The past century of research with primates led us to formulate a Rational Behaviorism that relates the first appearances of creative, seemingly insightful behavioral patterns and capabilities to conditioned and unlearned behaviors. We call these creative behaviors emergents and propose that they be juxtaposed with respondents and operants of classical and operant conditioning procedures. Emergents reflect creative adaptation - novel patterns of behaviors and not the fixedness that is anticipated by traditional conditioning procedures. Notwithstanding, the etiology of emergents rests on information accrued via conditioning, observation, and general experiences as well. Once defined, we then seek to identify the antecedents of emergents so as to understand them.

We have very strong evidence that animal learning is not limited to specific responses to specific stimuli. Rather, the animals learn about tasks on which they work, the resources of their environs and how to obtain these resources when their motivational states make them salient. They also learn to avoid aversive situations and to cope with those that must be endured.

We argue that reinforcement of behavior is not the end game! Rather it is information that will be stored and used in the future to form the foundations of symbolic functioning, communication, and even basic language skills in great apes, dolphins, and parrots. Our framework is to provide a unified understanding of behaviors from the most simple and predictable to the most creative and improbable - emergents.

For more information, contact:
Al Setka
Director of Communications
Great Ape Trust of Iowa
4200 S.E. 44th Avenue
Des Moines, IA 50320
(515) 243-3580
515.720.7430 (cell)
asetka@greatapetrust.org