Back to baseline.
A weekend vote in 1957 created JEAB, and later papers show the journal kept its lab-first mission while growing bigger and more diverse.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Horton (1987) tells the story of a 1957 meeting. Behavior analysts met at the Eastern Psychological Association. They wanted a new journal just for lab work. The group voted yes. JEAB was born.
The paper is a short, first-hand recount. No data. Just the tale of that single weekend.
What they found
The meeting ended with a clear plan. Start the Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior. Print lab studies only. Keep the science pure.
The vote showed the field was ready to split from general psychology journals.
How this fits with other research
Kelleher et al. (1987) tells the same 1957 story, but zooms in on Charlie Ferster. Ferster pushed hardest for the journal. Same event, different lens.
Laties (2008) picks up where Horton (1987) stops. It tracks JEAB for fifty years. More countries, more women authors, free online archives. The baby grew up.
EByiers et al. (2025) counts every odd species ever printed in JEAB. The count starts the year after the 1957 vote. The founders’ journal now holds data from parrots, fish, even cockroaches.
Saville et al. (2002) adds numbers. From 1958 to 1999 the share of pure lab studies stayed flat. The dream of a data-only journal held steady.
Why it matters
Knowing the origin keeps you grounded. When you read a JEAB article you see fifty-plus years of peer review that began in one hotel meeting. Share the story with new RBTs. It shows how a small group can shape an entire science.
Want CEUs on This Topic?
The ABA Clubhouse has 60+ free CEUs — live every Wednesday. Ethics, supervision & clinical topics.
Join Free →Open any recent JEAB article, note the odd species or topic, and tell your team, ‘This all started with a 1957 vote.’
02At a glance
03Original abstract
It will come as no surprise that my JEAB reminiscences, like many another, focus upon that smoke-filled hotel room at an EPA meeting in 1957 where the decision having been taken to "start our own journal," a head-count was required to ensure the availability of pa- pers in sufficient numbers to at least fill the first issue. But while this focal occasion in the launching of the Journal stands out, the antecedents and consequences of that momentous undertaking provide an array of equally note- worthy remembrances.
Journal of the experimental analysis of behavior, 1987 · doi:10.1901/jeab.1987.48-458