BEHAVIOR UNDER THE PARADIGM OF RADICAL BEHAVIORISM

Abstract

The matter of defining behavior figures scientific literature of diverse areas of knowledge for over a century, but an agreement about the fundamental aspects related to the topic was not reached yet. The main discussions usually identify behavior with diverse terms such as activity, action, relation, event and interaction. This article brings into discussion some aspects of the historical context related to the evolution of the term ‘behavior’. Furthermore, it discuss some implications of adopting the main definitions available and, in doing so, it also provides an analytical framework that we hope may be useful to behavior analysts in making consistent and contextualized choices on the definition of behavior, especially in the domain of operant behavior as formulated by radical behaviorism. Keywords: behavior, behaviorism, behavior analysis.