The establishing operation and teaching verbal behavior.

Twenty years ago Michael (1993) refined and extended the concept of the conditioned establishing operation (CEO). With this paper he updated his previous treatment of the topic (Michael, 1982) by providing terminological refinements and conceptually clear descriptions of the reflexive and transitive CEOs. In the 20 years since the publication of that paper there has been an increase in the application of CEOs as independent variables in the teaching of verbal behavior in applied setting. The purpose of this paper is to provide a brief overview of clinical applications of the EO to the teaching of verbal behavior during the last 20 years.