Association for Behavior Analysis International

This symposium includes three papers investigating the influence of reactivity on staff and teacher behavior during the implementation of staff management procedures. Reactivity occurs when behavior changes as a result of observation. In staff management, the concern is that staff will only engage in correct procedure implementation when they are being observed and not in the absence of supervision. In the first study Fuesy and Miltenberger demonstrate the effects of reactivity during to observation during the implementation of behavior plans by staff in a group home setting. In the second study by Minard and Miltenberger, teachers in a preschool setting were observed to increase their positive interactions only when being observed. However, the use of video monitoring lead to increased performance in the absence of the supervisor. In the third paper, Rickerson and Weil evaluate staff management procedures to increase proper hand washing by staff in a group home setting. The results show that the frequency and accuracy of hand washing increased but only when the supervisor was present, again demonstrating the effects of reactivity.

Research has investigated staff management procedures that produce treatment adherence and maintenance overtime. Treatment integrity is one of the most important aspects of staff management; without adequate treatment adherence, behavior analysts are unable to determine whether treatment is effective, function has been identified, or intervention revisions are needed. The literature on staff management procedures has demonstrated that performance feedback and self-monitoring are effective procedures for increasing treatment integrity of behavior plans in the presence of the observer, however, few studies have evaluated the effectiveness of these procedures when the observer is absent. This study evaluated the effectiveness of performance feedback and self-monitoring procedures and the level of reactivity to the presence of an observer exhibited by staff trained to implement individualized behavior plans. The results showed that staff performance increased with the intervention almost exclusively in the conspicuous observation condition.

This study was designed to evaluate self-monitoring and feedback procedures with preschool teachers and reactivity that occurred in a preschool classroom due to a supervisors presence. Preschool teachers positive interactions following the implementation of a self-monitoring and feedback procedure only slightly increased without the presence of a supervisor. Reactivity was identified with the presence of the supervisor as accurate reporting increased most in the supervisors presence. Following the identification of reactivity, positive interactions remained at high levels during the reactivity control and maintenance conditions.

Hand washing has been proven to be effective in preventing many serious diseases; however, both the general public and many healthcare professionals fail to wash their hands. Very little research has been conducted outside of healthcare settings to evaluate the adherence of hand-washing procedures. This study investigated if hand washing adherence in a residential setting can be improved with the use of verbal and graphical feedback a probabilistic bonus. Results suggested that the probabilistic bonus had a substantial impact on hand washing performance: more so than signs, educational in-service, and verbal-graphical feedback alone. Reactivity data were collected and showed performance was weak to non-existent throughout all phases until the probabilistic bonus; but that performance was still variable and occurred at low levels in this contingency phase. That is, the probabilistic bonus appeared to improve performance even when staff did not know they were being watched, however, performance was only moderate and variable