Association for Behavior Analysis International

To determine the highest behavioral-developmental stage in non-literate populations, 40 Nepalese adults were trained and tested on stage-based isolation-of-variables instruments (thatched roof problem and laundry problem). The thatched roof problem was a culturally based variant of the laundry problem. Participants were randomly assigned to two groups depending on the order of problems given (thatched roof first or laundry first). Correct answers were reinforced monetarily. The overall mean stage performance increased from M stage 8.98 (SD = 0.97) to M stage 9.18 (SD = 1.06) from training to transfer tasks. This transfer task performance was only half a stage lower than the behavioral-developmental stage educated westerns attain (Commons & Davidson, 2015). The order in which the problems were presented had a statistically significant effect on stage score improvement F(1, 38) = 6.218, p = 0.017, η2 = 0.113. When the thatched roof problem was presented first, it led to greater stage score improvements. This could be because the thatched roof problem matched the participants’ cultural experience better than the laundry problem. The results highlight that content and reinforcement are important in assessing behavioral-developmental stage in cross-cultural populations. They also support the notion that stage performance is mostly genetic and not learned through education.

Illusions have been a topic of research for decades. Kalderon posits that an illusion is “an experience of an object o appearing F, where o is not in fact F.” Commons describes illusions as “those instances where people report the appearance of stimuli in a way that distorts their physical properties”. Illusions influence perceptual understanding. Thus, they also distort truth and knowledge. Perturbations are changes that can potentially be observed. How they are perceived altered by their way of knowing. There are four major ways of “knowing”: a) Analytical knowledge is always true irrespective of "experience" or “data”; b) Anti-Analytical knowledge is not believing in “mathematical” or “logic” knowledge; c) Phenomenological which is experiential (Art, Law, Religion); d) Empirical include Science. Forty participants were asked about different sources of knowledge. They answered 77 questions on all forms of knowledge. A principle-components factor analysis on 77 items confirmed that there were 4 clear factors showing 3 positive ways of knowing and one negation of analytic. The four factors explained 54.39% of the total variance. Factor loadings ranged from .803 to .706.