B. F. Skinner is one of the outstanding American psychologists in the behavioristic tradition. For some twenty-five years he has made theoretical, methodological, and empirical contributions that have significantly affected the growth of psychology as a general science of behavior. For just as long, Skinner worked on the formulations presented in this book. He has also written a novel. These indications of a creative, yet disciplined thinker, suggest what the reader will find in this book: an original, imaginative, and systematic treatment of verbal behavior. Closer study, however, will be of great value to anyone seriously interested in the psychology of language and communication.

The book is a theoretical statement worked out in considerable detail and amply illustrated with literary material, examples from everyday life, and, to some extent, with clinical phenomena. It is neither a report of quantitative, empirical studies, nor a survey of