He argued that one must recognize and integrate unacceptable things about oneself to defuse their explosive potential during crisis. We can apply these ideas to society as well. A general collapse of moral or social values is less likely when society is in a realistic relationship to nature, for those realities maintain such systems more effectively than an artificially constructed social system of reinforcement. In the next chapter, we shall review various behavioral processes and consider the evolution of a system of behavioral integration. Reinforcement by what Skinner called the verbal community is responsible for the shaping and maintenance of what is uniquely human.
Reinforcement follows the logic of the society in which it occurs.
We cannot effectively manage and shape behaviors that we cannot directly observe, with the result that they become incoherent and chaotic. This, of course, produces the stuff of psychoanalysis, dreams, and nightmares. Change itself is one of the great unifying principles of psychology, and the management of change must be a matter of central concern for psychology. Nothing stays the same. Our survival, both as individuals and as species, depends upon our ability to meet the challenge of ever increasing change.