In his “Tactics of Scientific Research” (1960), his work on avoidance, his discovery of equivalence classes and his cautions on applications of coercion, Murray Sidman created high standards for behavior analytic research. I illustrate his influence in the context of three examples he might have characterized as pilot studies. Each examined trial N+1 response probabilities depending on whether trial N responding had produced a reinforcer. Differentially reinforced interresponse times, keys pecked in arbitrary matching, and two‐key response sequences provided no robust evidence that reinforcing some response property on trial N raises the probability of responding with that property on trial N+1. These negative findings shed light on the nature of operant classes and on the relation of reinforcers to the responses that produced them. Through selection, reinforcers create operant classes and engender variations of the responses within those classes; operant classes are held together by common contingencies. Sidman extended our understanding of operant classes by expanding them to include equivalence relations.

中文翻译：

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强化和操作类实验分析中的战术偶然性

Murray Sidman 在他的“科学研究策略”（1960 年）、他关于回避的工作、他对等价类的发现以及他对强制应用的警告中，为行为分析研究制定了高标准。我在三个例子的背景下说明了他的影响，他可能将其定性为试点研究。每个检查的试验 N+1 反应概率取决于试验 N 的反应是否产生了强化物。差异增强的响应间时间、任意匹配啄键和双键响应序列没有提供强有力的证据表明增强试验 N 的某些响应属性会提高在试验 N+1 中使用该属性响应的概率。这些负面发现阐明了操作类的性质以及强化物与产生它们的反应的关系。通过选择，强化物创建操作类并在这些类中产生反应的变化；操作类由共同的突发事件保持在一起。Sidman 通过将操作类扩展到包括等价关系来扩展我们对操作类的理解。