Association for Behavior Analysis International

This poster will summarize previously published work using the Autism Treatment Survey (ATS) to identify teaching strategies used for students with autisms pectrum disorders (ASD) in public school classrooms, as well as the preparation teachers received for implementing these strategies. 182 teachers from grade pre-k through 12th in one Southern state reported data on teaching strategies used in their classrooms. Results indicated that only 5% of teacher reported using evidence-based practices with students with ASD. Results from personel preparation report indicated most teachers attended a half- or full-day workshop on the strategy, and only 15% received training from their university-based teacher preparation program. Training and use of evidence-based practices was not influenced by (a) education level, (b) years of experience, (c) type of classroom, or (d) grade level taught. Implication of results and limitation of data will be discussed.

The limited influence of social stimuli as reinforcement for the behavior of children with autism is well documented. Reinforcement by social stimuli, such as attention and praise, is required for the maintenance and generalization of a multitude of social behaviors, most notably tacts and intraverbals maintained by generalized conditioned reinforcement. The purpose of this study was to systematically replicate recent findings showing that praise can be conditioned as a reinforcer. The participant was 5 years old, diagnosed with autism, and nonverbal. A preliminary functional analysis demonstrated that button-pushing was consistently more frequent in a contingent tickle condition that in contingent praise and no consequence conditions. Contingent pairing of praise and tickles was then administered in 2-min sessions and praise alone was evaluated before and after pairing sessions each day. Results indicate that button-pushing increased in the contingent praise condition following the pairing condition. Interobserver agreement was 99.4% across 50% of sessions. One interpretation of the data suggests that the motivating operation linked to the unconditioned reinforcer must be in effect in the conditioned reinforcement condition. Future research should continue refining the procedures for conditioning attention as a reinforcer while analyzing the role of motivating operations in the process.

For individuals with autism who have received early intensive behavioral interventions in a 1:1 setting, discriminating when and when not to respond in a group context can be a new skill they need to be taught as they move on to a less restricted environment. In this study, we analyze aggression exhibited by an elementary-age girl with autism during three group instruction situations in a small group setting. Prior to this study, she has had three years of experience receiving home therapy, and her problem behaviors are exclusively occurring during circle time, group game time, and independent desk work time where she is either asked to take turns or the therapist is working with another peer in the same class. Current study first analyzes the function of her problem behaviors through functional behavioral assessment. Second, using a reversal design nested within a multiple-baseline design across settings, we investigate effectiveness of two interventions. One intervention focuses on teaching a stress-coping skills, which may not necessarily relate to the function of the problem behavior; second intervention teaches her to discriminate when to respond using color system and allows her contingent access to opportunities to respond. Maintenance and generalization of the intervention effects will be assessed. Implications for practice and areas for further investigation will be discussed.

Discrete trials teaching (DTT) is a common procedure used with Early Intensive Behavioural Intervention in the treatment of children with autism. The study examined the effectiveness of a self-instructional package for teaching DTT to Applied Behavioural Analysis (ABA) tutors at the St.Amant ABA Program for children with autism. A modified multiple-baseline design across participants was used, and replicated six times. An AB design was used for one participant. During Baseline, newly-hired tutors taught three tasks to a confederate role-playing a child with autism. The tasks were: (a) pointing-to-named pictures, (b) identity matching, and (c) motor imitation. The tutors then studied the self-instructional package that included two mastery tests, four video demonstrations, and self-practicing the material. In Post-training assessment, participants taught the same three tasks to a confederate role-playing a child with autism. One tutor participated in a generalization phase. Participants averaged 3 hours and 56 minutes to master the manual. Eleven of the 13 participants achieved the mastery criterion (mean 80%) in Post-training assessments. Mean accuracy in DTT increased from 46.2% to 85.5% (a statistically significant increase), and the research design demonstrated strong internal validity. The self-instructional package appears to be an effective tool for teaching newly-hired tutors to conduct DTT.

Up to 90% of children with autism exhibit feeding problems, the most common is food selectivity or picky eating. Many studies have investigated interventions that are effective for children with feeding problems, however few studies have examined interventions appropriate and effective for use in the classroom setting. In the current study, shaping, a token system, positive reinforcement, and escape prevention procedures were used with one student with autism and food selectivity to increase acceptance of food. All of the sessions were conducted in a classroom setting. Results showed that the use of reinforcement and the token system were not as effective as the escape prevention procedures with differential reinforcement to increase overall food acceptance for the student.

In this study, activity choice extinction was used to decrease escape-maintained behavior by teaching a child to select between appropriate selected tasks. Activity choice extinction is a function-based intervention which reduces problem behavior without losing instructional time, while simultaneously using extinction (Geiger, Carr, & LeBlanc 2010). The study was conducted with a three year old child, diagnosed with autism, in an Early Childhood Special Education (ECSE) classroom. A functional analysis was conducted to determine the function of the problem behavior and it was found that the behavior was escape maintained. Baseline data were collected on the frequency of the problem behavior prior to the implementation of the treatment. First, a pairing procedure was used to pair each task with the appropriate icon. After this procedure is mastered, the activity choice extinction procedure was introduced. It is expected that the procedure will provide an alternate intervention to decrease escape maintained behavior to use in the ECSE classroom. The skills learned from this procedure can be transferred in the future to using a picture schedule.

We examined the effects of playful physical contact as an establishing operation (EO) for two preschool students classified as a preschooler with a disability. The participants functioned at an emergent speaker and emergent listener level of verbal behavior. We used a multi element design, specifically an alternating treatment with AB design. Data were taken across 5 programs, 4 acquisition programs and 1 perform task. Playful physical contact consists of tickling, hugging and bouncing the participants for 10 seconds every 10 learn units. The results show that playful physical contact was an establishing operation for the participants and they responded correctly to more learn units during these sessions. The participants also emitted more mands during sessions with playful physical contact.

The purpose of this study was to increase the lunch-time mand repertoire of three classrooms of children in a special needs school. The special needs school is located in a large metropolitan area and it serves children from three to 14 years of age. We selected three classrooms with six students, six teachers and one head teacher. The students in all three classroom had demonstrated the ability to emit some mands and tacts. We used a multiple baseline experimental design to evaluate the effectiveness of the procedure. The procedure consisted of teaching the instructors to provide conditions where establishing operations were created artificially during lunch time to elicit mands in the children (e.g., removing the spoon and fork and ask the child to eat his food). The dependent variable was the total number of mands emitted in each classroom. The results indicated that the procedure was effective at increasing a Mand repertoire in all children. There were maintenance effects in the behavior of both instructors and children.