Rational Frame Theory of Human Language - Essay Example

Relational frame theory – a discussion Introduction: There are hundreds of languages and dialects in the world used by different societies, cultures, and nations. The primary purpose of language (and dialects) is to communicate emotions, ideas, thoughts, and knowledge. Due to the importance of language in a society, many theories have been developed over the years and also how individuals in a society use it for their own and collective purposes. All the advancements and developments that one sees in today’s world would not have been possible without language and communication. In other words, practically every field of human endeavor needs the use of language in one form or the other. This paper looks at the concept of relational frame theory based on the tutorial developed by Dr Eric J. Fox, Ph.D, in his website. It will be based on the explanation of a hierarchical representation (given below) of Dr Fox’s views on this area. Based on tutorial developed by Eric J Fox (Fox, 2002) Overview: According to Dr Fox, language can create both problems and solutions. Any situation, whether it is positive or negative, is directly related to the language and emotion used. It can be used to instruct, to give praise or heap insults. It can be used to judge people and it can be used to make laws. It can be used to educate people and can be used to dictate actions. Words used in a certain context can even result in violence and wars. On the other extreme, it has the ability to bring about peace among nations. These few examples of the power of language show how much it can influence a society and its individuals. It should be stated here that language studies can help in understanding human behavior and actions to a large extent. It can help psychologists to provide solutions to problems faced by individuals. Traditional theories on the field believe that words used in language have symbolism and generativity. Symbolism refers to the power of a word to signify other meanings or things even though a particular word has a specific meaning. For example the word fire may evoke different emotions in people. For one person fire can mean warmth, for another it can mean pain, and for a third person it can mean food. This power of the word can have diverse effects on people in the context they are used. A combination of words, in other words a sentence, has generativity. According to Dr Fox, “generativity means that we can create and understand an infinite number of meaningful sentences or utterances” (Fox, 2002).The sentence ‘An apple is a blue fruit that is found in the North Pole’ may be absurd and incorrect, but it has meaning. In this context, any number of examples of generativity for true and false utterances can be given as examples. It is also believed by most cognitive theorists that language and communication happens through cognition of the human mind and also that innate or genetic factors also play a hand in language development and use by individuals. In effect some thought or idea is formed in the brain of a person. It is transformed into symbols or words which will then be communicated to others. The listener (or reader) will then store and process within his/her brain what is being communicated. Symbolism and generativity will influence this process. The listener then may or may not react to what has been understood by the message. So such theorists stress on the importance of psychological events which in turn will induce or produce other psychological events. Any action or thought by humans can be considered as psychological events. While all these factors are relevant, relational frame theory states that more factors need to be considered in order to understand, predict, and manipulate human behavior and actions. In other words, it takes a different approach to language and cognition which will be discussed in the next section. Relational frame theory: Relational frame theory states that human behavior is and can be influenced by the context (environment) in which the individual interacts. This can be past and present (current) environment. This factor, which is not considered by cognitive theorists, is extremely important in predicting and (influencing) changing psychological events. There are many elements in the current environment that can be changed or influenced, referred to as manipulative variables. The term referred to for this line of thought is ‘functional contextual theory’. They believe that it in order to influence psychological events, it is necessary to understand and control/change the manipulative variables in the current environment. For this to happen, it is necessary to understand the past history of interaction of a person with his or her environment and how it is influencing him or her at the present moment. Dr Fox provides several examples and one of them is given here. Teenagers who smoke usually have a positive attitude towards the habit. Changing their attitude is difficult unless the environment in which the person lives in manipulated. What is necessary is to change the context through actions like health education. This is what is known as manipulative variables. It is possible to manipulate the person to attend a health class where the dangers of smoking can be communicated. Dr Fox also provides examples illustrating the difference between manipulating the environment and psychological events. Mr A is depressed because he has lost his job. Motivating him to apply for other jobs and support from friends could possibly help him come out of the depression. Both these actions are manipulative variables. On the other hand, Ms B felt depressed due to low self-esteem. She could be helped by influencing psychological events since it is a mental state. There are other factors to be considered in a functional contextual theory. It will be relevant to explain the concept of a relational frame here. As mentioned above, many factors form a relationship that should be viewed (in a frame) in order to predict and influence human action (psychological events). This is the reason why it is referred to as a relational frame theory. Human beings (and even animals) can be taught to respond in a particular way if a pre-defined thing or event happens. Physical attributes like size and weight do not matter in this instance. A coin which may be smaller is size can have more monetary value. If the concept is taught to a person, the relational responding will override the physical attributes. Operants (generalized) means that a person tends to imitate another without thinking about the consequences. It may not an exact imitation, but the behavior shows that the person is trying to imitate the same actions or behavior of another. An example could imitative behavior of a sibling of his elder brother. Again people tend make examples of some famous personalities and behave accordingly (exemplar training). Relational frames are considered to be a part of the above factors. Then there are two types of entailment which form the properties of a rational frame. Mutual entailment states that if X is related to Y, the reverse is also true - that is Y is related to X. Combinational entailment involves more than two elements. For example, if X is related Y, and Y is related to Z, then there might exist a relationship between X and Z. So, if X is faster than Y, and Y is faster than Z, then the third factor is that X is faster than Z. taking into account what has been said above, a person is also influenced by something that is attractive to him or her (transformation of stimuli). If a person likes animals, then the language used may be different from another who despises them. A baby could be a girlfriend or a child according to the stimulus for a particular individual. A pregnant lady will refer to her unborn child as baby, while a boyfriend may call his fiancé the same name. It is what stimulates a person that influences language and behavior. So, it can be seen that language, cognition and behavior is contextually controlled and arbitrary. A person will use a particular word or sentence depending on the context as in the case of a pregnant woman. A person will use a particular word or sentence depending on his thoughts at the moment (boyfriend referring to his fiancé). There is also the factors of equivalent relationships (A=B) and instances of trained relationships (X is faster than Y) to be considered. Through this comes the concept of derived stimulus relations. The human mind is capable of forming complex relationships given a set of factors that can form a stimulus. The problem for analysts and theorists is that this capability of the human mind can develop extremely complex networks once the number of factors and relationships increase. Take an extension of combinational entailment. Suppose person A is introduced to the father (B), mother (C), sister (D), and brother (E) of his fiancé. He can make a permutation combination of all the relationships that can exist within the family of his fiancé. He can state that the person B is a probable father-in-law. He can state that the person D is a probable sister-in-law. He can state that his fiancée is the sister of person D. He can develop a friendship or enmity with the brother E. It all depends on all the factors mentioned above including the traditional symbolism and generativity followed by traditional theorists. Conclusion: It is clear why this approach is labeled relational frame theory. There are many factors other than symbolism, generativity, genetic and mental factors involved that can influence a person’s language and cognitive abilities. Unless all these factors are understood, it is not possible to control or influence behavior in case he or she needs help. It also involves the environment (both current and past), relational responding, entailments, stimuli, manipulative variables, contextual and arbitrary behavior that has to be taken into consideration. All these relative factors have to be viewed in a frame for clear understanding of the situation. In effect, the relational frame approach takes into consideration all the traditional factors along with new relevant ones in predicting and influencing psychological events (through language and cognition). References Eric, Fox J. (2002). Relational frame theory, Retrieved August 16, from http://www.ericfox.com/rft Read More