Conceptual contributions of Kantor's interbehavioral psychology.
Kantor and Skinner fit together and give you a single, stronger story for why behavior occurs.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Parrott (1984) wrote a theory paper. He asked: Can Kantor's interbehavioral psychology live with Skinner's radical behaviorism?
He argued yes. The two systems fit like puzzle pieces. Together they give behavior analysis a stronger base.
What they found
The paper found no clash. Kantor's field-based view and Skinner's selectionist view share the same core. Both reject mind-body dualism.
Merging them gives practitioners one coherent story about why behavior happens.
How this fits with other research
Mazur (1991) extends the same idea. He shows Skinner already bridges biology and social science. The Kantor-Skinner mix now covers both worlds.
Pear (1985) gives history behind the fit. He tracks how Skinner walked away from positivism. That break makes room for Kantor's broader field stance.
Emerson (2003) hands you the tools. He lists three ways to turn mental talk into behavior talk. These tools live inside the unified frame Parrott (1984) promotes.
Why it matters
You can stop defending two camps. Use Kantor's field language when you sketch setting events. Use Skinner's operant language when you write contingencies. One case note, one framework, zero tension.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Kantor's interbehavioral psychology may be characterized by its conceptual emphases upon (a) naturalism, (b) scientific pluralism, (c) organism-environment interactions, and (d) integrated event fields of continuously interrelated and interrelating factors. Despite differences between Skinnerian and Kantorian classification schemes, the conceptual features of interbehaviorism are compatible with those of Skinner's behaviorism, and taken together the two provide a firm theoretical foundation for an authenticially behavioristic psychology.
The Behavior analyst, 1984 · doi:10.1007/BF03391901