How Words and Speech Influence Covert and Overt Behaviour: A Functional Self-Discrimination Measure of Verbal Behaviour

Abstract

"How do words and speech influence covert and overt behaviour?" This question was distilled more precisely to a focus on how personal utterances function to predict wellbeing. From the philosophical orientation of functional contextualism, an empirical analysis of language using Relational Frame Theory (RFT) was undertaken in order to understand the functional relation between the term’s being used by the speaker as they recalled the antecedent and consequent events related to their current and historically situated acts. This, in part, involved identifying the values that were controlling the speaker’s observation and discrimination of what was important to them. This required developing a method, the Functional Self- Discrimination Measure & Interview (FSDM-FSDI), for classifying functional ways that the interviewees took perspective on experience and talked about themselves. Applying this method showed that: speaking of ‘values’ and their means of implementation significantly predicted long-term wellbeing; if a speaker uttered both value oriented self-rules and perspective taking statements, the combined effect was a stronger relationship with wellbeing; the way a person viewed themselves was significantly and positively related to their view of others; and, specific ratios of different categories of utterances equated to high levels of psychological flexibility. The FSDM-FSDI method developed and applied in this thesis represents a new approach to analysing natural language, which allows for the prediction and potential influence of the future behaviour and wellbeing of the speaker. This work, I believe, is a functional assessment of verbal behaviour, which is new in the field of Contextual Behavioural Science (CBS), and has important implications for those working and researching in the fields of psychological wellbeing and behaviour change. This enquiry coincidently led to a consideration of the social implications of this work and the development of prosocial and moral behaviour more broadly.