BCBA Behaviorism and Philosophical Foundations Practice Questions
Domain A of the BCBA Test Content Outline (6th ed.) · 8 of the 175 scored questions (5%)
185 questions across all nine domains in 4 hours, with a score for philosophical foundations so you know where you stand.
Free philosophical foundations drillA school team disagrees about whether a new reading program is working. The BCBA insists that the decision be based on weekly direct measures of each student's oral reading rate rather than on teachers' impressions. Which scientific attitude does this best reflect?
Behaviorism and Philosophical Foundations on the BCBA
Behaviorism and Philosophical Foundations is the smallest domain on the BCBA exam: 8 of the 175 scored questions across five tasks. The questions ask you to recognize the goals and assumptions of the science, explain behavior the way a radical behaviorist would, tell the branches of the field apart, and spot the seven dimensions of applied behavior analysis in a description of a program.
- Share of the exam
- 8 of 175 scored questions (5%) on every exam form
- Outline tasks
- 5 (A.1 to A.5)
- Our drill
- 10 questions from 27 philosophical foundations questions, untimed, an explanation after every answer; one free attempt, unlimited with a pass
What philosophical foundations questions test
- The goals of a science of behavior: description, prediction and control (task A.1)
- The philosophical assumptions: selectionism, determinism, empiricism, parsimony, pragmatism and philosophic doubt (task A.2)
- Radical behaviorism: private events as behavior, and explanations that point to the environment rather than to mentalistic causes or explanatory fictions (task A.3)
- Behaviorism, the experimental analysis of behavior, applied behavior analysis and professional practice guided by the science, and how they differ (task A.4)
- The seven dimensions of applied behavior analysis from Baer, Wolf and Risley (1968): applied, behavioral, analytic, technological, conceptually systematic, effective and generality (task A.5)
Sit the full exam under the real clock
185 questions across all nine domains in 4 hours, with a score for philosophical foundations so you know where you stand.
Free philosophical foundations drillHow to study it
- Learn each assumption with one example you can explain in a sentence; questions describe a researcher’s choice and ask which assumption it shows.
- Practice catching circular explanations. “He hits because he is aggressive” names the behavior twice and explains nothing.
- For the seven dimensions, learn the question each one answers: is it socially important (applied), is the change real and measured (behavioral), did we show control (analytic), could someone replicate it from the write-up (technological)?
- Eight questions is a small share, but they are fast points. Do not skip this domain because it is short.
Common questions
How many philosophical foundations questions are on the BCBA exam?
Eight of the 175 scored questions, 5% of the exam, across tasks A.1 to A.5. It is the smallest of the nine domains in the 6th-edition test content outline.
What is the difference between radical and methodological behaviorism?
Methodological behaviorism studies only publicly observable events and sets private events aside. Radical behaviorism, Skinner’s position and the one behavior analysis takes, treats private events such as thinking and feeling as behavior subject to the same principles, while rejecting mental states as causes of behavior.
185 questions across all nine domains in 4 hours, with a score for philosophical foundations so you know where you stand.
Free philosophical foundations drillThe other BCBA domains
Sources
Original practice questions for exam preparation, written to the BACB’s BCBA Test Content Outline (6th ed.) and the Ethics Code for Behavior Analysts (2022). Independent practice, not affiliated with or endorsed by the Behavior Analyst Certification Board (BACB). BCBA® and BACB® are registered trademarks of the Behavior Analyst Certification Board.