ontrol. This extended the range of the human social environment. Skinner draws a distinction between "language" and "verbal behavior." He notes that psychologists speak of the "acquisition of language" in the child and notes how language is structured out of words and sentences that express meanings, desires, needs, ideas, emotions, and propositions. For Skinner, language is behavior that has a special characteristics only because it is reinforced by its effects on people, first on other people, and then on the speaker him or herself.
For Skinner, then, the acquisition of language is a matter of operant conditioning, just as is all learning. Language acquisition is the result of exposure to a speaking community, but learning is not merely a matter of imitation. It is rather a matter of operant conditioning as certain behaviors are reinforced by community acceptance, by the understanding shown of what is being communicated. For Skinner, the human being first of all makes sounds just as do other animals: "Like other species, it had up to that point displayed warning cries, threatening shouts, and other innate responses, but vocal operant behavior made a great difference because it extended the scope of the social environment" (Skinner 88).
Skinner explains the reinforcing nature of language and the way it relates to operant conditioning and learning in general by giving the example of opening a door. He sees verbal behavior as behavior first of all, as noted, and because of its special character by being reinforced through its effects on people, it is free of the spatial, temporal, and mechanical relations which prevail between operant behavior and nonsocial consequences: "If the opening of a door will be reinforcing, a person may grasp the knob, turn it, and push or pull it in a given way; but if, instead, he says, 'Please open the door,' and a listener responds appropriately, the same reinforcing consequence follows"...