Association for Behavior Analysis International

The purpose of this study was to test the effects of a peer-yoked contingency on the students acquisition of observational learning repertoires. A delayed multiple probe design was used to measure participants acquisition of performance and academic observational learning. The dependent variable in this study was correct responses to probes for both performance observational learning and academic observational learning. The independent variable in this study was correct responses to a performance activity and the Peer-Yoked Contingency game board. Criterion for both observational learning repertoires was 80% correct responses to probe trials. Two target Participants and two peer confederates participated in this study. The target Participants were chosen because they did not have performance observational learning. Results showed that the Peer-Yoked Contingency game was effective for inducing performance and academic observational learning for the target Participants. Additionally, the intervention induced academic observational learning for both confederate peers.

The purpose of this study was to identify variables that may promote rule-following and rule-construction behavior in five children with and without disabilities. The basic procedure involved teaching motor signs for known and unknown items through MTS tasks in a specific context, and testing for the emergence of mands and tacts and the rule-following and rule-construction behavior that required the use of this information in a different context. Participants learned to respond to signs by selecting the appropriate visual stimuli (pictures of containers, tools, and unfamiliar stimuli). Tacts were tested asking the participant to sign the pictures. Mands were tested in a context where the participants were required to sign for the missing tools necessary to use specific containers. Then, three unfamiliar stimuli were used to replace the stimuli used in the original training. The final tests assessed if the informations learned during the original training could be transfer to the unfamiliar stimuli. Results pointed out to the emergence of tacsts and mands after listener training for most of the participants. However, the transformation effect of verbal rules using unfamiliar stimuli seemed to be related with the existence of bidirectional relations between the signs and objects specified in the rule.

Establishing a strong tacting repertoire is often one focus of language-training programs for children with autism and other developmental disabilities. In the current study, 2 participants with strong 1-word tact repertoires (i.e., at least 20 known tacts) were taught to tact using carrier phrases, e.g., I see a . In addition, one participant was taught to respond to a therapists tact of an item in an array of picture cards presented on a table by tacting a different item in the array. These skills were taught to promote tacting in more natural contexts, such as a caregiver reading a book to a child and taking turns tacting objects seen in the illustrations. Results indicate both participants acquired the use of carrier phrases when tacting and one participant has acquired tacting in a socially appropriate exchange. Generalization to both a naturalistic context (i.e, tacting pictures of novel items in a book) and a naturalistic setting (i.e., a library) will be assessed, and subsequent teaching will be conducted as needed.

In the present study we explored the effects of instructional accuracy (pre-contact descriptions) as well as the feedback frequency (i.e. continuous, accumulated) on instrumental and verbal performance (i.e. post-contact descriptions or rules) on a first order matching-to-sample task. The pre-contact description given to subjects, as well as the post-contact descriptions made by all participants, were analyzed according to the proposal made for Ortiz, Gonzlez & Rosas (2008) (i.e. specific and pertinent, generic and pertinent, specific and non pertinent, generic and non pertinent, irrelevant, absent). 36 students were assigned to one of six experimental groups that differed both on feedback frequency and accuracy of the instruction given in the second phase of the experiment. Results show that subjects who received a Specific and Pertinent (SP) instruction with an accumulated feedback frequency had the best instrumental performance and elaborated the best post-contact descriptions (i.e. rule). Obtained data suggest the relevance of the Response component (R) of an instruction in the acquisition of an instructional function by a pre-contact description.

One arguably critical component of effective discrete trial teaching (DTT) is the use of multiple exemplars to promote stimulus generalization. For example, it behooves us to ensure that one can tact "dog" when shown a picture of a golden retriever and when shown a picture of a Jack Russell terrier. However, research is currently lacking on whether it is more efficacious for multiple exemplars to be introduced simultaneously or sequentially with only 1 exemplar taught at a time. The current study examined whether the acquisition of motor imitation skills could be achieved more rapidly in a simultaneous (i.e., multiple exemplar) teaching framework or in a sequential (i.e., single exemplar) framework. Each condition had 3 target exemplars that involved various actions with the same stimulus (e.g., roll ball, throw ball, bounce ball). In the multiple exemplar condition, all targets were taught simultaneously, while in the single exemplar condition, targets were taught 1 at a time to mastery. Results found that acquisition was faster in the multiple exemplar condition when compared to the single exemplar and control conditions.

Narcotics trafficking is often described in ambiguous and inaccurate terms. This is problematic because imprecise verbal behavior in relation to some state of affairs inhibits effective action with regard to those events. An innovative methodology was used to explore verbal behavior in diverse media reports following the 2001 prison escape of Joaquin El Chapo Guzman Loera, reputed prominent agent of the Sinaloa Cartel. Results demonstrated that the terms cartel, mafia, gang, and organization were controlled in part by the same stimulus conditions, but which was emitted on a particular occasion was predictably related to other variables, including the speakers affiliation, immediate verbal context, and country of publication. We conclude that more precise terminology could improve efforts to understand and curtail narcotics trafficking. We also believe this methodology should continue to be developed as it may prove useful in analyzing other terms related to important social issues.

The purpose of the study was to investigate the acquisition of verbal operants in a longitudinal research with a typical development child from eighteen months until two years old. Verbal responses emitted by the child and his caretakers in a natural setting were analyzed in categories based upon Skinners verbal operants (1957), trying to identify relations between the emission of operants by caretakers and the child. Possible interaction patterns in the acquisition of verbal behavior were investigated. Thirty four sessions of fifteen minutes of duration were registered and transcript per week. Results show an abrupt increase in the cumulative frequency of emission of tact, mand, echoic and intraverbal categories of the participant after twenty months of age. This increase also could be noticed simultaneously in the emission of the same categories of the caretaker. The most emitted category of the child was tacts, while the most emitted category by the caretaker was mands. The results suggest that caregivers arrange contingencies for the installation of verbal operant in the repertoire of the child.

This study compared the effects of the Lovaas Method (LovM) and Verbal Behavior Approach (VBA) on the development of tact repertoires of three 11 to 12-year-old students with moderate to severe mental retardation. We administered the ABLLS-short form, determined current levels of performance, and implemented the protocols in an alternative school for students with developmental disabilities. Specifically, 10 targets from two categories were taught receptively to mastery criterion and then expressively to mastery criterion using the LovM, and ten different targets from the same categories were trained using VBA, which included transfer trials across operants. A within-subject alternating treatments with baseline design was used to evaluate skill acquisition and identify an optimal practice in regards to frequency of target operants mastered to criterion, measures of efficiency, maintenance, and generalization. The results of this investigation suggest that both protocols are effective in teaching receptive and tact target operants; however, across all participants, VBA resulted in fewer errors and was more efficient in teaching tact operants. Limitations and recommendations for future research are discussed.

One very frequent deficit observed with autistic individuals is faulty conversational skills. Even when autistic individual acquire functional ecoics, tacts and intraverbals, faulty autoclitics, amongst other variables, lead to the inability to comment during ongoing conversations. This inability hinders the individual's possibility to interact effectively. As such, this inability may also affect others' willingness to interact with the individual, which in turn could reduce social, leizure and occupational opportunities. This paper will report an intervention based on a pause prompt and the use of negative reinforcement to teach three autistic individuals to comment during an ongoing conversation. The intervention was applied with three individuals of different ages (seven, ten and nineteen years); in different contexts (school, individual and community); and different verbal repertoires. The intervention technology was developed based on the premiss that the pause will trigger discomfort in the individual, which in turn will set the occasion for the therapist to negatively reinforce the occurence of verbal comments.

Skinner (1957) attested that the acquisition of one type of verbal operant will not necessarily occasion the emergence of another type of verbal response topography. In contrast, several studies have shown that multiple exemplar training (MET) is a mechanism that can facilitate the emergence of untrained operants, and it has been considered a powerful tool for establishing generalized operant responses also known as derived relational responses in the language of Relational Frame Theory (RFT). Using a multiple probe design across participants, the current study evaluated the effects of two training protocols in the emergence of untaught intraverbal responses (listing and vocal spelling of words). In Experiment 1, four participants diagnosed with intellectual disability were trained in taking dictation responses and tested for the emergence of intraverbal responses in the form of vocal spelling of words. In Experiment 2, three out of the four participants were trained to relate three sets of three synonyms each using a conditional discrimination training, and tested for the emergence of intraverbal responses in the form of listing and vocal spelling of synonyms. The results demonstrated that the training procedures used during both experiments were effective in occasioning the emergence of untrained intraverbal responses. It was suggested that participants should have had a history of relational responding through the course of their academic life which facilitated the emergence of different intraverbal responses in this study.

The present study is a partial replication of an earlier work that was effective in teaching 3-4 year old boys with autism to increase their tacts emitted in non-instructional settings. The treatment package included an intensive tact instruction procedure on number of tacts. The participants in the present study varied slightly to girls and also included slightly older students up to 7 years old. The non-instructional settings were almost identical to the original study and included: the play area of the classroom, the play area of the classroom during unpacking time, and the lunch table. The experimental design was similar in that both studies used a multiple probe design across participants. All probe sessions were conducted daily for a cumulative 15 minutes, 5 minutes in each NIS. Intensive tact instruction included direct instruction of 100-tact learn units in addition to the daily learn units that the students were already receiving.