Behavioral Interventions最新文献

The speaker immersion protocol (SIP) is an intervention that attempts to increase the frequency and spontaneity of a child's spoken communication. SIP has demonstrated effectiveness with increasing mands and other verbal operants (Ross et al., 2006); however, prior investigations have not examined SIP in the context of needing to recruit the social attention of a communicative partner in the presence of an establishing operation. The current study sought to extend the literature on SIP by adding a recruitment for social attention component to the intervention with two children with Autism spectrum disorder and limited spontaneous language. Prior to intervention, both participants engaged in low levels of target-requesting behavior even when a communication partner was readily available close by. After receiving an intervention designed to increase vocal requests, both participants demonstrated a significant increase in the number of vocal requests they emitted; however, that did not generalize to making appropriate bids for attention until recruitment for attention was embedded within SIP. Future studies should continue to examine the most effective and efficient ways to improve both the quantity and the quality of autistic children's social communication.

Self-injurious behavior is thought to be the product of interactions between deficits related to a primary disability (e.g., limited communication repertoires and adaptive skills) and learning experiences that reinforce problem behavior (e.g., consoling the child, terminating non-preferred activities, etc.). For these cases, functional communication training (FCT) may be prescribed to decrease challenging behavior and increase the client's communicative repertoire. However, FCT procedures for individuals with multiple physical impairments may require considerable individualization and modifications. Unfortunately, the existing body of research related to the assessment and treatment of behavior of individuals with motor, visual, or other impairments is relatively limited. The purpose of this report is to demonstrate how practitioners can modify assessment and treatment procedures to decrease challenging behavior and promote independence when working with individuals with multiple impairments. We provide an example of effective skill acquisition and behavior reduction interventions for a young girl, Ava, presenting with multiple disabilities—including visual, hearing, and motor impairments. Consistent with the habilitative aims of applied behavior analysis, the intervention was effective at decreasing Ava's challenging behavior and increasing her independent communication and adaptive behavior.

eSports is a newly rising field with rapidly increasing cultural validity. Despite the wide array of similarities between eSports and traditional sports, behavioral skill acquisition interventions have yet to be applied to video game skills. Although video feedback has been established as effective for traditional sports, further research is needed to validate its efficacy as a standalone intervention. In this study, the effects of video feedback were analyzed with three participants in a nonconcurrent multiple baseline across subjects design. Participants performed a specific in-game behavior (an anti-air attack) in a controlled match against the researcher, then viewed recordings of their performance and received positive and corrective feedback from the researchers. The generalization of the skill improvement was evaluated through the rate of successful skill implementation in ranked online matches. Results showed that the video feedback intervention improved performance over baseline for all participants and generalized to online matches.

Involving clients in therapeutic decisions is a crucial component of effective and ethical behavior-analytic practice. However, discrepancies between client preference for treatment options and treatment effectiveness are possible in the course of treatment. The purpose of this paper is to advance the discussion of discrepancies between client preference for treatment options and treatment effectiveness by (a) reviewing relevant considerations for adapted strategies to involve clients with limited prerequisite skills in therapeutic decisions, (b) presenting clinical data that exemplifies discrepancies between client preference for treatment options and treatment effectiveness, (c) describing nuanced considerations for navigating discrepancies, and (d) providing suggestions for future research on this topic.

Effort tolerance refers to a repertoire of selecting a larger reinforcer requiring a higher-effort response over a smaller reinforcer requiring a lower-effort response. The current study investigated the effects of an online group-based effort-tolerance training on students' effort tolerance. The study adds to the literature because no studies have investigated the effects of a progressive ratio schedule of reinforcement as an intervention that targets effort tolerance for a whole class in an online platform and in general education settings. During the intervention, researchers gradually increased the response requirements (i.e., number of math problems) to access a larger reinforcer and incorporated choice-making opportunities to promote second-grade students' selection of a higher-effort/larger-reinforcer response. The findings yielded mixed results – the intervention was relatively effective at increasing effort tolerance for students performing on and below grade level for math, but the same effects were not shown in students performing above grade level. Future applications in education and research are discussed.

Functional communication training is an effective intervention for establishing an appropriate, alternative response that produces the functional reinforcer maintaining challenging behavior. Once the alternative response is established, it is differentially reinforced—typically using dense schedules—while challenging behavior is placed on extinction. After achieving clinically significant reductions in challenging behavior, reinforcement schedule thinning is conducted to promote the maintenance of the alternative response under more practical reinforcement schedules. In the current study, we compared two different methods for thinning the schedule of reinforcement for the alternative response to a terminal schedule. One method, referred to as the dense-to-lean (DTL) approach, involves gradually decreasing the density of alternative reinforcement over successive sessions until the terminal schedule is reached. Another method, referred to as the fixed-lean (FL) approach, involves abruptly decreasing the density of alternative reinforcement by rapidly transitioning to the terminal schedule. Whereas the former approach has been evaluated extensively within the applied literature, the latter approach has not been the focus of much empirical work in either the clinic or the laboratory. An alternating treatment design was used to directly compare these approaches, both of which included noncontingent access to competing stimuli. Participants achieved clinically significant reductions in challenging behavior at the terminal schedule more readily with the FL than the DTL approach. The results are further discussed in terms of the efficacy and efficiency for both approaches, the potential mediating effect of competing stimuli, and implications for future research.

Token economies are among the oldest and most successful teaching programs in applied behavior analysis. Despite a rich history of basic and applied research on token systems, there remains a research-to-practice gap. Our aim in this paper is to bridge this gap between research and application, by providing evidence-based recommendations and practical guidelines for application of token reinforcement methods. The recommendations in Part 1 are for building a token economy from the ground up, in learners without a history of token reinforcement, whereas those in Part 2 are concerned with existing token economies without regard to how they were established. Although token economies have proven generally effective across a range of settings and populations, they could be even more effective when based on the latest research and theory. Thus, apart from specific recommendations, we hope to show the benefits of an integrated evidence-based approach to the application of token reinforcement principles in educational and clinical settings.

Educators and parents are encouraged to arrange language-rich environments, which provide children with exposure to language that is diverse in form and function and with repeated opportunities to emit verbal responses under a variety of conditions. Intraverbal relations constitute a large portion of these verbal interactions and may include compound antecedent verbal stimuli. Prior research has shown that responding may come under the control of limited features of compound antecedent stimuli, which may be evident when responding does not occur in the presence of individual elements or emergent performances (e.g., symmetrical relations) are absent. The current study evaluated the effects of alternating convergent intraverbal (CIV) and tact by feature, function, or class sessions on emergent tact performances in a game-like arrangement. Participants included four children exhibiting expressive language deficits. The results revealed that correct responding on CIV trials did not consistently predict tact performances for the same targets. These findings highlight the need for additional research on the effective arrangement of compound stimuli in early educational interventions.

Smartphones are highly complex machines serving multiple purposes. Although access to different applications may be a source of inspiration and may lead to increased well-being, excessive screen time usage can lead to increased stress, reduced physical activity, and neck and shoulder discomfort. The purpose of the present study was to evaluate the effects of (a) goal setting, (b) turning off notifications, and (c) sharing information about screen time with peers on smartphone usage in a sample of young adults who reported interest in reducing their smartphone usage. Goal setting and turning off notifications for social media applications effectively reduced smartphone usage for five out of seven participants. Sharing information with peers did not lead to decreased smartphone usage. Follow-up measures showed an increase in smartphone usage compared to the intervention phases. With only a few studies on strategies to reduce smartphone usage within behavior analysis, the current study expands the literature and provides directions for future studies.

We applied independent and interdependent group contingencies in a counterbalanced reversal experimental design to the vocational on-task behavior for two groups of adults with intellectual disabilities. On-task behavior increased for all participants in both groups above a criterion of 80% of time on-task during both treatment phases. Independent and interdependent group contingencies were equally effective in increasing on-task behavior. Responding was maintained at the criterion level for all members of one group at a 4-week follow-up. No increases in negative social interactions were observed when the interdependent group contingency was in effect and participants reported both contingencies to be socially valid. We suggest that group contingencies can be an effective intervention in increasing on-task behavior of individuals with intellectual disabilities in vocational settings.