Howard Rachlin (1935–2021) was an American psychologist and the founder of teleological behaviorism. He was Emeritus Research Professor of Psychology, Department of Psychology at

Stony Brook University Stony Brook University (SBU), officially the State University of New York at Stony Brook, is a public university, public research university in Stony Brook, New York, United States, on Long Island. Along with the University at Buffalo, it is on ...

in New York. His initial work was in the quantitative analysis of operant behavior in pigeons, on which he worked with William M. Baum, developing ideas from

Richard Herrnstein Richard Julius Herrnstein (May 20, 1930 – September 13, 1994) was an American psychologist at Harvard University. He was an active researcher in animal learning in the Skinnerian tradition. Herrnstein was the Edgar Pierce Professor of Psycho ...

matching law In operant conditioning, the matching law is a quantitative relationship that holds between the relative rates of response and the relative rates of reinforcement in concurrent schedules of reinforcement. For example, if two response alternatives A ...

. He subsequently became one of the founders of

Behavioral Economics Behavioral economics is the study of the psychological (e.g. cognitive, behavioral, affective, social) factors involved in the decisions of individuals or institutions, and how these decisions deviate from those implied by traditional economi ...

. His most recent research focused on patterns of choice over time and how those patterns affect self-control (on which he worked with George Ainslie), including cooperation over time. His interests in Behavioral Economics included: decision making, the

prisoner's dilemma The prisoner's dilemma is a game theory thought experiment involving two rational agents, each of whom can either cooperate for mutual benefit or betray their partner ("defect") for individual gain. The dilemma arises from the fact that while def ...

, addiction, and gambling. He was one of the first board members of the

Society for Quantitative Analysis of Behavior The Society for the Quantitative Analyses of Behavior was founded in 1978 by Michael Commons, Michael Lamport Commons and John Anthony Nevin. The first president was Richard Herrnstein, Richard J. Herrnstein. In the beginning it was called the Harv ...

. He was married to the novelist Nahid Rachlin. They had a daughter, Leila.

Books

* Introduction to modern behaviorism (1970) * Behavior and learning (1976) * Behaviorism in everyday life (1980) * Judgment, decision, and choice: a cognitive/behavioral synthesis (1989) * Behavior and mind: the roots to modern psychology (1994) * Science of self-control (2000) * The escape of the mind (2014)

References

Sources

* * *

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rachlin, Howard 21st-century American psychologists American behavioral economists 1935 births 2021 deaths 20th-century American psychologists