Skinner and a solution to the problem of inner events.

Stemmer (1992) wrote a theory paper. He asked: Can Skinner's radical behaviorism handle thoughts, feelings, and other private events without adding mental stuff?

The author stayed inside Skinner's own writings. He showed how 'inner' events are just more behavior—smaller, private, but still physical.

The paper finds that Skinner already had a clean, physical story for mental life. Private events are covert operants. They enter the same three-term contingency as public acts.

No new cognitive entities are needed. The framework stays 100 % environmental.

Stemmer (1990) set the stage. That paper used the same no-mentalism rule to explain grammar. Stemmer (1992) widens the same defense to every 'inner' event.

Eisler (1984) made a similar move for observational learning. He showed that watching and later doing can be told with pure environmental history—no mind in the middle.

Spencer et al. (2022) keeps the project alive. They revive Skinner's old term 'countercontrol' but dress it in modern RFT language. The spirit is the same: explain resistance without adding mental homunculi.

Capaldi (1992), published the same year, is a cousin piece. It says 'psychological history' is not stored inside the person—it is actualized right now in current interactions. Both papers keep the ontology slim and current.

When a parent says, 'He must be anxious inside,' you can stay scientific. Treat the private event as behavior that follows the same reinforcement rules as any other. Track its triggers and payoffs in the environment, not in a hidden mind. Your treatment plans stay observable, testable, and jargon-free.