OK, so to be honest, I'm writing these show notes while on the road after an amazing Hoosier ABA conference (more on that in a subsequent episode or two ;-). As such, I'll be uncharacteristically brief.
To risk hyperbole, I think that just about anyone can benefit from listening to this episode. My guest, Dr. Jim Moore, talks about his ups and downs (followed by more ups and downs... and ups) with weight loss. What I like about Jim is that he shares these deeply personal struggles in order to, in my estimation, help others who have similar problems.
Jim has gone from being overweight, to super fit, to morbidly obese... to now, where he is on a trend of fairly sustainable success. He acknowledge he still has room to improve, but check these pictures out, and you'll get an idea of how much progress he's gained:
And because I'm on the road, I unfortunately do not have my notes from our interview. That said, I do recall discussing an article titled, The Shame of American Education, by B.F. Skinner himself.
I also mentioned a podcast that I listen too called The Drive, with Dr. Peter Attia. This episode of the Joe Rogan Experience also features a debate between two Ph.D.s on what an optimal diet is (and if you don't know already, this podcast is not for virgin ears!).
If there are other references I missed, visit the Contact page and let me know what it was, and I'll update these show notes.
This episode is brought to you by the following:
- Brett DiNovi and Associates is hosting a great event called "Growing up with Skinner". This is a one-day event that is taking place on November 30th in Mt. Laurel, NJ at the Weston Hotel and Conference Center. If you're not in New Jersey, don't worry, as it is available for live-streaming. This event will feature a keynote by Dr. Julie Vargas, who will be talking about her experiences with growing up with B.F. Skinner as a Dad (how cool!). It will be followed by talks from Brett DiNovi and Matt Linder from BDA, and Dr. Don Hantula will provide the closing address. All told, 5.5 supervision CE's are available, and best of all, the proceeds of this event will benefit the B.F. Skinner Foundation. Interested? Click here to learn more.
- The Precision ABA Workshop, by Dr. Rick Kubina of Chartlytics. This will be held on November 15th and 16th in Indianapolis, Indiana. This 2-day workshop will guide you through the steps of precision measurement and help you obtain superior ABA outcomes. You will learn evidence-based science and practical techniques that you can implement in your own ABA service delivery. If you're going to attend and want to save 10% on registration, use the coupon code Matt.
- The Next Gen Revolution Summit, taking place on November 10th & 11th in Las Vegas. Attend in person, or live-stream so you can watch it in your Jammies. If you're interested in seeing talks from instructional luminaries like Janet Tyman and T.V. Joe Layng, hearing what podcast guests Megan Miller and Sara Gershfeld Litvak have to say, or learning about the latest in technological innovations in our field, this is the event for you. If you do decide to attend, use offer code Matt to save 10%.
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Loved this podcast and the frank, honest & personal experience laced throughout with (Australian) behaviour principles in real life contexts.
Not by any means a BCBA myself so some of my language and understanding may be a bit askew, but I was wondering if at 65 minutes where Jim talked about using his values to help stack the deck with delayed consequences whether this is actually instead an immediate consequence. ie reminding yourself you said you would do something whilst you are in the process of not doing it, acts as kind of an immediate punisher, and the only two escapes are to then go and do the behaviour or escape the thought behaviours of failure/shame by trying to engage in some other distracting thought behaviours.
So in a sense, when Jim looks at that photo and remembers his values he is putting in place a stimulus that can act as as both MO(?) and as an immediate punisher, depending on what response he has to the photo.
Or have I totally misunderstood this.
Hey Tyrone, thanks so much for a) tuning in, and b) writing such an awesome question. I will actually forward this to Jim to see his take on it. Best, Matt
Hi Tyrone,
Your bring up a very interesting point. The function of the alarm reminder is debatable in my opinion, but it definitely creates aversive stimulation that increases the value of escape via getting up to go to the gym. It reminds me a bit of how guilt control is discussed by Mallot and Shane in the 7th edition of Principles of Behavior. I think you could make an argument that it could be a type of contrived mediating stimulus that prompts self-management behavior of “reviewing values.” Its often useful for me in practice, when using ACT with kids, to employ contrived mediating stimuli along with self-monitoring to prompt the “self-management” behaviors associated with ACT. I think it’s a great point to discuss further.
What’s interesting to me is how hard it is to discuss this without using mentalistic terms like “remind” and/or remember. I am not sure how people who do not at least consider RFT when explaining and analyzing human behavior explain competition between direct acting and indirect acting contingencies. Great question and comment and thanks so much for listening!
Thanks so much for the reply (and to Matt for forwarding on my question).
I am really intrigued by this space of changing context cognitively along with external context change to help shape our own behaviour. I will now have to go away and look up Mallot & Shane as well as “contrived mediating stimulus”.
Totally agree that talking about this and thinking about it gets really hard without considering RFT, almost like you have to run everything through a translator first.
Cheers
Thank you, Tyrone, Matt and Jim for the thoughtful and engaging discussion following an inspiring episode that evoked values-based committed action from a SERIOUS couch potato 🙂 RFT is certainly not my expertise; however, your comment about the use of mentalistic terms such as “remind” made me curious. How is this circumstance, other than the nature of internal verbal behavior, different than any other environmental ‘prompt’ to engage in a behavior? I will gladly accept a reference as a short reply if I am completely missing an important mark 🙂
Thanks, again! Off for a bike ride before some breakfast bacon. It is early in the shaping of my new lifestyle.
Hmmm… bacon. Glad you’re enjoying this discussion!
Hi Erin,
I wonder if it has to do with how Jim came to learn that photo was a prompt for exercise behaviour. It wasn’t paired, through reinforcement history, like my alarm clock that goes off and I have learnt that if I ignore that, then I will be late for work and I have learnt to escape that unpleasant consequence directly, by getting up when the alarm goes.
But in this instance, looking at the photo of his daughter has not been paired through direct learning of escaping the long-term consequences of not exercising, in the same fashion as the alarm.
I can feel my grasp of behavioural learning and RFT getting really stretched so will stop my intellectual exercise there and hope that someone else can either slap down my line of thought or extrapolate on it.
Cheers.
Hi all!
Another awesome episode…
I heard Jim mention a bit about self-monitoring his weight and his own interventions with himself and got curious— is there is or has been “precision dieting” going on out there? I’m thinking along the lines of precision measurement of pinpointed dieting behaviors, improving fluency of these pinpoints and maybe related outcome measures for how they might succeed as dieting interventions? I tried to search and didn’t come up with too much. I know there’s are vast bodies of ACT lit and ABA lit re:weight loss but what work has been done in the PT
community that’s out there I might reference? Also, which SCC graph would be best suited to the task of recording weight (if any)? I did turn up an article about semi-log charting of growth….but it’s about cell growth. Even still, hmmmmm—-People have cells, seems logical to me! Any way, I’m very interested, your journey was and still is an inspiring one especially with intersection of ACT principles and PT. Hoping the questions don’t seem too silly — I’m am a novice to PT community so please take mercy on me if so! Awesome job again on the show guys…
Matt
This is a great question, and one I have thought about too. My advice is to join the Standard Celeration Society’s Facebook page, and search the posts in the group. Once you’ve done so, and you’re still looking for info, go ahead and post a question to the group. I’m wiling to bet you’ll get a lot of people who are willing to help you. All the best! Matt