Abstract
This paper puts forward a rounder conceptual model for interpreting short- and long-term effects of choice behavior. As a further development of dual-process theory, Kahneman (2003) distinguished between intuition and reasoning, which served as the respective precursors of the cognitive processing systems 1 and 2. We maintain that they reflect the more rigorous distinction between brief and immediate and extended and elaborated relational responding, which may be reinterpreted through an analysis of their functional properties. Repertoires of relational responding are offered by the multi-dimensional multi-level model. Specifically, we provide a conceptual account of how nudging, or the manipulation of environmental contingencies, works on the creation and modification of relational framing. Educative nudges, or boosts, are a subset of nudges that may more easily maintain target choice behavior in the future. The central role of verbal behavior is essential toward formulating rules, which inform and guide choice behavior over time. Although nudges are traditionally regarded as System 1-steered aspects, they are herein regarded as cues for responding to relational frames, which may induce System 2-steered aspects. We suggest adopting the implicit relational assessment procedure (IRAP) to inform how coherent and immediate responding to novel relational responding may occur in the presence of choice behavior. Several examples are included to support the claim of encompassing relational responding and choice behavior. We address the instances of consumer behavior, stereotypy and prejudices, eating behavior, and overcoming cognitive biases. The conclusions depict a promising way forward for the study of choice: an improved model for interpreting and overcoming human errors, due to changes in the contingencies of behavior.
Highlights
THE NEED FOR ANENHANCED CONCEPTUAL MODELAs nudge-focused research receives unprecedented attention, we question the comprehensiveness of the conceptual models that sustain the applications of nudging interventions
We suggest adopting the implicit relational assessment procedure (IRAP) to inform how coherent and immediate responding to novel relational responding may occur in the presence of choice behavior
We submit that Behavioral analysis (BA) and its contemporary extension of contextual behavioral science (CBS) may be able to provide an overarching conceptual model for nudging that represents more than a simple tactic or a batch of incoherent techniques aimed at overcoming behavioral and cognitive biases (Hansen, 2017)
Summary
As nudge-focused research receives unprecedented attention, we question the comprehensiveness of the conceptual models that sustain the applications of nudging interventions. RFT is a post-Skinnerian analysis of cognition and language, and it offers an experimental interpretation of this supposed insensitivity to contingency effect included in a more general vision of cognition and language It comprehends a conceptualization of these properties of verbally controlled behavior that are relevant to nudging and that describe persistent patterns of non-functional behaviors influenced by cognitive biases (such as the hindsight bias). RFT extends BA’s set of operant principles to analyze higher human cognitive functioning, including rapid intuitive judgment encompassed in System 1 and the conscious awareness (i.e., analytic thinking) of System 2 In this context, framing is used metaphorically to label a particular kind of human behavior, responding to arbitrary relations between stimuli under contextual control. Given the learning history of the individual and the degree to which future choices may be indirectly “taught,” the distinction between nudges informed by relational frames and boosts may no longer be necessary to reach better-informed and longer-lasting choice behavior
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