Power of the Behavioral Model

I have mentioned before how correctly using the behavioral model eliminates the kind of name-calling and attribution of negative motives that are so common. Using the model requires a little skill and practice, but mostly paying attention.

It’s based on the old adage of punish the behavior and not the child. Good parents don’t call their children bad; they ask for better behavior.

As an easy example, take the spouse (or teen) coming home later than expected. The other party is waiting up, feeling worried and upset, ready to pounce when the door opens. “You promised to be home by X! Don’t you care about my feelings? You are so inconsiderate! You don’t care about me (or your family)!” And on it goes. The other person gets defensive, possibly angry, especially if there is a good explanation – some accident or emergency.

The behavior is coming home late. Both can agree. Even if there is not a good reason, there may still be a solution that both can agree on without antagonistic remarks. But in the heat of the moment, it’s hard to discuss only behavior without affixing blame and bad intentions.

This is hard even for journalists who we expect to be objective. This Atlantic article published a few days after the Lincoln Memorial incident is instructive. By then several videos had become available showing different sides of the story, but people still couldn’t stick to the facts – they couldn’t report the behavior without assigning motives.

In the original picture, a student, “wearing a ‘Make America Great Again’ hat, smiles before an Omaha tribal elder, a confrontation viewers took as an act of aggression by a group of white youths against an indigenous community – and by extension, people of color more broadly.” The behavior was standing, wearing a certain hat and smiling. It was automatically racist. He didn’t just hate the individual; he hated all Native Americans as well as every other minority. The smile was called a smirk, when it could have meant he felt nervous having an adult in his personal space beating on a drum.

Later video showed that the tribal elder moved toward the student (not the other way around). Which was the act of aggression? Possibly neither. We don’t know what they were thinking. Neither said anything to indicate what they were thinking, but observers on both sides were sure they knew. The tribal elder later said it felt hostile “and caused him and his companions to fear for their safety.” In that case why did he move forward? What behavior gave him that impression? Follow-up questions are called for.

The explosion of emotion led to condemnation on social media of the student, and by extension, other students at his school, the school itself and even Catholic education! No behavior to support any of this – but let’s throw in some death threats.

The story was much more complex, but most people made up their minds and moved on. The article even says about the students, “their actual intentions and motivations seem vital to any account of what took place. But not only can we never really know what those were, they also don’t matter once the original video has been shot and shared.”

Had this happened only 15 years ago, the incident would have gone unnoticed except for the people involved. Those heckling the students would have felt satisfied that they stood up for their beliefs. The students would have gone home with a story of an unexpected confrontation with a tribal elder. He, in turn, may have felt proud of his role.

But thanks to new technology, national news got to broadcast erroneous first impressions. Even with new evidence, the New York Times tried to soften their original take by reporting a revised opinion “that an explosive convergence of race, religion and ideological beliefs – against a national backdrop of political tension – set the stage for the viral moment.” Of course uninvolved citizens across the country got to express outrage for or against the student(s) complete with name-calling and insults. It’s mob mentality carried out on smart phones.

It’s easy to look at behavior and jump to conclusions. It’s also gratifying, if we can uncover a conclusion that satisfies our own preconceived prejudices. The article itself even calls a MAGA hat “an almost perfect avatar for apparent white nationalism.” It’s a sad state when a hat can set off such an emotional firestorm! Behavior like this does not lead to a happy ending, and it's time we all stopped jumping to a favored conclusion and blaming the other side long enough to figure that out.