1958; Jacobs et al., 1988). Each joint represents a specific number of
degrees of freedom that, when added, yield a complex system comprised of a large
number of movement (e.g., Benjamini, et al., 2010; Golani, 1976; Pellis, 2010;
Teitelbaum, et al., 2004). In contrast, behavior, as used by those trained in pragmatic
behavioral psychology, ignores specific organismic or phenotypic behavior (to a large
3
4
One might label this “phenotypic” behavior
One might label this “instrumental” behavior.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 22
part) focusing instead on a description of an interplay among situational variables
(Antecedent conditions), a large (and indefinite) set of organismic behaviors, and the
impact on situational variables brought about by that set of organismic behaviors
(Consequences).5 In conceiving of behavior in this way, behavioral psychology
accomplishes two scientific goals.
First, the field achieves a tractable behavioral taxonomy. Rather than dealing
with the degrees of freedom involved in organismic behaviors, the taxonomic rules
permit us to reduce ‘behavior’ to general functional characteristics (e.g., Type I versus
Type II behavior, Konorski, 1967; operant versus respondent, Skinner, 1938; etc).
Second, in so doing, the term “behavior” refers to a construct (a latent construct) that
one may measure indirectly through an aggregate of its characteristics.
The use of “behavior” to refer to a construct rather than a set of organismic
variables changes the meaning of the term radically. Instead of referring to specific
organismic behaviors, the theoretical meaning of ‘behavior’ ignores the specifics of the
body and what it does – instead the construct refers to and is defined by a description of
functional relations among environmental (situational affordances), potential adaptive
problems in that environment, and the environmental changes brought about by any
organismic behavior (e.g., Figueredo et al., 2007). Hence, the modern Functional
Analyst may treat learning, attending, remembering, hoping, kindness, aversion, fear,
courage, or despair as examples of a class of behavior – a latent construct more
commonly known as actions – which are appropriate for rigorous ABC analyses.
5
This is sometime known as a ‘functional’ definition of behavior.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 23
Notice here, although an observer cannot ‘see’ or measure actions such as
seeing, attending, or remembering directly - even common folk language captures the
notion directly as an “act of seeing”, an “act of attending” or an “act of remembering”.
Hence, an observer must infer the existence of the latent construct (seeing, attending,
remembering) based on relations between antecedents and consequences presumably
caused by an indefinitely large set of organismic behaviors (acts) that are nonetheless
directed towards a common function (action).
In more formal terms, the construct “behavior” (an act) lacks a definite behavioral
(in the folk psychological sense) referent. In short, psychologists who depend upon
behavior for their raw data, such as psychologists who study sensation and perception,
cognition, social, and personality psychology to name a few must, measure samples of
pre-specified, behavioral characteristics – that is, characteristics of the latent construct
labeled ‘behavior’ or action. Theoretically, these characteristics are ‘caused’ by changes
in a situation (e.g., Jacobs et al., 1988) brought about by organismic behavior. These
psychologists, based on representative measures of the full suite of behavioral
characteristics, then infer the strength, probability, or status of the latent construct
(behavior) in question (e.g., seeing, attending, remembering).
Hence, methodological behaviorists typically study measurable characteristics of
behavior. That is, methodological behaviorists study the dynamics of a latent construct –
a construct that the researcher cannot observe directly, but whose characteristics the
researcher infers from the dynamics of a sample of indicators (e.g., facial expression,
questionnaire answers, reaction time, search path taken in a virtual environment). That
Information, Norms, and Adherence 24
is, the research infers the dynamics of a latent construct through the behavior of a set of
observable and measurable characteristics presumably caused by that latent construct.
All of this leads us to the point of this section – the status of ‘adherence’ as a
theoretically legitimate example of a latent construct – which we may label ‘behavior’.
Common language recognizes, at least obliquely, the status of abstract behavioral
constructs. Take, for example, the phrases “an act of kindness”, “an act of aggression”,
“an intentional act”, or “an obedient or disobedient act”. An act of kindness is an action
that may entail a host of organismic behaviors; it is in no way defined by those
organismic behaviors. Instead, the interplay between Antecedent conditions and
Consequences brought about by a set of organismic behaviors define an act of
kindness (the specific organismic behavior is irrelevant to the construct). So too it is with
an act of adherence. As with all other latent constructs, measuring adherence to a rule
as an action involves (at least initially) a specific aspect of the situation - observable
rules imbedded in and a part of the situation.
Acquiring Adherence
If we consider adherence to normative rules (governance) as a malleable (docile)
action, we might ask, “How does one influence governance?” To help answer that
question we return to the WJ and Adam example. Although the “if these Antecedents
and if this target Behavior” as well as the relation between them were evident in his
statement, WJ did not clearly specify the consequences of a governance failure. Adam,
who lacked experience with the full set of governance contingencies, declined to
cooperate (he exhibited weak to non-existent governance). This led to a second
statement, “Adam, please pick up these toys or I will throw them out” that specified the
Information, Norms, and Adherence 25
Antecedents (the here and now), the target Behavior (pick up the toys), and the
consequent of governance failure (I’ll throw them out). Obviously, the ‘strength’ of the
instrumental behavior we label governance changed as a function of the unpacked
statement. 6 We consider this set of contingencies in the next section.
4.2. Achieving norm governance
The general purpose of a social norm, which can be stated verbally as “if this
Antecedent and if this target Behavior, then these Consequences”, is to bring an
individual into contact with extant social consequences produced by social norm nonadherence. To simplify matters, these contingencies, which consist of relations among
behavior and its consequences in the presence of antecedent conditions, may fall into
two general classes – categorized by the temporal relations between the behavior and
its consequences.
4.2.1. Immediate consequences
The first category, immediate Consequences, refers to a condition in which the
target Behavior “produces” immediate Consequences that stabilize (positive
consequences) and/or destabilize (no or negative consequences) the target Behavior.
This is well understood – behavior stabilizes (e.g., increases in probability) or
destabilizes (e.g., increases in variability) as a function of its consequences. In this
case, a stated social norm acts in a way that alters the base rate of the target Behavior
in the presence of specified Antecedent conditions. Hence, the target Behavior can
6
This example contains another fact that we can consider only briefly. Adam discriminates Antecedent conditions
quite well. When his father, who consistently acts on specified consequences, states a normative rule, norm
adherence is relatively strong. That is, Adam adheres to the normative rule consistently. When his mother, who less
consistently acts on specified consequences, states a normative rule, norm adherence is relatively weak. That is,
Adam sometimes cooperates and sometimes does not (Jacobs et al., in preparation provide three experimentally
based demonstrations of contextualized governance of behavior by social norms).
Information, Norms, and Adherence 26
come into immediate contact with effective Consequences – and is maintained or
enhanced. That is, stating a normative rule may bring target behavior under the
influence of extant Behavior-Consequent contingencies straight away.7
Notice that the major influence of the norm statement on the target Behavior is to
change the base-rate of the target Behavior. Extant contingencies, related to the
Consequences of the target Behavior, then directly influence and maintain that
behavior. Put bluntly, the influence of the stated norm disappears. Theoretically, the
norm statement is not stored, represented, remembered, or retrieved. With its function
completed, the norm and its associated adherence drops out of the repertoire8.
4.2.2. Delayed consequences
The second category, Delayed Consequences, refers to a condition in which the
target Behavior produces delayed (at times on the order of days, months, years, or even
decades) consequences. A classic example is that contained in the normative rule
“Don’t Smoke”. To unpack the rule: If, during your lifetime (Antecedent), you smoke
regularly (target Behavior), then you have a high probability of developing lung cancer
or a cardio-vascular disease and dying prematurely (Consequences). Here, the analysis
regarding strong governance (adherence) – and the recommendations based on the
analysis – becomes somewhat more complex.
As before, the ultimate role of the normative rule is to bring the target Behavior in
contact with extant environmental contingencies. As before, the proximate role of the
normative rule is to alter the base rate of target Behavior in the presence of specified
Antecedent conditions. But, because the Consequences of the target Behavior are too
7
8
We might call this no trial or zero-trial learning.
Automaticity develops – see below for a more complete description.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 27
delayed to stabilize the target Behavior, the theory predicts the target Behavior will
destabilize. That is, the theory predicts increases in the variability of the target Behavior,
which will thereby decrease the probability of the target Behavior re-occurring.
This creates a bit of a puzzle. We observe, under some circumstances,
stabilization of target Behavior under the influence of a normative rule specifying
temporally delayed consequences (see section 5.4.3) – when this happens, the
question becomes, “What stabilized the behavior?”
Conceptually, stabilization of target Behavior has to do with interplay among the
individual(s) who deliver(s) a norm, the individual whose target Behavior is brought
under the governance of the norm, and the individual(s) who enforce(s) the norm.
Consider the simple proximate rule, “if you clean the backyard, then I will give
you 100 dollars”. The probability of the target Behavior changes and stabilizes – it
appears to contact the 100-dollar contingency. The probability of the target Behavioral
chain (i.e., whatever organismic behaviors it takes to get the back yard clean) remains
high and stable. Although the target Behavior is apparently under the influence of the
promised 100 dollars, it is not. It is instead under the influence of the behavior of the
individual who promised the 100 dollars, particularly how consistently he (or his kind)
has delivered on specified consequences (particularly adherence to stated rules) in the
past.
4.2.3. Altruistic punishment
The analysis moves forward in this way. Although normative rules influence the
base rate of target Behavior, the presence of the rule, coupled with an experiential
history of oft unspoken contingencies surrounding such a rule, ensures a high and
Information, Norms, and Adherence 28
stable base rate of the target Behavior. Put another way, the contingencies surrounding
the normative rule statement ensures that governance (as an action) remains high and
stable.
Reflect, for a moment, on a fact we described earlier: Adherence to a normative
rule is a malleable action sensitive to its consequences. If that is true, then theoretically,
there are contingent relations supporting or undermining adherence. That is, there are
identifiable relations among a normative rule statement, a set of Antecedent conditions,
adherence (a functionally defined target Behavior), and a set of Consequences. In
human interactions, adherence (or governance) failures often produce aversive
consequences. Humans easily detect non-adhering (rule-breaking) conspecifics
(cheaters; see e.g., Trivers, 1971). Moreover, humans appear to be governed by both
informal and formal injunctive rules of collective consequences (e.g., social norms,
rules, and moral principles) that we apply to cheaters.
People are generally intolerant of cheaters – tending to perceive such people as
aversive – leading the cheated to adopt similar uncooperative strategies (tit-for-tat), to
remove themselves from the interaction (defection), or, more commonly, to administer
retribution, thereby dispensing “Altruistic Punishment” to the rule breaker. Administering
punishment, even altruistically, can come at great personal cost to the altruist (Dreber,
Rand, Fudenberg, & Nowak, 2008; Rand, Ohtsuki, & Nowak, 2009). Here, the rules
governing the visitation of consequences on normative rule breakers – primarily the
costs that punishment visits on the altruist – defy economic logic.
Nevertheless, the weight of the evidence suggests that humans are quite willing
to suffer personal cost to administer Altruistic Punishment: people freely incur great
Information, Norms, and Adherence 29
personal cost to punish cheaters – those freeloaders who do not pull their weight in
cooperative rule-bound endeavors – a finding that holds in every culture studied (e.g.,
Herrmann, Thöni, & Gächter, 2008). The weight of the evidence also suggests that
norm adherence is sensitive to and influenced by social sanctions applied
systematically (and perhaps through biologically prepared principles) to those who
break normative rules: those who do not adhere to normative rules risk suffering for
their malfeasance (see e.g., Carpenter, Bowles, Gintis, & Hwange, 2009; de Quervain
et al., 2004; Egas & Riedl, 2008; Fehr & Gaechter, 2002; Herrmann, Thöni, & Gächter,
2008; Ohtsuki, Iwasa, & Nowak, 2009).
4.2.4. Adherence as an automatic avoidance response influenced by ‘understood’
sanctions
All of this reminds us of a literature that developed between about 1930 and 1980
– a literature that examined avoidance responding in other species. Consider a series of
studies conducted by Richard Solomon and his colleagues using a standard active
avoidance learning procedure. Here, the experimenter selected a response (a target
Behavior) that the subject must emit to escape or avoid a painful aversive stimulus. The
experimenter introduced the subjects to an experimental chamber, who then
experienced three clearly defined conditions. The onset of a warning signal (an
Antecedent condition) marked the beginning of a warning period; leaping over a barrier
(the designated target Behavior) terminated the warning signal and initiated a safe
period (a Consequence, usually marked by the absence of the warning signal). If the
subject did not emit the target Behavior during the warning period, a brief electric shock
Information, Norms, and Adherence 30
occurred repeatedly. The shock period continued until the subject emitted the target
Behavior (an escape response), which produced a new safe period.
Typically, avoidance learning occurred in several stages. Initially, the subject only
responded during the shock period. Upon emitting the target Behavior (the escape
response), shock and the danger signal terminated and the safe period began. As the
subject encountered additional learning trials, the target Behavior occurred
progressively earlier in the shock period. The subject then began to respond during the
warning period, completely avoiding the shock period. With continued training, the
subject responded only at the beginning of the warning period – thus effectively
avoiding shock (see e.g., Solomon & Wynn, 1953; 1954).
Using this procedure with dogs, Solomon and his colleagues found that, once
well established, an avoidance response is difficult to extinguish (Solomon, Kamin, &
Wynne, 1953).9 Moreover, the avoidance response gained in strength as training
progressed. These researchers also found that, with extended training, there was little
or no behavioral or physiological evidence of fear exhibited during the avoidance
sessions (see also, Gantt, 1953; Kamin, Brimer, & Black, 1963; Maier, 1949;
Masserman, 1943; Solomon et al., 1953; Starr & Mineka, 1977). In short, during
avoidance training, automaticity occurred – avoidance responding became increasingly
automatic over the course of such training.
Recent neuroimaging literature makes it clear that Altruistic Punishment, whether
administered as social rejection, approbation, monetary penalties, or the like produces
neural responses similar to those produced by physical pain (e.g., Eisenberger,
The behavior emitted by the experimenters (running the dogs) extinguished before the dog’s behavior (avoidance)
extinguished.
9
Information, Norms, and Adherence 31
Lieberman, & Williams, 2003; 2004; Eisenberger & Lieberman, 2004; Immordino-Yang,
McColla, Damasio, & Damasio, 2009) and that, for many of us, merely perceiving pain
in other humans may cause similar responses (e.g., Jackson, Meltzoff, & Decety, 2005).
As importantly, recent neuroimaging research makes it clear that performing an
avoidance response activates neural structures and circuitry commonly associated with
reward and reinforcement (e.g., Delgado, Jou, LeDoux, & Phelps, 2009; Kim, Shimojo,
& O’Doherty, 2006). Those facts, coupled with the conditions under which humans
administer Altruistic Punishment, lead us to consider Adherence, at least in many
cases, as an at least partially automated avoidance response.
4.2.5. Automaticity
If we simultaneously examine the accepted characteristics of automaticity
specified by more recent literature (e.g., Moors & De Houwer, 2006; Wood & Neal,
2007), and the characteristics of the acquisition and maintenance (stabilization) of
avoidance responding (e.g., Solomon & Wynne, 1954; Mineka, 1979), a remarkable set
of parallel features appear.10
If we think of an individual’s experiential history as consisting of a multitude of
training experiences, then we may begin to appreciate the contributions of that history to
normative rule adherence. Very few of us consider which fork to use when dining out,
acceptable language given the company we keep, where we deposit our bodily wastes,
or whether or not we will work for a living. Much like Solomon’s dogs, we adhere to
these rules automatically, guided by experiences that others used to teach us – often
10
Here we ignore the models designed to explain the development of automaticity and, instead, focus on the
features (characteristics) that define it. Hence, we are ignoring explanatory (causal models) and using a taxonomic
approach to the problem of classifying adherence properly.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 32
using procedures relying on aversive consequences. Importantly, we continue to adhere
to these rules without the need of immediate or even a high risk of other-administered
social sanctions – the act of adherence itself appears to be rewarding.
4.2.6 Removing Governance Consequences
A change in injunctive social norms will not affect governance unless two
conditions obtain: The chance of being caught is high or governance (adherence) is
specifically trained as a context-free instrumental action. An anonymous reviewer
approached the former assertion by wondering what might happen to governance, “…if
there were no reasonable chance of getting caught?” Although it was tempting to
describe recent or current events (e.g., the social consequences of the disruption
Hurricane Katrina brought about, the ongoing looting because of police removal in
Egypt, or even the anonymity effects so often observed by the social psychologists), it
seemed more appropriate to answer this question with three direct examples from the
experimental literature.
We begin with an assertion: Humans are not well-calibrated scientific
instruments. Measures taken by humans are consistently inconsistent, unreliable, and
subjective. We have known this at least since Wilhelm Bessel described significant
differences in observationally based measures taken by Navil Maskelyne and his
assistant David Kinneybrooke (see Boring, 1950, pp. 134-142 for a brief account).
To increase the accuracy of human observers, researchers often train them to
follow a system of well-articulated observational rules (e.g., Jacobs et al., 1988). These
researchers are all too aware of the extraordinary and idiosyncratic variability in the
ways humans see and record behavior – and of the extraordinary persistence with
Information, Norms, and Adherence 33
which humans cling to their observational biases. It often requires months of training
before a researcher can bring observers’ behavior under the governance of a set of
clearly articulated objective observational rules.
After extensive practice with relatively complex observational rules, observers
typically agree about 70% of the time when they know others are checking their
reliability; but agreement drops precipitously when we check those same observers
without their knowledge (e.g., Kent, Kanowitz, O’Leary, & Cheiken, 1977; Reid, 1970;
Taplin & Reid. 1973). That is, adherence is relatively strong when the observer can be
caught breaking observational rules but relatively weak when the observer cannot be
caught breaking observational rules. Moreover, if an investigator informs observers of
the expected observational outcome (his or her personal rules), observers tend to drift
from adherence to the formal observational criteria (rules) toward adherence to the rules
articulated by the investigator. Feedback from the principal investigator regarding the
“quality” of the observational record intensifies the effect (Kent, O’Leary, Diament, &
Dietz 1974; Shuller & McNamara, 1976). Finally, over time and if unwatched, observers
‘drift’ from the original observational rules. If alone and unwatched, observers drift in
their own idiosyncratic ways; if in collaborative pairs and unwatched, observers drift
together – that is, inter-observer agreement remains high within the pair, but agreement
with the original observational rules decays over time (DeMaster, Reid, & Twentyman,
1977; Kent et al., 1974; Romanczyk, Kent, Diament, & O'Leary, 1973; Wildman,
Erickson, & Kent, 1975).
Data such as these indicate that stable rule adherence (governance), at least in
the case of artificially imposed rules, requires consequences. With consequences,
Information, Norms, and Adherence 34
governance appears to remain stable across time; without consequences, governance
appears to decline precipitously
4.2.7. Behavioral Development
Given the foregoing, we claim that rule governance (norm adherence) is a
malleable behavior, initially under the control of consequences (usually aversive), but
that may becomes “habitual” or “automatic”. We do not claim that all governance (norm
adherence) is experientially acquired, only that experience influences governance, and
that it remains plastic in response to changes in the environmental contingencies,
although (as with language acquisition) the degree of plasticity may decrease with age
or experience or both (e.g., Tees & Werker, 1984; Werker & Tees, 2005).
The fact that most behaviors are partially genetic and partially environmental is a
well-established principle in behavioral biology – a principle demonstrated across a wide
array of species and behaviors (West-Eberhard, 2003; Figueredo, Hammond, &
McKiernan, 2006). In humans, most scientifically studied behaviors constitute a complex
mixture of “nature” and “nurture”. Although, natural and sexual selection might also help
shape norm adherence over evolutionary time, behavioral biologists currently assert
that any substantial behavioral evolution involving humans minimally requires the
passage of millennia (Cochran & Harpending, 2009). Because this manuscript
specifically addresses the evaluation of psycho-educational intervention programs,
which need to show effectiveness on a much shorter time scale, we limit ourselves to
the consideration of the malleable components of norm adherence or rule governance,
and leave inherited components to the behavioral geneticists.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 35
Furthermore, there are both situation-specific and situation-independent
components of rule governance. Adherence to a specific norm may be shaped by a
situation-specific contingency of reinforcement, following the A-B-C principle described
above. A more general form of rule governance (norm adherence), however, may also
be trained as situation-free instrumental action.
Altruistic punishment is an example of an apparently situation-free instrumental
action. As described above, other humans routinely inflict punishment upon “cheaters”
for breaking any social norms, rather than limiting these consequences to the violation
of one specific rule. In fact, evolutionary psychologists have presented evidence that
humans are biologically prepared to enforce social rules of unknown or arbitrary
content, meaning that they are quick to learn these rules and process them much more
quickly and accurately than they do more abstract logical problems of the same general
form (e.g., Cosmides & Tooby, 1992; Gigerenzer, Hertwig, & Pachur, 2011).
If that is the case, then humans living in human societies will be exposed
throughout development to more generalized contingencies of reinforcement where an
overall pattern of rule-following behavior is systematically reinforced and an overall
pattern of rule-breaking behavior is systematically punished, regardless of which
particular rules are specifically at issue at any single point in time. Thus, we claim that
there should develop both situation-specific and situation-independent components of
rule governance in humans, by virtue of the characteristics of the social environments
which they typically inhabit. Although this pattern implies that there was genetic
selection over evolutionary time for situation-independent components of norm
Information, Norms, and Adherence 36
adherence, in addition to operant selection over developmental time, we limit ourselves
to the latter processes for present purposes.
5. Word and deeds: declarative and procedural targets of social norms
Traditional cognitive psychology recognizes a distinction between “declarative”
and “procedural” knowledge.11 The field measures declarative knowledge as speaking
about something appropriately and procedural knowledge as doing something
appropriately. The experimental literature surrounding this distinction clearly
demonstrates that declarative and procedural behaviors depend upon separable and at
least partially independent brain structures (see e.g., Eichenbaum & Cohen, 2004;
Ullman, 2001 for reviews). This suggests that brain systems devoted to talking about
something (instrumental verbiage) are at least partially independent of brain systems
devoted to doing something (instrumental behavior) – and leads to the fact that,
although these two forms of behavior may occur simultaneously, each can be under the
influence of distinct, identifiable sets of contingencies (see e.g., Baum, 2004).
These facts lead us to our final general point: The purpose of a psychoeducational program is to produce strong rule governance – adherence to injunctive
(prescriptive) norms. The point is to bring the target (instrumental) Behavior of an
individual or group of individuals from what it is (its current set of localized descriptive
norms) to something else (the larger set of socially approved descriptive norms). Yet,
psycho-educational programs seldom target instrumental behavior (procedural routines)
of interest, instead they target, perhaps unintentionally, what people say about the topic
of interest (instrumental verbiage or declarative routines). To put it another way, psycho-
11
Researchers often call these declarative and procedural memory and operationalize both in the same way.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 37
educational programs often directly teach people to speak about specific problems in
appropriate ways; they seldom directly support people acting appropriately. To use the
vernacular, the designs of many psycho-educational programs produce norms that
permit people to talk the talk but not to walk the walk. We will unpack this last point in
the examples that follow.
6. Summary
By this view, instrumental verbiage (e.g., speaking, reading, writing, and the like)
constitutes a class of behaviors influenced by its social context and its consequences.
The same is true of instrumental actions. The source of these consequences serves as
a rough-and-ready way to differentiate declarative instrumental verbiage and procedural
(or instrumental) action. Both declarative instrumental verbiage and instrumental actions
are partially under the influence of physical contexts and consequences (food, water,
danger, etc.) and partially under the influence of social contexts and consequences
(approval, disapproval, Altruistic Punishment, etc.). Although some physical contexts
and consequences may be involved, social contexts and consequences appear to be a
primary influence on adherence to social norms.
A second important fact to derive from a functional perspective is the existence of
“multiple baselines.” This label refers to the fact that several classes of behavior may
unfold simultaneously. In Arizona, for example, one often sees individuals driving while
talking on a cellular telephone. These drivers perform two distinguishable tasks:
maintaining control of an automobile according to the rules of the road (instrumental
action) and maintaining a conversation according to the rules of social interactions
(instrumental verbiage). Colloquially, some call this multitasking.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 38
A third important fact is that separable classes of behavior may be under the
influence of distinct consequences. To return to Arizona drivers, the consequences of
violating the rules of the road (e.g., crashes, tickets) influence instrumental actions
associated with driving whereas consequences of violating social conventions (e.g.,
insulting a person, losing a business deal) influence instrumental verbiage (e.g., voice
modulation, polite responses) simultaneously. That is, distinguishable schedules of
reinforcement operate simultaneously: One set of consequences influence the behavior
classified as driving (instrumental or procedural behavior) and another set of
consequences influence the behavior classified as talking on the telephone
(instrumental verbiage or declarative behavior).
If, as we argue, this scenario operates on most of, if not all adult education
programs, then we have a reasonable way to predict the conditions under which those
programs will fail. Moreover, we have several clues that might help us solve the
ubiquitous and consistent problem of the failure of large-scale public education
programs.
7. Applying these principles to psycho-educational programs
7.1. Two contingency sets
Although we will not work out detailed examples, the principles outlined above
permit us to describe, and provide examples of conditions under which an education
program will not perform up to expectations.
Bluntly put, programs predicted to fall short of expectations provide support for
declarative routines (instrumental verbiage) but do not provide support for appropriate
procedural routines (instrumental action). These conditions establish situation-specific
Information, Norms, and Adherence 39
social norms for particular ways of speaking about program goals. They produce
appropriate instrumental verbiage – ‘ideas’ or ‘principles – because articulating them
avoids social disapproval and other aversive consequences as long as the person
remains enrolled in the program; they do not, however, have procedures to stabilize
newly established social norms or to stabilize appropriate instrumental action in the
open environment. That is, although the Antecedents and the target Behaviors (the
norms) articulated in the program may be clear, there are few, if any, Consequences for
failures to adhere to widely accepted Descriptive norms – that is, to emit appropriate
target Behaviors in the open environment. Hence, the theory predicts that programs
offering no real consequences for failures to adhere to Descriptive norms – for doing
anything other than articulating appropriate ideas within the context of the program itself
– will not perform as expected.
7.2. Preventing initiation of adolescent smoking
Extant meta-analyses of the outcome of school-based interventions designed to
prevent the onset of adolescent cigarette smoking often use the causal model anchoring
the program (“program theory”) as a classification tool, yielding, roughly, four
approaches to program development (Wiehe, Garrison, Christakis, Ebel, & Rivara,
2005; Thomas & Perera, 2002; Rundall & Bruvold, 1988; Bruvold, 1993). These
programs cover the gamut from programs targeting instrumental verbiage alone through
those targeting instrumental action. “Rational” programs, for example, provide factbased information on smoking and its delayed detrimental health consequences.
“Psychological” programs attempt interventions targeting increased self-esteem and
general life skills, such as decision-making. “Social Influence” programs teach youth to
Information, Norms, and Adherence 40
recognize social situations where drug use may appear desirable and then provide
practice mastering such situations without engaging in drug use. “Contextual” programs
attempt to influence the environmental consequences in various social situations
(school or “community”) of youth, e.g. by changing school policies around tobacco use
in addition to curriculum-based lessons. No class of program directly targets
governance (norm adherence) in the open environment.
These intervention models differ in respect to their major didactic methods, e.g.
non-interactive methods such as lectures through teachers in information-based
programs or interactive role-playing to acquire new social skills in social-influence
models (Tobler, 1986). Findings on the effectiveness of these interventions on selfdescribed behavior generally report small to medium effect sizes ( Tobler, 1986;
Rooney & Murray, 1996; Hwang, Yeagley, & Petosa, 2004; Rundall & Bruvold, 1988),
and small effect sizes for studies that included long-term follow-ups (Skara & Sussman,
2003). All available meta-analyses, however, conclude that Social Influence and
Contextual programs influence relevant behavioral markers (mostly self-reported
smoking, sometimes biologically validated) more than Rational or Psychological
programs. One study (Tengs, Osgood, & Chen, 2001) used simulation models and
sensitivity analyses to assess cost-effectiveness of providing school-based prevention
curricula on a national scale and found favorable results indicating a positive return-ofinvestment under varying model assumptions, including a dissipation of effects after one
to four years.
Rational and Psychological programs assume that increased factual knowledge
of consequences of health-comprising behaviors is a necessary and sufficient condition
Information, Norms, and Adherence 41
for norm adherence in the open environment (i.e. generalize to other social contexts
outside the classroom situation). The analysis offered here asserts the assumption is
false. Programs that teach factual knowledge, by definition, target declarative behaviors
(instrumental verbiage) leaving both instrumental action and governance itself without
support. Hence, the view is consistent what is observed – changes in declarative
behaviors but little to none in instrumental action or governance. Similarly, Social
Influence and Contextual interventions provide direct support for changes in
instrumental verbiage, but also offer some, although indirect support for open
environment changes in instrumental action and governance. Again, the view is
consistent what is observed – direct changes in performance on assessments tapping
declarative behavior and some change in those tapping instrumental action and
governance.
Although many recognize these assertions as fact (see e.g., Faggiano, VignaTaglianti, Versino, Zambon, Borraccino, & Lemma, 2008. Medley, Kennedy, O’Reilly, &
Sweat, 2009; for reviews of various programs), and some report success of ‘skill-based”
programs (e.g., Halford, Markman, & Stanley, 2008), few describe principled theorybased reasons explaining why some programs are effective and others are apparently
ineffectual.
The commonality of findings in several meta-analytical studies – that
interventions aimed at changing the way people talk about harmfulness of smoking
succeeded in doing so (e.g. Hwang et al., 2004) and, at the same time, do not change
instrumental action (and thereby governance) – confirms the superiority of interactive,
social influence-based interventions over “psycho-educational” ones. This empirical
Information, Norms, and Adherence 42
evidence, derived from decades of research on smoking prevention programs, is
inconsistent with the assumption that increased factual knowledge of consequences of
health-comprising behaviors is a necessary and sufficient condition for norm adherence
in the open environment. Moreover, the empirical evidence provides support for an A-BC framework of norm adherence.
7.3. Promoting pro-environmental behaviors
A vast literature indicates that human behavior contributes directly to
environmental deterioration (e.g., Ponting, 1992). If this relation is to change, then
human behavior must change. The majority of programs dedicated to this end assume a
direct correspondence between information/education –knowledge – and behavior itself.
That is, those creating programs in this field assume governance (a strong
correspondence between expressed norms (instrumental verbiage/declarative behavior)
and instrumental action) emerges directly from appropriately trained instrumental
verbiage. Problematically, current efforts to increase knowledge -- information-based
programs that have been ongoing for the past 20 years -- suggest the assumption is
false. These programs do not detectably increased human pro-environmental behavior
(Hungerford & Volk, 1990; Frick et al, 2004; Kollmus & Agyeman, 2002; Pooley &
O’Conner, 2000; Sia, Hungerford & Tomera, 1985/86).
According to the view presented here, programs that ignore instrumental action
and governance while targeting various classes of instrumental verbiage (e.g.,
awareness, attitude, and declarative knowledge) will not perform as expected.
Moreover, the view predicts that programs that do not specify proper normative rules or
provide ill-defined/inadequate consequences of governance by normative rules (i.e., “if”
Information, Norms, and Adherence 43
statements with no enforceable “then” statements) will come up short. Finally, the view
suggests that psycho-educational interventions that do not adequately specify or
provide three-term contingencies supporting change in instrumental action
(reinforcement for target Behavior) and changes in governance, contingencies that
connect normative rules (the educational material/knowledge) with consequences for
adherence or non-compliance (governance), will not produce promised behavioral
changes in the open environment.
In short, the view predicts that even though verbal statements may appropriately
highlight connections among ecosystems, species, habitats, human impacts, largescale consequences of human disturbances, and may even specify solutions that could
remedy these problems, without enforceable behavioral consequences for norm
adherence (following or breaking normative rules), little change in instrumental action or
governance will occur.
Consider the fact that traditional environmental information/education programs
targeting measures of attitude (instrumental verbiage) have produced few demonstrable
effects on instrumental behavior. The outcome of a study described by DiEnno & Hilton
(2005) provides a clear example. These authors compared the outcome of a traditional
psycho-educational program targeting expressed norms against the outcome a
constructivist program targeting adherence to expressed norms that “fit” within an
individual’s existing worldview and/or knowledge base. That is, the traditional program
targeted and assessed declarative routines only; the constructivist program targeted
both declarative and procedural routines.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 44
Given the foregoing theoretical work, it is no surprise that the traditional program
produced no detectable effects on expressed social norms measured as knowledge or
attitudes whereas the constructivist program produced significant effects on both
instrumental verbiage (expressed descriptive norms) and instrumental action (target
Behavior).
Consider the outcome of a comparable program offered by Dimopoulos et al.
(2008). These authors tested an environmental educational program that contained
informational (declarative) modules along with activities requiring active participation,
group cooperation, and project-based learning (procedural modules). The authors used
a quasi-experimental, pre- and post-test design to assess changes in declarative and
procedural routines. Furthermore, the authors included an active-learning process,
which combined both traditional and constructivist processes described above. Results
showed that only a subclass of the declarative routines changed (Dimopoulos et al.,
2008). That is, some classes of instrumental verbiage (declarative routines reflecting
knowledge) increased whereas others (attitudes and verbal commitments to act in a
pro-environmental way) did not (see also, Armstrong & Impara, 1991; Aivazidis et al,
2006; Smith-Sebasto & Cavern, 2006). The authors did not take measures of either
instrumental action or governance itself. It therefore remains uncertain if the program
affected either instrumental action or governance.
Clearly, environmental information/education programs have effectively changed
the way that people talk about the environment . These programs have “raised
awareness” of global warming, the necessity to recycle, and the prevalent need for
conservation (e.g., Kaiser & Fuhrer, 2003; Kaiser, Ranney, Hartig, & Bowler, 1999).
Information, Norms, and Adherence 45
That is, these programs have changed the way that people talk about global warming,
recycling, and conservation. Unfortunately, this awareness has not translated to proenvironmental instrumental actions.
7.4. Campaigns against sexual violence
Despite mandatory knowledge-based anti-sexual-violence education, one-inthree men and two-in-three women enrolled in college courses reported participating in
a sexual crime, as either a victim or perpetrator, during the past year (Sisco &
Figueredo, 2008).
Knowledge-based psycho-educational campaigns designed to decrease not only
reports of, but also the rate of sexual crime, encourage “healthy sexual attitudes” in an
effort to create healthy sexual behavior. By the reconstructed model, expressed sexual
attitudes causally influence enacted sexual behavior. Hence, changing inappropriate
attitudes will change action.
As in other fields, most researchers assess changes in targeted “attitudes” by
means of self-report. The attitudes most often targeted by these programs are: (1)
reducing the acceptance of sexual aggression (2) discouraging the blaming of victims
and (3) promoting open discussion of sexual boundaries and contraception. Because
these attitudes are widely known to be more socially desirable than others, it is not clear
if the “attitude change” reported by these programs reflect changes in personal values
or is merely an artifact of training people to articulate socially desirable words. Perhaps
more importantly, it is not clear open-environment instrumental action or governance
reflect attitude change.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 46
Though anti-sexual-violence psycho-educational programs consistently change
instrumental verbiage – interpreted as increased factual knowledge – they do not
reduce self-reported rape-supportive attitudes, questionable sexual intentions, or victim
blaming (Breitenbecher & Scarce, 2001). Further, even when anti-sexual violence
campaigns alter core “sexual attitudes”, the efforts appear futile – self-reported beliefs
do not correlate highly with self-reported sexually aggressive behavior (Gidycz, Layman,
Rich, Crothers, Gylys, Matorin, & Jacobs, 2001; Kalof, 2000; Sisco, Becker, &
Figueredo, 2006); That is, open-environment instrumental actions do not change
detectably.
7.4.1. Individual differences in suitability for treatment.
One reason for the consistent failure of such programs is that individuals may
obstruct the effectiveness of the campaign. In traditional language, for example, a
psychopath is not likely to attend to a message appealing to one’s conscience.
Similarly, when Breitenbecher and Scarce (2001) inquired about the reasons awareness
campaigns fail, students responded that, although the information was powerful, it was
not applicable to them as individuals. Perhaps this is the result of a “one size fits all”
approach. If only a small portion of the rape awareness information is personally
relevant to each student in the audience, individual students would be more likely to
disregard the relevance of the entire message than to reconsider their general feelings
of invincibility (Festinger, 1957).
By this view, unique phylogenetic, ontogenetic, and perceptual experiences
compose each individual’s extant antecedents and effective consequences (see
glossary). Although normal social consequences may influence the probability of a
Information, Norms, and Adherence 47
psychopath’s instrumental verbiage temporarily, they are unlikely to influence the
probability of that same psychopath’s instrumental actions in the open environment.
A similar condition may exist for women and men. For example, women and men
generally speak of sexuality in very different ways; a meta-analysis of 177 studies
demonstrated significantly more women than men report fear, guilt, or shame about
sexuality – and report feeling less comfortable with their sexual choices (Oliver & Hyde,
1993). Hence, the social consequences of adherence or non-compliance to injunctive
sexual norms may differ (dramatically) for women and men. If this is the case, then
programs designed specifically for female or male sensitivity to governance failures in
this realm may be an important component of any program aimed at decreasing sexual
violence.
7.4.2. Norm adherence not linked to ‘real world’ consequences.
The social norm that awareness training theoretically embodies (‘Do not commit
sexual violence’) differs from the normative rule perceived by the audience (‘Do not
publicly endorse sexual violence’). Currently, over 75% of students report being
involved in sexual violence and yet only 6% of sexual crimes are reported to campus
authorities (Sisco, Becker, & Figueredo, 2006). Even fewer of reported crimes produce
convictions. Thus, non-adherence to the social norms, and even the formal legal rules,
governing the inappropriateness of sexually coercive behaviors may not produce
immediate aversive consequences with sufficient reliability to deter the behavior.
Further, one could conjecture that positive attributes of sexual encounters stabilize the
behavior. Moreover, any public endorsement of rape-supportive beliefs invokes
immediate punitive responses (ranging social disapproval through legal retribution) from
Information, Norms, and Adherence 48
almost all public forums. Due to decades of awareness campaigns, rape-supportive
public speech has become taboo; consequently, there is now so little variance in raperelated self-reported beliefs that self report does not predict actual aggression (Loo &
Thorpe, 1998). Hence, although verbal statements about this topic are subject to
immediate social consequences, the real problem, the target behavior, is not. Thus,
unique ABC relations surround targeted verbal behavior and the target Behavior – and
they appear to occur in parallel with one set of antecedents and consequences
supporting the instrumental verbiage and another set supporting the instrumental
action.12 Theoretically, what is needed is a consistent targeting of instrumental action
(procedural) and instrumental verbiage (declarative routines).
8. Reconstructing and articulating principles of Rule Governance relative to
successful social programs
8.1 Interventions with teeth
Thus far, we have discussed information-only programs that have failed. We now
turn to examples of programs that not only work, but illustrate (at least indirectly) the
principles we have outlined herein.
8.2 Operation Ceasefire
Consider Operation Ceasefire (e.g., Braga, Kennedy, Waring, & Piehl, 2001).
The specified outcome of the program was to control and deter serious gang violence –
particularly youth homicides. To do so, the project designers posited “…that crimes can
be prevented when the costs of committing the crime are perceived by the offender to
Brechner (1977) introduced the phrase “superimposed schedules” to describe one form of compound
schedules - a situation in which a single response leads to multiple consequences. Although it is
attractive to think of rule governance in this way, the condition does not obtain. Instead, it appears that
two distinct schedules are in effect at the same time – each operating on distinct classes of instrumental
behavior – the target behavior and governance – each class of behavior leading to its own unique set of
consequences – a situation that one might describe with the phrase “simultaneous schedules”.
12
Information, Norms, and Adherence 49
outweigh the benefits of committing the crime (Gibbs 1975; Zimring and Hawkins 1973)”
(Braga et al, 2001, p. 201). To do so, the intervention occurred in two phases. During
the first, the working group implemented a set of activities to diminish the flow of
firearms into the target area.13
During the second, the project designers held formal meetings and individual
contact with gang members -- delivering a simple rule: (A) If in the city of Boston, (B)
and if violent behavior occurred (that is, if a gang member hurt another person), (C)
then, the authorities will “pull every legal lever” available. The “pulling every lever”
consequences consisted of, for example, “The authorities could disrupt street drug
activity, focus police attention on low-level street crimes such as trespassing and public
drinking, serve outstanding warrants, cultivate confidential informants for medium- and
long-term investigations of gang activities, deliver strict probation and parole
enforcement, seize drug proceeds and other assets, ensure stiffer plea bargains and
sterner prosecutorial attention, request stronger bail terms (and enforce them), and
focus potentially severe federal investigative and prosecutorial attention on, for
example, gang-related drug activity.” Hence, the program designers set up an ‘incentive
structure’ through their rule – and left it to the members of each gang to form and
enforce gang-specific norms to prevent contact with that incentive structure. The
program designers therefore created a social norm to be enforced internally within the
gangs themselves, by applying external consequences collectively upon the gangs as
self-regulating social units.
13
Note that the working group did not expect to decrease the number of firearms already in gang hands,
but instead to limit the supply of new firearms.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 50
Although the design of the intervention prevented strong causal inferences, as
the authors express it, “The [data pattern] shows a 63 percent reduction in the mean
monthly number of youth homicide victims from a pretest mean of 3.5 youth homicides
per month to a posttest mean of 1.3 youth homicides per month. This simple analysis
suggests that Operation Ceasefire was associated with a large reduction in youth
homicides in Boston (see also Piehl et al. 2000).” (p. 204).
8.3 Smoking prevention
As for the issue of youth smoking, several econometric studies converge on the
finding that raising the price for cigarettes through tax increases results in stronger
declines of participating in smoking among youth than adults: young smokers have a
higher price elasticity of demand for cigarettes than older smokers. This effect may have
two prongs: abruptly higher prices for cigarettes through tax increases (as opposed to
small-increment price raises by the tobacco industry; Liang & Chaloupka 2002) cause
younger people who have already started to reduce their consumption (Chaloupka &
Grossman, 1996) and deters those on the brink of becoming regular smokers to do so
(Ross & Chaloupka, 2003). Lewit, Coate & Grossman (1981) estimate that youth
between 12 and 17 have a price elasticity of demand of stunning -1.2, or about 3 times
more than adults on smoking participation.
8.4 Pro-environmental behavior
An effective instrumental behavioral intervention was performed in Memphis, TN
in the early 1990’s. The project involved, “…refinement of penalty strategies to manage
behavior,” (Potter, Dwyer & Lemming, 1995, p. 197). Prior to a complete reorganization
of the court system, there was not a shared norm identifying pollution and other
Information, Norms, and Adherence 51
environmentally bad behaviors as important to reduce. Using functional analytic
methodology, norms and contingencies were changed through an integrative,
supportive, coherent infrastructure in the following ways: (1) a single court was instituted
(with one judge) to hear environmental code infractions (resulting in expedient justice
without delay and setting precedent with consistent, predictable consequences), (2) a
reduction of inter-agency personnel involved with environmental-code infractions
thereby creating continuity of individuals involved with cases (resulting in shared social
norms and positive reinforcement structures in those personnel), (3) significant increase
in penalties (fines for infractions) resulting in a significant instrumental behavioral
consequence (previous penalties were nominal and thus trivial), and (4) the judge
presiding over the case follows through with personal site visits where previous
infractions took place (thereby changing antecedent conditions for all stakeholders and
potential infractors). As a result, inspectors report a “major increase in violators’
willingness to comply with environmental codes” (Potter, Dwyer & Lemming, 1995, p.
208). Inspectors report convergence among all enforcement personnel (shared norms),
but also individuals expected to comply with regulations are now “intimidated” (again
shared norms).
9. General Discussion
We reviewed the relevant literature on three distinct kinds of information-only or
psycho-educational interventions in the fields of smoking prevention, pro-environmental
behavior, and rape prevention, and critiqued the reconstructed program theory
underlying each of these information-only interventions from the perspective of
behavioral analytic theory. In each case, we found there is insufficient attention to
Information, Norms, and Adherence 52
important distinctions between declarative and procedural routines and the contingent
consequences needed to shape them. Most of these psycho-educational interventions
rely on verbal consequences of instrumental verbiage (declarative routines), and do not
provide social consequences for overt instrumental actions (procedural routines) which
are presumably the ultimate targets of the program. Although, in many instances,
providing social consequences for overt instrumental actions is far beyond the sphere of
influence of program designers, the pragmatics of this proposal are something to be
worked out in the future. All we are indicating in the present argument is the need for
this kind of real-world contingency for the program to work.
We also reviewed relevant literature in a way that permits a bridge across this
gap, namely by the principles of norm adherence (governance), which brings
instrumental action under the influence of verbally specified, clearly articulated
injunctive normative rules. This principle indicates that it might be possible to establish
contingencies in the open environment supporting reliable adherence to learned verbal
normative rules. We have found, however, that none of the three areas of psychoeducational interventions reviewed implements the necessary procedures to accomplish
this goal. To increase the probability of success, as defined by those implementing
social programs, enhanced success may come hand-in-hand with enhanced program
designs.
Finally, we have shown by these specific illustrations how society can derive
cumulative knowledge by attending to the cumulative history of social programs and
their associated evaluation outcomes rather than proceeding program-by-program. We
have used functional analytic theory as our meta-theoretical framework to guide a
Information, Norms, and Adherence 53
critique of the reconstructed program theory underlying psycho-educational
interventions. We are not claiming, however, this is the only perspective on this matter.
Nor are we claiming this is a complete account of the theory needed to guide effective
social programs. Instead, we merely offer it as an example of the kind of integration
(consilience) that we can and must do if we are to create a truly cumulative body of
program evaluation theory. If such a body of cumulative knowledge can be amassed,
then it opens up the possibility that in the future these principles could be applied
proactively to advise against programs, interventions, or treatment components that are
doomed to failure, and to recommend others that are more likely to succeed.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 54
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Author Note
W. Jake Jacobs and A.J. Figueredo provided support for a portion of this research
through personal funds. The order of 2nd, 3rd, and 4th authorship was determined by lot.
We thank Sacha D. Brown, Rafael Garcia, and Lee Sechrest, for comments,
corrections, and careful thought regarding these ideas and their presentation. We, of
course, take full responsibility for the final product that you now hold in your hands.
*Address
correspondence to W. Jake Jacobs, Department of Psychology, 1503 E
University Blvd., PO Box 210068, Psychology Bldg. Rm. 312, Tucson AZ 85721, Phone:
+1 (520) 626-4825, Fax: +1 (520) 621-9306. email addresses: wjj@u.arizona.edu;
sisco@u.arizona.edu, dawnh@email.arizona.edu, fredericmalter@WEB.DE,
ajf@u.arizona.edu respectively.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 70
Glossary
We provide this glossary because many of the words used here as theoretical
constructs carry excessive surplus meaning.
Antecedent conditions: from the Latin “What proceeds” or “to go before”. This includes the
history of the species, the developmental history, extant anatomical and physiological
states as they interplay with the extant environment.
Effective Consequent: An event contingent on instrumental Behavior, following it within one to
two sec and changing the subsequent ‘strength’ (probability, latency, etc.) of that
behavior. Often shortened to Consequent or Consequences.
Governance/Adherence/Compliance/Obedience: A subclass of instrumental behavior
measured by its ‘fit’ between environmental contingencies as specified by a rule and
targeted instrumental Behavior (fit between ABC and rule specification). Often
shortened to governance or Adherence.
Instrumental action: A subclass of instrumental Behavior classified by its form and measured
by its outcome exclusively – usually as environmental work. Often shortened to
Operant.
Instrumental Behavior: What behavior as a tool accomplishes – Hence, the outcome of an
instrumental behavior defines it. Often shortened to Behavior.
Instrumental: Serving as a tool.
Rule: Instrumental verbiage that points to environmental contingencies. Takes an explicit or
implicit “if A, and if B, then C” form. Rules set an occasion for instrumental action and
Governance. May be called ‘pointers’.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 71
Schedule of Reinforcement: The spatio-temporal relation between a target Behavior and
contingent events that influence the ‘strength’ of the behavior (probability, latency,
pattern, etc.). In this case, ‘reinforcement’ refers to events that increase or decrease the
‘strength’ of the behavior. Schedules of Reinforcement come in two major forms:
Continuous Schedule of Reinforcement (CRF): The reinforcer occurs
immediately each time the organism emits the target Behavior. Also
known as Continuous Reinforcement.
Partial Schedule of Reinforcement: The reinforcer does not occur each time the
organism emits the target Behavior. Partial Schedules of Reinforcement
come in four major flavors:
Fixed Ratio Schedule of Reinforcement (FR): The reinforcer occurs after the
organism emits the target Behavior a fixed number of times,
Fixed Interval Schedule of Reinforcement (FI): The reinforcer occurs after the
organism emits the target Behavior and after a fixed amount of time has
elapsed.
Variable Ratio Schedule of Reinforcement (VR): The reinforcer occurs after the
organism emits the target Behavior an unpredictable number of times.
Variable Interval Schedule Reinforcement (VI): The reinforcer occurs after the
organism emits the target Behavior and an unpredictable amount of time
has elapsed.
Concurrent Schedules of Reinforcement: The spatio-temporal relations between
target Behaviors and contingent events that influence the ‘strength’ of
those behaviors (probability, latency, pattern, etc.). These schedules of
Information, Norms, and Adherence 72
reinforcement are simultaneously available to the organism so the
organism can emit target Behavior appropriate to either or both schedules.
Social norms: a subclass of rules pointing to socially acceptable and unacceptable social “if A,
and if B, then C” contingencies.
Verbiage: A subclass of instrumental Behavior classified by its form (vocalization, writing,
gesticulation, facial expression, etc.) and measured by its outcome exclusively –
usually as influence on conspecifics. Although, according to the Oxford English
Dictionary, the first meaning of “verbiage” has negative connotations, we accept only
the second entry as our technical definition: “Diction, wording, verbal expression”. We
intend no other meaning.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 73
Biographical Sketches
W. Jake Jacobs, Ph.D., is a Professor of Psychology and Psychiatry, Fellow of Sports
Medicine, and Director of the Anxiety Research Group at the University of Arizona. He
serves as a core member of the Ethology and Evolutionary Psychology and Cognitive
and Neural Systems programs, and affiliates with the Clinical Psychology program
there. He serves as an Action Editor for Traumatology and has served on editorial
boards of journals such as Rehabilitation Psychology and Psychological Review. Dr.
Jacobs’ worries about proximate and ultimate theories of the etiology of contextualized
anxiety disorders and stress, and relations between Hot/Cool Neural Systems and rule
governance in regulating emotions.
Melissa Sisco, Ph.D., is currently doing her clinical internship at the Chicago Psychiatric
Center, University of Illinois where she is completing the final requirements for a joint
PhD in Clinical Psychology and Psychology, Policy and Law. Ms. Sisco has worked in
the area of sexual violence for the past 10 years specializing in institutional program
development and evaluation of sexual violence prevention and treatment. She has
worked with a variety of agencies in efforts to address the sequelae of sexual violence
including international court, corrections, restorative justice, and mental health
providers.
Dawn Hill, Ph.D., teaches environmental and evolutionary psychology, biopsychology
and personality at the University of Arizona. She is also a Conservation Psychology
researcher and consultant. Dr. Hill’s research areas include individual and group
conservation behavior, environmental education effectiveness and program evaluation,
community conservation efforts, and the intersection of environmental science and law.
Information, Norms, and Adherence 74
Her primary emphases are in evolutionary and behavioral psychology, which brings a
unique perspective in her field, as well as investigating the strong effect of situational
forces on conservation behavior and education.
Frederic Malter, Ph.D., combines perspectives of social psychology and program
evaluation to improve evaluation practice. He received his PhD in program evaluation
by examining outcomes of school-based anti-smoking education. Dr. Mater’s work
focuses on the application of quantitative methods to support decision makers in the
improvement of social programs and policies. He is interested in quantitative research
on programs aiming to ameliorate social ailments. He is a member of the American
Evaluation Association (AEA), and the German Evaluation Society (DGEval). Dr. Malter
has presented at numerous regional, national and international conferences and
facilitated workshops around evaluation methods and practice.
Aurelio José Figueredo, Ph.D., is a Professor of Psychology, Family Studies and
Human Development at the University of Arizona. Dr. Figueredo serves as Director of
the graduate program in Ethology and Evolutionary Psychology, an inter-disciplinary
program integrating the studies of comparative psychology, ethology, sociobiology, and
behavioral ecology, genetics, and development. He currently serves as a member of the
Board of Directors of the Evaluation Group for Analysis of Data. His research interests
lie in the evolutionary psychology and behavioral development of life history strategy,
sex, violence, and the quantitative ethology and social development in human and
nonhuman organisms.