The Impact of Coherence on Persistent Rule-Following in the Face of Reversed Reinforcement Contingencies

Abstract

Rule-governed behavior has long been associated with generating insensitivity to direct contingencies of reinforcement. This insensitivity to environmental changes has also been implicated in human psychological suffering. From a behavior analytic perspective, rule-following is a verbal behavior, and thus has been suggested to be potentially affected by the level of coherence within the verbal stimuli involved. In this explorative study, 216 participants received a rule that differed in terms of its coherence based on experimental training. The active conditions did not differ significantly in rule persistency, but differed from the control condition that was less rule-persistent. Rule-persistence was found to be significantly correlated with stress and anxiety in the control condition. A post-hoc interpretation of the findings is provided.