from Ed Ford (950528.early am PDT)
Bill Powers (950527.0950 MDT)
I agree with Rick on Bill's post on understanding behavior. The very
hardest thing I've dealt with in teaching educators PCT is that very
problem. They want to control the child's behavior by manipulating the
child. All they get in the more disruptive child is more chaos, violence,
or passive resistence. That's why my program based on PCT is so powerful
and yet so misunderstood as to WHY AND HOW IT WORKS. Teachers and
administrators see the results and can't believe what they see. Yet they
still think they are controlling behavior. What's happening (I think) is
that when they ask the child "what are you doing?, what are the rules?, what
will happen if you break the rules?, Is that what you want to happen?, Where
do you want to be now?, and What will happen if you disrupt again?; when
they ask these questions the child eventually begins to think (some refuse
to deal with you but later because they want to be with their friends go
along). In the process of thinking, because they have a higher priority for
being in class with their friends, they set another reference level for
following the classroom rules when controlling their various controlled
variables. The only comforting thought is to read how you scientists have
the same problem at your level of interaction.