Evaluating functions of praise for children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder

We assessed whether novel praise statements could be used to (a) maintain and increase responses with existing reinforcement histories and (b) teach a previously untaught response among children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder across two experiments. During response–stimulus pairing, two responses resulted in preferred edibles but only one also produced a praise statement. In the absence of edibles, the response continuing to produce praise tended to persist more. Next, reversing the praise contingency tended to increase the other response. However, in no case did contingent delivery of those same praise statements result in the acquisition of untaught responses. These findings suggest that conditioning praise statements could serve different functions (antecedent or consequence) depending on the reinforcement history for particular responses.