Introductory Concepts
Elementary Relationships
Extensions of Verbal Behavior
Multiple Controlling Relationships
Building on the Elementary Relationships
;

10.4 Thematic Control Example #1

If someone were to say to you “say alligator” and you responded with “crocodile,” this would be an example of thematic control because there would be no point-to-point correspondence between the stimulus and the response. For that matter, you could say “doorknob” and that would be thematic control, too.

Thematic Control

When a controlling variable evokes a response and has the following features:

There is NO point-to-point correspondence between the controlling variable and the response

Whether or not there is formal similarity between the controlling variable and the response

Formal characteristics of either the controlling variable or the response

Dynamic characteristics of either the controlling variable or the response

Thematic Control
2 Comments
Collapse Comments

Oh! So formal control is us getting exactly what we asked for with point to point correspondence and thematic control just comes with the modality

No it’s just point to point

This section is for the civil and public discussion of the content of this page. We reserve the right to moderate and remove comments that are irrelevant, disrespectful, hateful, harassing, threatening, or spamlike. If you are experiencing a technical issue, please contact our helpdesk for assistance.

Leave a Comment