Critical Thinking About Psychological Concepts: Session 249 with Hank Schlinger

The Behavioral Observations Podcast with Matt Cicoria

It's kind of a podcast cliche - one that I'm certainly guilty of - to refer to an interview as, "wide-ranging." However, in this case, that description certainly fits.

I had the pleasure of chatting with Dr. Hank Schlinger, who, amongst other pursuits, teaches in the Department of Psychology at Cal State Los Angeles.

During this conversation we talked about the state of ABA when he entered the field; his behavioral interpretations of psychological concepts like intelligence, consciousness, object permanence, and others; books he's written on parenting and developmental psychology; Skinner 1945 and the idea of explanatory fictions; why it's easy to be a skeptic about some things and harder with others; and, as the title of this podcasts suggests, how to foster critical thinking skills.

We also spent a bit of time previewing what he and Dr. Eb Blakely will be presenting on at the 2024 Verbal Behavior Conference. As always, we conclude the show with advice for the newly-minted BCBA.

Lastly, Hank is an accomplished musician, and we spent a few minutes on how being a Behavior Analyst influences his approach to songwriting. In fact, Hank has given me permission to play a portion of the song, One More Invention, that was inspired by, you guessed it, behavior analytic principles. As such, you’ll hear that instead of the normal outro music as the show concludes.

Here are the links to some of the things we talked about.

• The Verbal Behavior Conference speakers' list.
• Malott's Principles of Behavior, 8th edition.*
• Skinner (1945). The Operational Analysis of Psychological Terms.
• Hank's Skeptic Magazine article, Consciousness is nothing but a word.
• Hank's Instagram.
• Hank's book, How to build good behavior and self esteem in children.*
• A Behavior Analytic View of Child Development, also by Hank.*
• Hank's 1998 album, One More Invention.

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