ABSTRACT
We used behavioral skills training (BST) to teach multiple skills to 2 cohorts of 18 participants. BST consisted of the standard 4 components: (a) didactic instruction, (b) modeling, (c) role-play, and (d) feedback, modified to be delivered in a large-group format. All components were provided by 1 trainer, simultaneously to all participants, with peers delivering feedback during role-plays. Across 4 targeted skills (e.g., discrete-trial teaching), the average performance of Cohort 1 improved from less than 60% correct implementation in baseline to a performance of between 85% and 100% correct, across participants, following BST. We used social validity data collected from Cohort 1 to modify the length of instruction across skills for Cohort 2. BST was similarly effective for Cohort 2, with a decrease in the additional training required for trainees to demonstrate the skill in a novel role-play scenario or with a client. Implications for effectively scaling up BST are discussed.
ABSTRACT
Children with developmental disabilities may engage in less frequent and more repetitious language than peers with typical development. Scripts have been used to increase communication by teaching one or more specific statements and then fading the scripts. In the current study, preschoolers with developmental disabilities experienced a novel script-frame protocol and learned to make play-related comments about toys. After the script-frame protocol, commenting occurred in the absence of scripts, with untrained play activities, and included untrained comments.
Subject(s)
Autism Spectrum Disorder/psychology , Communication , Play and Playthings/psychology , Social Behavior , Verbal Behavior , Behavior Therapy , Child, Preschool , Female , Humans , Male , Peer Group , Treatment OutcomeABSTRACT
Each day, people encounter stimuli they find unpleasant. Some children with autism may require systematic instruction to acquire the communication skills necessary to request the termination of such aversive stimuli. We taught 2 school-aged boys with autism a mand (e.g., signing "stop") that could be used to escape a variety of aversive stimuli. First, we employed a systematic assessment to identify aversive stimuli to use during training. We then conducted mand training sequentially across those stimuli until sufficient exemplars were trained for generalization to occur to untrained stimuli. For both participants, cross-stimulus generalization was observed after training with 2 stimuli. Participants manded for escape in the presence of aversive stimuli, but almost never manded in the presence of preferred stimuli or when the programmed stimuli were absent. In addition, we found an inverse relation between acquisition of the mand and engagement in problem behavior and evidence of generalization to nontraining contexts.
Subject(s)
Autistic Disorder/psychology , Autistic Disorder/rehabilitation , Education of Intellectually Disabled/methods , Generalization, Psychological/physiology , Reinforcement, Psychology , Verbal Behavior/physiology , Association Learning , Child , Conditioning, Operant/physiology , Female , Humans , Male , Reaction Time/physiologyABSTRACT
Clinicians are particularly challenged by the development of interventions for behavior maintained by automatic reinforcement because reinforcers that maintain the responses often cannot be directly observed or manipulated. Researchers have conducted either preference assessments or competing items assessments when developing effective treatments for behavior maintained by automatic reinforcement. However, interventions based on these assessments have not been directly compared. The current study evaluated procedures to make such a comparison. High-competition items resulted in greater reductions in vocal stereotypy than did high-preference items for a preschool boy with autism.
Subject(s)
Autistic Disorder/rehabilitation , Behavior Therapy/methods , Competitive Behavior , Reinforcement, Psychology , Automation , Child, Preschool , Choice Behavior , Conditioning, Operant , Humans , Male , Stereotyped Behavior/physiology , VoiceABSTRACT
Six participants with autism learned conditional relations between complex auditory-visual sample stimuli (dictated words and pictures) and simple visual comparisons (printed words) using matching-to-sample training procedures. Pre- and posttests examined potential stimulus control by each element of the complex sample when presented individually and emergence of additional conditional relations and oral labeling. Tests revealed class-consistent performance for all participants following training.
