Effects of group socialization procedures on the social interactions of preschool children.

We investigated the effects of group socialization procedures on the social behavior of preschool children in two studies. Group socialization procedures consisted of teachers using antecedent and consequent events to promote social interaction during children's games. During intervention, teachers discussed friendship with the children and then prompted and praised child-child social responding within the context of games. Children's social behavior was assessed during two sessions, group game periods (i.e., intervention sessions) and nonintervention play periods (i.e., generalization sessions). In both studies, a multiple baseline design across two target children and peers in their respective group was used to evaluate the effects of group socialization procedures. During group game periods, after intervention, target children increased their rates of both prompted and unprompted social interactions with peers. Also, in nonintervention play periods, target children improved both the rate and the duration of their social responding with peers. Results indicated that group socialization procedures were a practical and effective method for improving young children's social interaction during both structured games and unstructured play activities.

Effects of peer-mediated social initiations and prompting/reinforcement procedures on the social behavior of autistic children.

Peer-mediated social initiations and prompting/reinforcement procedures were evaluated (in training and generalization sessions) as interventions for increasing the positive social behavior of four autistic children. During baseline, the peer trainer made few social initiations and did not prompt or socially reinforce subjects. For two subjects, baseline was followed by social initiation intervention, and for the other two, baseline was followed by prompting and social reinforcement. Both interventions produced dramatic and comparable increases in positive social behavior in training sessions. Post-treatment responding was not observed for either intervention. When interventions terminated in a second baseline period, the subjects' behavior returned to the level observed during the initial baseline. The subjects were then exposed to the intervention procedure they had not yet experienced. Again, there were positive and comparable behavior changes in the treatment setting, but no increase in positive social behavior was observed during generalization assessment.