The article presents the beginnings of a conceptual framework for analyzing the dynamics of arbitrarily applicable relational responding (AARRing). The framework focuses on the dimensions and levels of AARRing that have been the focus of empirical and conceptual analyses in the literature on relational frame theory over the past 30 years. The name of the framework is abbreviated the MDML, and the conceptual and empirical context from which it emerged is presented. The framework currently consists of four dimensions, (i) coherence, (ii) complexity, (iii) derivation, and (iv) flexibility; and five levels of relational development, (i) mutual entailing, (ii) relational framing, (iii) relational networking, (iv) What is the MDML and What Does it Offer?At this point in an earlier version of the current paper we first presented the historical background to the MDML before describing the framework itself and explaining why we

The effects of rules on human behaviour have long been identified as important in the psychological literature. The increasing importance of the dynamics of arbitrarily applicable relational responding (AARR), with regards to rules, has come to be of particular interest within Relational Frame Theory (RFT). One feature of AARR that previous research has suggested may differentially impact persistent rule-following is level of derivation. However, no published research to date has systematically explored this suggestion. Across two experiments, the impact of levels of derivation was examined on persistent rule-following at two stages of relational development: mutual entailment (Exp. 1) and combinatorial entailment (Exp. 2). A Training IRAP was used to establish a mutually entailed relational network in Experiment 1 and a combinatorially entailed network in Experiment 2, and to train these networks to different levels of derivation. This was followed by a contingency switching Match-to-Sample (MTS) task to assess rule persistence. Results from both experiments were generally consistent with the suggestion that lower levels of derivation produce more persistent rule-following. Unexpectedly, however, the findings from Experiment 1 also indicated that persistence was moderated by the type of novel word employed. Variations in results across both experiments and their implications for future research are discussed.

Rule-governed behavior and its role in generating insensitivity to direct contingencies of reinforcement have been implicated in human psychological suffering. In addition, the human capacity to engage in derived relational responding has also been used to explain specific human maladaptive behaviors, such as irrational fears. To date, however, very little research has attempted to integrate research on contingency insensitivity and derived relations. The current work sought to fill this gap. Across two experiments, participants received either a direct rule (Direct Rule Condition) or a rule that involved a novel derived relational response (Derived Rule Condition). Provision of a direct rule resulted in more persistent rule-following in the face of competing contingencies, but only when the opportunity to follow the reinforced rule beforehand was relatively protracted. Furthermore, only in the Direct Rule Condition were there significant correlations between rule-compliance and stress. A post hoc interpretation of the findings is provided.

The Implicit Relational Assessment Procedure (IRAP) has been used as a measure of implicit cognition and to analyze the dynamics of arbitrarily applicable relational responding. The current study employs the IRAP for the latter purpose. Specifically, the current research focuses on a pattern of responding observed in a previously published IRAP study that was difficult to explain using existing conceptual analyses. The pattern is referred to as the singletrial-type-dominance-effect because one of the IRAP trial-types produces an effect that is significantly larger than the other three. Based on a post-hoc explanation provided in a previously published article, the first experiment in the current series explored the impact of prior experimental experience on the single-trial-type-dominance-effect. The results indicated that the effect was larger for participants who reported high levels of experimental experience (M = 32.3 previous experiments) versus those who did not (M = 2.5 previous experiments). In the second experiment, participants were required to read out loud the stimuli presented on each trial and the response option they chose. The effect of experimental experience was absent but the single-trial-type-dominance-effect remained. In the third experiment, a different set of stimuli to those used in the first two was employed in the IRAP, and a significant single-trial-type-dominance-effect was no longer observed. The results obtained from the three experiments led inductively to the development of a new model of the variables involved in producing IRAP effects, the Differential Arbitrarily Applicable Relational Responding Effects (DAARRE) model, which is presented in the General Discussion.Key words: RFT, Relational network, IRAP, trial-type, differentialThe Single-Trial-Type-Dominance-Effect 3The study of derived stimulus relations has been used by many behavior analysts as a conceptual basis for analyzing behaviors that appear to be closely related to human language and cognition. Perhaps the clearest and most self-conscious example of this approach is provided by Relational Frame Theory (RFT; Hayes, Barnes-Holmes, & Roche, 2001).Drawing on the seminal work of Sidman (1971; see 1994, for a book length treatment) on equivalence relations, RFT argued that the functional units of human language and cognition involve a wide range of generalized relational operants, known as relational frames, each possessing three core properties. The first property is mutual entailment and involves a bidirectional relation between two stimuli, such that if A is related to B then B is related to A.The second property is combinatorial entailment and involves three or more stimuli, such that if A is related to B and B is related to C, then A is related to C and C is related to A. The third property is the transformation of functions, which recognizes that any mutual or combinatorial entailment will involve specific behavioral functions. Thus, if A is related to B, and B acquires a mildly appetitive function, the func...

The article describes how the study of derived stimulus relations has provided the basis for a behavior-analytic approach to the study of human language and cognition in purely functional-analytic terms. The article begins with a brief history of the early behavior-analytic approach to human language and cognition, focusing on Skinner's (1957) text Verbal Behavior, his subsequent introduction of the concept of instructional control (Skinner, 1966), and then Sidman's (1994) seminal research on stimulus equivalence relations. The article then considers how the concept of derived stimulus relations, as conceptualized within relational frame theory (Hayes, Barnes-Holmes, & Roche, 2001), allowed researchers to refine and extend the functional approach to language and cognition in multiple ways. Finally, the article considers some recent conceptual and empirical developments that highlight how the concept of derived stimulus relations continues to play a key role in the behavior-analytic study of human language and cognition, and in particular implicit cognition. In general, the article aims to provide a particular perspective on how the study of derived stimulus relations has facilitated and enhanced the behavior analysis of human language and cognition, particularly over the past 25-30 years.