From innovation to standard practice: developing and disseminating behavioral procedures.

This paper proposes a three-stage continuum for discussing the development and dissemination of behavioral technology. At the level of behavioral techniques, researchers need only establish a functional relationship between technologically defined intervention procedures and socially significant target behaviors. Dissemination is conducted for informational purposes only, and the purposes and details surrounding subsequent use of the technique are left to the discretion of the user. At the level of behavioral demonstration, a collection of socially acceptable intervention procedures is refined and standardized and must be shown to produce behavior changes across a number of subjects. Here dissemination is conducted, in large part, to generate support for provision of services. At the level of behavioral models, procedural descriptions must be useroriented. Additionally, model effects must be obtainable by agents not associated with their development and must compare favorably with other treatment or service alternatives. The purpose of dissemination at this level is to obtain adoptions and replications of the model. Details of development and dissemination of behavioral technology at each of these three levels are discussed.

Vocational skill assessment of severely mentally retarded adults.

The Trainee Performance Sample, a vocational skills assessment instrument, was revised to enhance content validity and utility in making vocational skill learning placements for severely retarded individuals. The Trainee Performance Sample employs a process measurement approach; i.e., each of the 30 test items (a variety of benchwork tasks) includes both training and correction procedures within the item. To some extent, the examinee's ability to benefit from various training strategies is measured. Psychometric analyses demonstrated that the revised Trainee Performance Sample meets standard test development criteria. Thus, a dynamic approach to vocational skills assessment of severely retarded individuals--one that involves training while testing--has been shown to have both utility and psychometric adequacy.

Manipulation of stimulus features in vocational-skill training of severely retarded individuals.

Fifty-one severely retarded adults were taught a difficult visual discrimination in an assembly task by one of three training techniques: (a) adding and reducing large cue differences on the relevant-shape dimension; (b) adding and fading a redundant-color dimension; or (c) a combination of the two techniques. There were significant differences between training conditions in both trials- and errors-to-criterion performance. These were attributed to differential establishment of stimulus control in the first phase of training, with the combined procedure being the most effective, the color coding/fading next, and the relevant-dimension cue-disparity method the least powerful. These results demonstrated that substantial differences may exist in the efficacy of various vocational-skill training procedures involving manipulation of stimulus features.

Evaluation of family intervention through unobtrusive audio recordings: experiences in "bugging" children.

Five children referred to a child-family intervention program wore a radio transmitter in the home during pre-intervention and termination assessments. The transmitter broadcast to a receiver-recording apparatus in the home (either activated by an interval timer at predetermined "random" times or by parents at predetermined "picked" times). "Picked" times were parent-selected situations during which problems typically occurred (e.g., bedtime). Parents activated the recorder regularly whether or not problems occurred. Child-deviant, parent-negative, and parent-commanding behaviors were significantly higher at the picked times during pretest than at random times. At posttest, behaviors in all three classes were substantially reduced at picked times, but not at random times. For individual subject data, reductions occurred in at least two of the three dependent variables for three of the five cases during random time assessments. In general, the behavioral outcome data corresponded to parent-attitude reports and parent-collected observation data.