An Operant Analysis of Hate Speech and Disinformation

In terms of contingencies, what maintains what politicians, platforms, and audiences say and share when a statement is false or classified as hate speech? This book answers that question with the method of behavior analysis applied to verbal behavior: instead of inferring what the speaker had in mind, it asks which variables control the utterance and what it produces in those who hear it.

In four parts and twelve chapters, the book covers the phenomenon and the data (definitions, prevalence, and fact-checking agencies); the operant analysis of discourse (false statements as verbal operants, attitudes and prejudice as equivalence classes, hate speech as disguised mands and aversive control, digital bubbles, and voting as verbal behavior); the ecology of information (the attention economy, algorithms, the producer–audience cycle, the Overton window, and infodemiology); and the possible interventions, with the evidence for each.

The book does not classify statements as false or take a political side: it applies the same method to all sides, always attributes falsehood to the agency that classified it, and separates data, interpretation, and hypothesis in each analysis.

Written for behavior analysts, psychologists, and researchers already familiar with behavior analysis. A note on the production process describes how generative artificial intelligence was used in writing and in source checking, under the definition, review, and responsibility of the six authors. Translated from the Brazilian Portuguese edition.

A Editora Walden4 é a editora do Instituto Walden4, em Brasília-DF. Publica livros em Análise do Comportamento, autismo, psicoterapia e práticas psicológicas baseadas em evidências, com linguagem acessível para estudantes, profissionais e famílias. Boa parte do catálogo é gratuita em PDF. Veja todos os livros ou publique conosco.