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Choosing a larger-later reward over a smaller-sooner reward may be thought of as altruism toward one's future self. A question that arises in this connection is: What is the relation between delay and social discounting? To begin to answer this question, social and delay discount functions need to be comparable. Delay is ordinarily measured on a ratio scale (time), which allows for meaningful division and addition. Social distance is ordinarily measured on an ordinal scale (rank order of social closeness). To convert social distance to a ratio scale we use a psychophysical distance function obtained via magnitude estimation (Stevens, 1956). The distance functions obtained are well described by a power function (median exponent = 1.9); we show how they may be used to rescale ordinal to ratio social discount functions.

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How may patterns of behavior change over an organism's lifetime? The answer is that they evolve (behavioral evolution) as species evolve over generations (biological evolution). In biological evolution, under certain conditions, groups of cooperative organisms would be selected over groups of non-cooperative organisms, even when cooperation imposes a cost to individuals. Analogously, in behavioral evolution, patterns of acts may be selected even when each individual act in the pattern is costly. Although there is considerable debate among biologists whether the conditions for group selection are met in biological evolution, it is argued here that they are met in behavioral evolution (as well as in cultural evolution). The article shows how selection of patterns can explain the learning of self-control and altruism.

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The question whether talking to yourself is thinking is considered from two viewpoints: radical behaviorism and teleological behaviorism. For radical behaviorism, following Skinner (1945), mental events such as 'thinking' may be explained in terms of private behavior occurring within the body, ordinarily unobservable by other people; thus, radical behaviorism may identify talking to yourself with thinking. However, to be consistent with its basic principles, radical behaviorism must hold that private behavior, hence thinking, is identical with covert muscular, speech movements (rather than proprioception of those movements). For teleological behaviorism, following Skinner (1938), all mental terms, including 'thinking,' stand for abstract, temporally extended patterns of overt behavior. Thus, for teleological behaviorism, talking to yourself, covert by definition, cannot be thinking.

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Complex ambivalence refers to situations in which high-valued temporally extended and abstract patterns of acts (such as healthy behavior) are opposed to high-valued particular acts (such as smoking a cigarette). In such situations, a self-controlled act differs from an impulsive act not by virtue of the source of control (inside versus outside the organism) but by virtue of the temporal extent of the contingencies controlling the behavior (extended versus constricted contingencies). Soft commitment is another name for patterning behavior over time so that it may come into contact with temporally distant or extended contingencies. Behavioral methods of establishing self-control typically target particular impulsive acts. The present article suggests that self-control in situations of complex ambivalence also may be achieved by focusing not on reducing the impulsive act itself but on the establishment of patterns (soft commitment) so that behavior comes into contact with the extended contingencies. As an illustration of how this may be accomplished, a specific self-control program is outlined for smoking.

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The effect of anonymity on altruism was examined in a social discounting task with hypothetical rewards. Social discounting - the rate at which increases in social distance decrease value to the participant - was compared across three groups. Participants in the Anonymous group were told that recipients would not know who they were. Participants in the Observed group were asked to imagine that each of their choices was being observed by the recipient. Participants in the Standard group were given no special instructions with respect to anonymity or identity. Social discounting was measured at each of 7 social distances ranging from first closest friend or relative to the 100th closest. Social discount rates for all three groups were well described by hyperbolic functions. Participants in the Observed group were willing to forgo more money for the benefit of others (were more altruistic) than were those in the other two groups. Although participants in the Anonymous group, with no prospect of reciprocation, were willing to forgo less money for the sake of others than were those in the Observed group, they did express willingness to forgo significant amounts. This is some evidence that individual altruistic acts cannot be explained wholly by the possibility of reciprocation.

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The amount effect of delay discounting (by which the value of larger reward amounts is discounted by delay at a lower rate than that of smaller amounts) strictly implies that value functions (value as a function of amount) are steeper at greater delays than they are at lesser delays. That is, the amount effect and the difference in value functions at different delays are actually a single empirical finding. Amount effects of delay discounting are typically found with choice experiments. Value functions for immediate rewards have been empirically obtained by direct judgment. (Value functions for delayed rewards have not been previously obtained.) The present experiment obtained value functions for both immediate and delayed rewards by direct judgment and found them to be steeper when the rewards were delayed--hence, finding an amount effect with delay discounting.

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Altruistic behavior benefits other individuals at a cost to oneself. The purpose of the present experiment was to study altruistic behavior by players (P) in 2-person iterated prisoner's dilemma games in which reciprocation by the other player (OP) was impossible, and this impossibility was clear to P. Altruism by P could not therefore be attributed to expectation of reciprocation. The cost to P of altruistic behavior was constant throughout the study, but the benefit to OP from P's cooperation differed between groups and conditions. Rate of cooperation was higher when benefit to OP was higher. Thus altruism (not attributable to expectation of reciprocation) can be a significant factor in interpersonal relationships as studied in iterated prisoner's dilemma games, and needs to be taken into account in their analysis.

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If a repeated gamble is subjectively structured into units each consisting of a string of consecutive losses followed by a single win, longer strings will necessarily be less valuable. Longer, less valuable strings will be discounted by delay more than will shorter, more valuable strings. This implies that the whole gamble's expected, delay-discounted value will increase as delay discounting increases. With this restructuring, even games of (objectively) negative expected value, such as those at casinos, may be subjectively positive. The steeper the delay discounting, the greater the subjective value of the gamble (over normal ranges of discounting steepness). Frequent gamblers, who value gambles highly, would thus be expected to discount delayed rewards more steeply than would nongamblers.

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People value rewards to others but discount those rewards based on social distance; rewards to a socially closer person are valued more than identical rewards to a socially more distant person (Jones and Rachlin, 2006). The concept of social discounting can explain cooperation and defection in two-player prisoner's dilemma (PD) games (Axelrod, 1980). The contingencies of a PD game are such that in any single game cooperation is costly to each player herself but beneficial to the other player. From the viewpoint of each player, the costs of cooperation are fully realized, but the benefits of cooperation are discounted by the social distance to the other player. The present experiment measured cooperation and defection in two PD-game conditions with differing reward magnitudes. In one (the 1-2-3-4 condition), the cost of cooperation exceeded its socially discounted benefit, and players were predicted to defect; in the other (the 1-2-9-10 condition), the discounted benefit of cooperation exceeded its cost, and players were predicted to cooperate. Over the course of repeated trials defection increased with the 1-2-3-4 condition but not with the 1-2-9-10 condition. Moreover, participants who rated their partners as closer, relative to random classmates, cooperated at higher rates--consistent with social discounting.

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Delayed rewards are less valuable than immediate rewards. This well-established finding has focused almost entirely on individual outcomes. However, are delayed rewards similarly discounted if they are shared by a group? The current article reports on three experiments exploring the effect of group context on delay discounting. Results indicate that discount rates of individual and group rewards were highly correlated, but that respondents were more willing to wait (decreased discounting) for shared outcomes than for individual outcomes. An explanatory model is proposed suggesting that decreased discount rates in group contexts may be due to the way the effects of both delay and social discounting are combined. That is, in a group context, a person values both a future reward (discounted by delay) and a present reward to another person (discounted by the social distance between them). The results are explained by a combined discount function containing a delay factor and a factor representing the social distance between the decision maker and group members. Practical implications of the fact that shared consequences can increase individual self-control are also discussed.

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Altruism may be learned (behavioral evolution) in a way similar to that proposed in the target article for its biological evolution. Altruism (over social space) corresponds to self-control (over time). In both cases, one must learn to ignore the rewards to a particular (person or moment) and behave to maximize the rewards to a group (of people or moments).

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Pigeons were rewarded for distributing eight pecks across two keys (L and R) in various patterns. The simplest pattern was at least one switch between the two keys (LR or RL) anywhere during the sequence; the next simplest was at least one instance of LLRR or RRLL anywhere during the sequence; the next was LLLRRR or RRRLLL; the most complex was LLLLRRRR or RRRRLLLL. Note that each more complex pattern contains the simpler ones within it. Initially, all patterns were reinforced but amount of reinforcement varied directly with complexity of pattern. The pigeons typically began the eight-peck sequence by pecking on their dispreferred key and then switched to their preferred key during the sequence. In subsequent conditions, simpler patterns were progressively unreinforced until finally only the most complex pattern (exactly four pecks on one key followed by exactly four pecks on the other) was reinforced. Three of the 4 pigeons tested maintained responding under this contingency; responding of the 4th pigeon extinguished. A second group of 4 pigeons was exposed immediately after training to extinction of all patterns except the most complex one. Three of the pigeons failed to maintain responding and the 4th maintained responding at a very low level. These results are evidence that response patterns can be shaped directly without building them up from a sequence of individually reinforced responses. The results may serve as a model of how self-controlled and altruistic behavior can arise through reinforcement.

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Altruistic behavior has been defined in economic terms as "…costly acts that confer economic benefits on other individuals" (Fehr & Fischbacher, 2003). In a prisoner's dilemma game, cooperation benefits the group but is costly to the individual (relative to defection), yet a significant number of players choose to cooperate. We propose that people do value rewards to others, albeit at a discounted rate (social discounting), in a manner similar to discounting of delayed rewards (delay discounting). Two experiments opposed the personal benefit from defection to the socially discounted benefit to others from cooperation. The benefit to others was determined from a social discount function relating the individual's subjective value of a reward to another person and the social distance between that individual and the other person. In Experiment 1, the cost of cooperating was held constant while its social benefit was varied in terms of the number of other players, each gaining a fixed, hypothetical amount of money. In Experiment 2, the cost of cooperating was again held constant while the social benefit of cooperating was varied by the hypothetical amount of money earned by a single other player. In both experiments, significantly more participants cooperated when the social benefit was higher.

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Misconceptions abound about teleological behaviorism (TB). Because very few people other than the author publicly call themselves teleological behaviorists, the fault must be mine. The present article is an attempt to clear up those misconceptions. First I will try to indicate what teleological behaviorism is not. Then, in the form of six fables (loosely connected stories, allegories, analogies, fairy tales, and arguments), I will try to give the reader an understanding of what teleological behaviorism actually is.

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This essay uses the recent victory of an IBM computer (Watson) in the TV game, Jeopardy, to speculate on the abilities Watson would need, in addition to those it has, to be human. The essay's basic premise is that to be human is to behave as humans behave and to function in society as humans function. Alternatives to this premise are considered and rejected. The viewpoint of the essay is that of teleological behaviorism. Mental states are defined as temporally extended patterns of overt behavior. From this viewpoint (although Watson does not currently have them), essential human attributes such as consciousness, the ability to love, to feel pain, to sense, to perceive, and to imagine may all be possessed by a computer. Most crucially, a computer may possess self-control and may act altruistically. However, the computer's appearance, its ability to make specific movements, its possession of particular internal structures (e.g., whether those structures are organic or inorganic), and the presence of any nonmaterial "self," are all incidental to its humanity.

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Humans often make seemingly irrational choices in situations of conflict between a particular smaller-sooner reinforcer and a more abstract, temporally extended, but larger reinforcer. In two experiments, the extent to which the availability of commitment responses-self-imposed restrictions on future choices-might improve self-control in such situations was investigated. Participants played a prisoner's dilemma game against a computer that played a tit-for-tat strategy-cooperating after a participant cooperated, defecting after a participant defected. Defecting produced a small-immediate reinforcer (consisting of points convertible to gift cards) whereas cooperating increased the amount of subsequent reinforcers, yielding a greater overall reinforcer rate. Participants were normally free to cooperate or defect on each trial. Additionally, they could choose to make a commitment response that forced their choice for the ensuing five trials. For some participants, the commitment response forced cooperation; for others, it forced defection. Most participants, with either commitment response available, chose to commit repeatedly despite a minor point loss for doing so. After extended exposure to these contingencies, the commit-to-cooperate group cooperated significantly more than a control group (with no commitment available). The commit-to-defect group cooperated significantly less than the control group. When both commitment alternatives were simultaneously available-one for cooperation and one for defection-cooperation commitment was strongly preferred. In Experiment 2, the commitment alternative was removed at the end of the session; gains in cooperation, relative to the control group, were not sustained in the absence of the self-imposed behavioral scaffold.

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Parties in real-world conflicts often attempt to punish each other's behavior. If this strategy fails to produce mutual cooperation, they may increase punishment magnitude. The present experiment investigated whether delay-reduction - potentially less harmful than magnitude increase - would generate mutual cooperation as interactions are repeated. Participants played a prisoner's dilemma game against a computer that played a tit-for-tat strategy, cooperating after a participant cooperated, defecting after a participant defected. For half of the participants, the delay between their choice and the computer's next choice was long relative to the delay between the computer's choice and their next choice. For the other half, long and short delays were reversed. The tit-for-tat contingency reinforces the other player's cooperation (by cooperating) and punishes the other player's defection (by defecting). Both rewards and punishers are discounted by delay. Consistent with delay discounting, participants cooperated more when the delay between their choice and the computer's cooperation (reward) or defection (punishment) was relatively short. These results suggest that, in real-world tit-for-tat conflicts, decreasing delay of reciprocation or retaliation may foster mutual cooperation as effectively as (or more effectively than) the more usual tactic of increasing magnitude of reciprocation or retaliation.

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Altruistic acts have been defined, in economic terms, as "…costly acts that confer economic benefits on other individuals" (Fehr and Fischbacher, 2003). In multi-player, one-shot prisoner's dilemma games, a significant number of players behave altruistically; their behavior benefits each of the other players but is costly to them. We consider three potential explanations for such altruism. The first explanation, following a suggestion by the philosopher Derek Parfit, assumes that players devise a strategy to avoid being free-loaders-and that in the present case this strategy dictates cooperation. The second explanation says that cooperators reject the one-shot aspect of the game and behave so as to maximize reward over a series of choices extending beyond the present situation (even though reward is not maximized in the present case). This explanation assumes that people may learn to extend the boundaries of their selves socially (beyond their own skin) as well as temporally (beyond the present moment). We propose a learning mechanism for such behavior analogous to the biological, evolutionary mechanism of group selection. The third explanation assumes that people's altruism is based on a straightforward balancing of undiscounted costs to themselves against discounted benefits to others (social discounting). The three proposed explanations of altruism complement each other.

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Laboratory studies of choice and decision making among real monetary rewards typically use smaller real rewards than those common in real life. When laboratory rewards are large, they are almost always hypothetical. In applying laboratory results meaningfully to real-life situations, it is important to know the extent to which choices among hypothetical rewards correspond to choices among real rewards and whether variation of the magnitude of hypothetical rewards affects behavior in meaningful ways. The present study compared real and hypothetical monetary rewards in two experiments. In Experiment 1, participants played a temporal discounting game that incorporates the logic of a repeated prisoner's-dilemma (PD) type game versus tit-for-tat; choice of one alternative ("defection" in PD terminology) resulted in a small-immediate reward; choice of the other alternative ("cooperation" in PD terminology) resulted in a larger reward delayed until the following trial. The larger-delayed reward was greater for half of the groups than for the other half. Rewards also differed in type across groups: multiples of real nickels, hypothetical nickels or hypothetical hundred-dollar bills. All groups significantly increased choice of the larger delayed reward over the 40 trials of the experiment. Over the last 10 trials, cooperation was significantly higher when the difference between larger and smaller hypothetical rewards was greater. Reward type (real or hypothetical) made no significant difference in cooperation. In Experiment 2, real and hypothetical rewards were compared in social discounting - the decrease in value to the giver of a reward as social distance increases to the receiver of the reward. Social discount rates were well described by a hyperbolic function. Discounting rates for real and hypothetical rewards did not significantly differ. These results add to the evidence that results of experiments with hypothetical rewards validly apply in everyday life.