A group of responses of varying topography, all of which produce the same effect on the environment or have the same function. Ex: opening a bag of chips, greetings.

• A. Response Class
• B. Response Generalization
• C. Repertoire
• D. Replication

Answer: (A)

Think about function rather than form. A response class is a group of behaviors that all produce the same consequence in the environment, even though they look different (different topographies). For example, to greet someone, a person might say hello, wave, or nod—each is a different way to accomplish the same social effect: getting attention and starting interaction. Because these varied behaviors share the same function, they belong to one response class. It’s a way to capture that multiple forms can be interchangeable in achieving a goal.

This helps distinguish it from the broader idea of a repertoire, which is the full set of behaviors a person can perform. A response class is a functional slice of that repertoire—defined by the shared outcome—whereas repertoire is simply all the possible behaviors. The other terms don’t describe this grouping by function in the same way: response generalization refers to spreading a trained response to new, similar situations, and replication isn’t the label used for a group of functionally equivalent responses.