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Effective Dissemination Requires Effective Talk: a Comparison of Behavior-Analytic Journals

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Abstract

We explored language used in three behavior-analytic journals (the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis (JABA), the Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior (JEAB), and Behavior Analysis in Practice (BAP)) to evaluate differences in factors related to the ease of comprehension. Using a linguistic analysis tool, we compared the first three paragraphs of the introductions of research articles in ten issues of each of the journals. JEAB was found to use language that was less concrete, meaningful, and imageable than the two applied journals. Implications for the field are discussed.

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Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, Eastern Connecticut State University, 83 Windham Street, Willimantic, CT, 06226, USA

    James W. Diller, Kristalyn Salters-Pedneault & Alana R. Gallagher

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  1. James W. Diller
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  2. Kristalyn Salters-Pedneault
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  3. Alana R. Gallagher
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Correspondence to James W. Diller.

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Diller, J.W., Salters-Pedneault, K. & Gallagher, A.R. Effective Dissemination Requires Effective Talk: a Comparison of Behavior-Analytic Journals. Behav Analysis Practice 7, 103–106 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40617-014-0020-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40617-014-0020-5

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