From Relays to Microcontrollers: The Adoption of Technology in Operant Research

Abstract

Adoption of exogenous technology for the automated arrangement of contingencies has accompanied and shaped the development of the experimental analysis of behavior. During the early days, motors and electromechanical relays were used for controlling and recording experimental events. As it became available, solid-state equipment began to replace electromechanical relays between the 1960s and 1970s. About the same time, the advent of minicomputers and personal computers, resulted in interfaces, and state-notation programming languages designed for simplifying the daily work of operant researchers. During recent years, new technology involving low-cost microcontroller input-output boards, and a variety of analog and digital sensors has become available worldwide. These boards could help developing new lines of research and disseminating behavior analysis around the world.

Beyond single discrete responses: An integrative and multidimensional analysis of behavioral dynamics assisted by Machine Learning

“…One reason for this was the affordable technology available at the end of the first half of the last century to make reliable and automatized behavior records and measures. These records were made primarily through the use of mechanical and electronic switches (Escobar, 2014). Thus, the methodological approach focused on computing the frequency and temporal distribution of the activation or deactivation of switches (e.g., the total number of responses to an operand, number of responses per unit of time, inter-response times, etc.).…”

“…The relevance of accurate and objective records to any empirical science is well known. It is established that one of the main reasons for the success of the operant paradigm was its objective record of behavior (Escobar, 2014;León et al, 2020b). Under the single-response paradigm (e.g., pressing the lever or entering the dispenser) was possible to identify ordered functional relations between different variables and procedures (e.g., schedules of reinforcement; deprivations or motivational operations) and temporal patterns of discrete responses.…”

Beyond Single Discrete Responses: An Integrative and Multidimensional Analysis of Behavioral Dynamics Assisted by Machine Learning

“…One reason for this was the affordable technology available at the end of the first half of the last century to make reliable and automatized behavior records and measures. These records were made primarily through the use of mechanical and electronic switches (Escobar, 2014 ). Thus, the methodological approach focused on computing the frequency and temporal distribution of the activation or deactivation of switches (e.g., the total number of responses to an operand, number of responses per unit of time, inter-response times, etc.).…”

“…The relevance of accurate and objective records to any empirical science is well-known. It is established that one of the main reasons for the success of the operant paradigm is its objective record of behavior (Escobar, 2014 ; León et al, 2020b ). Under the single-response paradigm (e.g., pressing the lever or entering the dispenser) it is possible to identify ordered functional relations between different variables and procedures (e.g., schedules of reinforcement, deprivations or motivational operations) and temporal patterns of discrete responses.…”

Learning to stand tall: Idiopathic scoliosis, behavioral electronics, and technologically‐assisted patient participation in treatment, c. 1969–1992

“…Moving away from mundane examples of behavioral electronics in laboratory settings to improve and automate experimental control (on the use of electromechanical technology by Skinner in the 1950s, see: Escobar, 2014; Escobar & Lattal, 2014), the Schwitzgebel brothers expanded the notion to include the use of electronics as an “aid to observation”, but also in psychotherapy in the form of “interventional or prosthetic devices” or in “the direct control of behavior by restricting voluntary actions or by eliciting involuntary ones” (R. K. Schwitzgebel et al, 1964, p. 233). Contemporary uses of closed‐circuit television and video‐tape replay to observe the psychotherapeutic encounter fell within this domain (Lindsley, 1969), as did teaching machines (Rutherford, 2003, pp.…”