# event and property centered explanations

**URL:** <http://discourse.iapct.org/t/event-and-property-centered-explanations/13728>\
**Category:** CSG1994\
**Created:** [October 30, 1994, 4:03pm UTC](http://discourse.iapct.org/t/event-and-property-centered-explanations/13728 "1994-10-30T16:03:04Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
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**Author:** ![William\_T\_Powers2](http://discourse.iapct.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/w/c67d28/32.png) [@William\_T\_Powers2](http://discourse.iapct.org/u/William_T_Powers2)\
**Post date:** [October 30, 1994, 4:03pm UTC](http://discourse.iapct.org/t/event-and-property-centered-explanations/13728/1 "1994-10-30T16:03:04Z")

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[From Bill Powers (941030.0400 MDT)]

RE: Behavior.

Webster's Collegiate: n. 1. Mode of conducting oneself; deportment. 2.  
The way in which an organism, organ, or substance acts, esp. in response  
to a stimulus; as, the behavior of glands; activity or change in  
relation to environment; as, the \_behavior\_ of steel under stress.

I see \_three\_ major meanings of behavior here.

Behavior itself, the noun, is simply an observed activity which can only  
be described as a collection of variables changing through time. But the  
dictionary recognizes that context creates two meanings having to do  
with whether behavior is spontaneous or visibly caused.

One meaning is "evidence of inner processes" as in "Genghis Kahn behaved  
abominably toward his enemies." The actions performed by Kahn are  
asssumed to be generated by processes inside Kahn, spontaneously; thus  
we attribute this kind of behavior to the behaving system alone.

The second is "evidence of external influences," as in "the behavior of  
a moving planet in a gravitational field" or "the behavior of a rat on  
an FR10 schedule." This kind of behavior is seen as a consequence of an  
external force or influence, without which there would be no behavior.

The distinction between the first and second meanings is in the  
attribution of behavior to a cause: either an internal cause or an  
external cause. In both cases, behavior is construed as some sort of  
change through time.

The third meaning of "behavior" is subtler, because the changes in  
variables through time is not the point; the point is in the  
\_relationship\_ between observed changes and observed influences. This is  
found in "the behavior of steel under stress." Under a tensile stress, a  
steel rod will elongate. The particular elongation observed, however, is  
not the central idea: the central idea is the coefficient of elongation,  
the ratio of change in length to applied force. If the applied force is  
one ton and the elongation is one millimeter, the behavior of the steel  
is said to be the same as when the force is two tons and the elongation  
is two millimeters.

This third meaning of behavior pertains to a \_property\_ of the thing  
that behaves. The elastic coefficient of a steel rod, whether linear or  
nonlinear, is a property belonging to the rod, which determines how  
length will depend on applied force. The applied force does not cause  
this property to exist in the same way it causes an elongation of the  
rod. Instead, the property is what determines how much elongation will  
occur for \_any\_ particular amount of applied force, including zero. The  
property does not predict that any particular elongation will occur; it  
is not a description of particular events, but of a consistent  
relationship that holds between variable events. The property exists not  
in the presumed cause nor in the time-course of the variables that are  
caused to change, but in what lies between, the structure of the object.

The transition from an event-centered view to a property-centered view  
can be seen in coming to understand how a lever works. At first, we see  
only that if we press down on this end, that end goes up. Then we notice  
that if we lift up on this end, that end goes down. If we move our end  
rapidly, the other end moves rapidly. If we create a brief movement that  
immediately returns to the initial condition, the other end does  
similarly, but the other way. And if we do nothing to this end, the  
other end does nothing.

This is all the knowledge we would need in order to control the other  
end of the lever. Of course given a second lever we would have to open  
the investigation again, because the behavior of the other end would  
probably be different. In the long run we would be able to anticipate  
how to control the other end of the \_typical\_ lever, with allowances for  
variability between levers. This is as far as we can go with the  
empirical approach based on observing behavior-as-event.

To make the transition to the property-centered approach, we would  
transfer attention from the activities at the ends of the lever and look  
at the lever itself. We would discover three kinds of levers, and we  
would find the geometrical and mechanical properties that depend on the  
placement of the fulcrum. We would discover the properties of the lever  
that account for the relationship between movements at one end and  
movements at the other end -- any movements at all. When we talk about  
the lever, we would no longer offer descriptions of what the other end  
does when you do various things to this end. We would just say d1/d2 =  
l1/l2. This doesn't describe any particular behavior, but it says that  
if you move one end by a distance d1, in whatever manner, you will find  
that the distance moved by the other end, d2, will continuously satisfy  
the equation for a lever with arms l1 and l2.

PCT is part of a scientific tradition that looks for properties, not  
specific causes of specific effects. This is one reason, and in  
retrospect perhaps the main reason, that psychologists have had great  
difficulty in understanding PCT.

The behavior of a control system is to make its inputs match a reference  
signal and its outputs be whatever they must be to achieve that result.  
So we can talk about properties of an organism without mentioning any  
particular action or any particular environment. But to many  
psychologists, this is not recognizeable as a law of behavior. What they  
want to hear is something like "If the level of aspiration is increased,  
the level of effort will increase" or "an increment in reinforcement  
produces an increment in behavior." They want to know what will happen  
if something else happens. Of course from the PCT model we can deduce  
what will happen in any particular case, given suitable translations of  
terms, but we can also see that there are circumstances under which  
something different would happen. So we tend to talk in terms of  
properties of the model (once we have verified that it does work) and to  
ignore specific examples of behavior. When we look at data, we see it as  
illustrating a property of the model that would be seen in many other  
circumstances. But to the event-oriented psychologist, one set of  
observations may not seem to have anything to do with another set.

When we argue about cause and effect in behavior, we're asking whether  
the environment causes behavior or the organism causes behavior. This is  
looking for an event-oriented answer. A property-oriented answer is that  
neither is true. The governing factor is a property of the organism that  
determines \_how\_ the action of an organism will depend on events in the  
environment and vice versa. A change in the properties of the organism  
will result in a change in the relationship between the environment and  
the actions; the observed relationship is a consequence of the internal  
organization of the organism. When we characterize that internal  
organization as a hierarchy of control systems, we are describing,  
implicitly, an infinite variety of relationships between environmental  
events and action events -- but a single organizing principle.

Well, that's enough of a train of thought that started at 4:00 AM. The  
universe is permeated with the odor of turpentine.

> **···**
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------  
> Best,
> 
> Bill P.