Association for Behavior Analysis International

What do teacher's really know when it comes to supporting the needs of students having Autism Spectrum Disorders? Over the recent decades a multitude of post secondary training programs, professional development and similar learning opportunities have become available to educators. This survey is designed to begin to capture what practicing educators are taking from these learning experiences and applying to the their student's day to day learning experiences. Specific areas of focus will include: Role of Reinforcement, Academics, Social Skills, Communication, Behavioral Supports, Sensory needs, Trauma Experiences and Motor Development. The subject group for this pilot study includes over 100 graduate level students described as a mixture of pre-service, post baccalaureate professionals and practicing teachers. Results will be presented with a focus on identifying trends across a variety of demographic variables including urban versus rural schools, socio economic status, professional experience and types of teaching environments. Specific data trends will also be identified in regards to the knowledge of and application evidenced based practices across the domains outlined earlier. Data collection for this survey is currently underway.

The reinforcement is a central mechanism in the development of operant behaviors. The research evaluated the reinforcing effects of preferred videos over the acquisition of simple discrimination of children with intellectual disabilities and autism. Participants were students aged 8 to 10 years from a school of a city in S?o Paulo. Data collection was held in the school where participants were recruited. The experimental stimuli involved two geometric forms, videos of children's animation series and their representative photographs. Following the interview, familiarization and preference assessment phases, upon selecting a target geometric form (the discriminative stimulus in the simple discrimination), participants were given an opportunity to watch videos. After reaching the criterion, the discriminative reversal phase was introduced. The dependent measure was the percentage of times the participant chose the target geometric form. The results demonstrated that videos were efficient as reinforcing consequences for children with intellectual disabilities and autism. The preference assessment effectively identified these videos more quickly and with low cost of response. The implications of these results for digital stimulus preference assessments are discussed. This study can highlight practices and instructional programs for handicapped and contribute with the research in the fields of Education, Psychology and Special Education.

Compliance with instructions to handover preferred tangible items and transition to the next activity is a required skill in education settings. Problem behavior and non-compliance with the instruction finished can lead to disruption to classroom routines and reduced instructional time. The following study aims to extend Hanley, Jin, Vanselow, and Hanratty (2014) methodology on delay and denial tolerance training to teach two participants diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder to accept finished. The study taught participants to handover preferred items (tolerance response) following the instruction its finished (termination cue) and transition to and complete a less preferred activity without engaging in problem behavior. Initially the tolerance response resulted in immediate access to the reinforcer. Gradually and systematically a delay to reinforcement was introduced and during the delay the participants were required to comply with adult instructions including academic demands. A multiple baseline design across participants was used to evaluate the effects of the intervention. Following high rates of problem behavior at baseline the intervention was introduced and problem behavior immediately reduced to zero levels for both participants consecutively. Furthermore compliance with adult instructions following the tolerance response increased for both participants.

The education environment is not always conducive with extinction bursts, as they can be dangerous and are typically disruptive to the milieu of the classroom and surrounding classrooms and to the student displaying maladaptive behaviors. The student in the current study was an 8 year old 3rd grader in a self-contained Autism classroom. He displayed aggressive and self-injurious behaviors. To avoid further disruption and danger, this research team used a differential reinforcement without extinction procedure and placed the above stated behaviors on a Fixed Ratio 1 schedule. This procedure and schedule was set up so that staff provided corrective attention to precursor and aggressive behaviors and provided a Fixed Ratio 1 schedule attention to rule-following behaviors. Aggressive behaviors reduced to zero over five consecutive days. During generalization phases the aggressive behaviors increased. However, following fidelity checks and training, the aggressive behaviors decreased to zero once again. As the research team looked at the data, they were able to determine that it was possible to run a differential reinforcement procedure without extinction to decrease problem behaviors in the classroom setting.

A growing number of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder receive early and intensive intervention based upon the principles of applied behavior analysis. However, some of these children reside in homes where the family primarily speaks one language (e.g., Spanish), while therapy services are primarily provided in another language (e.g., English). In these situations it is possible that, while children are learning language skills, the social validity of those skills is compromised. Moreover, families may deem learning a second language to be a socially important skill more generally. Using three multiple-probe across stimulus sets designs, the current study used the stimulus equivalence paradigm to evaluate the extent to which English-Spanish stimulus relations emerge with three children with Autism Spectrum Disorder. In addition, once establishing equivalence relations, the extent to which stimulus relations generalize to interactions with parents in the childs natural environment and maintain over time was also assessed. Finally, the social validity of the instructional intervention was also evaluated.

Self-report measures suffer from numerous limitations including biases of reference and social desirability. However, these measures continue to be relied upon to provide within-respondent information. This poster outlines the use of behavioral mechanisms to assess a newly developed academic work ethic scale. 171 fifth- through eighth-grade students completed the Academic Work Ethic-Student (AWE-S) measure that was developed using the empirically-supported Multidimensional Work Ethic Profile (Miller et al., 2002). This measure was designed to assess dimensions of academic work ethic for upper elementary and high school-level students in order to better evaluate traits that support school success. Partial Assignment Completion (PAC) procedures were applied to assess the relationship between student choice and self-reported academic work ethic. Step-wise logistic regression revealed that specific AWE-S dimensions (Hard Work and Self-Reliance) were significantly related to student behavior, accounting for 10% of the choice variance. The discussion details the utility and future directions of behavioral mechanisms, including the Partial Assignment Completion Procedures, to develop self-report measures of academic work ethic.

School shootings are detrimental events that directly affect students, faculty and staff, families, and the broader community. A proactive approach of teaching students to respond correctly during lockdown drills may decrease the number of injuries and deaths that occur during a real lockdown. In this study, we used a multiple baseline design across participant groups to evaluate the effectiveness of behavioral skills training to teach 32 typically developing kindergarten students how to respond during lockdown drills. Students were provided instructions of what to do when a lockdown drill was called followed by a model of the behavior by the experimenter. The students then rehearsed the behavior until mastery with the experimenter while receiving feedback on their performance. Results showed that the participants responded correctly only after behavioral skills training was implemented, as demonstrated by increases in correct steps and decreases in noises/vocalizations from baseline levels. Correct responding maintained following training for all participant groups.

Inclusive education is a key strategy for achieving Education to all. These aspects imply changes in the culture, organization and school practices, which minimizing the barriers to learning and promoting the participation of the entire school community. The main objective was to collect the first indications for the content validation of a Questionary that measure inclusion Index in Families Inclusion Index and identify the perspectives of a group of mothers on their children's educational inclusion. Eight mothers of children with specific language disorders (TEL) between 2 and 5 years old participated in this study. The questionnaire is part of Index for Inclusion developed by Booth and Aincow (2002); it is divided into three dimensions: culture, politics and practices. The results showed: 1) All children were accepted at schools, besides encourage their participation; 2) Mothers had good communication with teachers and authorities about the progress of their children and changes in school. In conclusion, it can be noted this instrument is useful for identifying the culture, policies and practices within schools. However, it recognizes the need to increase the population sample to validate the questionary.

Current practitioner training research has focused heavily on behavior skills training and the individual element of performance feedback. However, this method of staff training is both time and resource intensive, requiring the trainer to make multiple site visits to provide feedback. By utilizing an antecedent-based training method such as video modeling, the trainer only visits the classroom once to consult with the teacher and observe the student. Following, an individualized video model is made and delivered to the teacher. This study uses a multiple probe across participants design to evaluate the use of individualized video models as a training tool to train teachers in the implementation of evidence-based practices with their students. Further, the behavior and learning of both the teacher and student were measured. Results indicate that exclusively using video modeling as training tool resulted in increased evidence-based practice implementation for the teachers, as well as, corresponding increased skill acquisition for the students.

Descriptive praise statements are widely recommended for use with preschoolers by psychologists and educators, despite little scientific evidence to support this stance. The purposes of this study were to first evaluate the effectiveness of praise as a reinforcer for engagement in maintenance tasks using a concurrent operant arrangement, and subsequently, compare the effectiveness of descriptive and general praise for facilitating skill acquisition using a multielement design. Three boys diagnosed with developmental delays and four children of typical development, two boys and two girls, participated in the first part of this study. For five of the seven participants, praise statements did not function as a reinforcer for engagement with maintenance tasks. These results suggest that praise may not widely function as a reinforcer for maintaining preschoolers behavior. To date, the relative value of descriptive and general praise for increasing behavior during an acquisition task has been evaluated with one of the participants of typical development. For this participant, skills were acquired faster under prompt-only and prompt + neutral statement conditions, compared to descriptive and general praise conditions. These results suggest that prompting may be the primary component necessary for skill acquisition.

Over thirty years of evidence based teaching and research, Morningside Academy, a non-profit behavior analytic school in Seattle, WA has found that most students with an Individualized Education Plan can perform multiplication and division facts at high rates without the aid of a calculator. Disability Support Services at Jacksonville State University typically specifies a calculator accommodation for any student with an Individualized Post-Secondary Plan. The Morningside Math Fact Fluency curriculum was implemented with a college freshman who has an Individualized Post-Secondary Plan to determine if the student could improve his rate correct per minute of written answers to single-digit multiply-divide facts. Using the material and protocol of the Morningside Math Fact Fluency curriculum, rate correct per minute was graphed on a Standard Celeration Chart. After each short, timed practice, direct instruction and error correction was implemented as needed. Weekly probes were given to assess maintenance and generalization. Across twenty-six 30-min sessions, the students rate correct per minute improved from 12 to 27 and reached criteria of 40- 50 correct per minute on all materials practiced. After maintenance was measured the student continued to perform with automaticity of 40-50 correct per minute.

We tested the effects of the video self-modeling strategy on increase in class participation and decrease in out-of-seat behaviors. The dependent variables were participants out-of-seat behaviors and class participation emitted by the participant across three experimental settings: free-play, transition, and lunch time. The independent variable was the implementation of the video self-modeling strategy to increase participants class participation and decrease his out-of-seat behaviors. For the video self-modeling, participants appropriate participation behaviors were videotaped in the three target settings. During the intervention, the participant was required to watch the recorded appropriate behavior for 1.5 min before each intervention session started. Additionally, he was also required to watch the self-modeling video everytime when he emitted out-of-seat behaviors. The video self-modeling intervention was run three times a week for approximately seven weeks. A multiple baseline design across settings was employed to identify a potential functional relation between dependent and independent variables. Results demonstrated that the video self-modeling intervention would be effective to increase the preschoolers out-of-seat behaviors and class participation.

The practice of research evaluation as a generator of knowledge resources, which consequently leads to the transformation of the training strategies in the undergraduate and graduate programs is an issue that requires more attention of university academics. Research competencies are the skills, abilities and attitudes that are implemented to generate new knowledge as observing, reading, expression, construction and problematization. The aim was to describe the research competencies in the first semester students of the faculty of psychology at a public University in Veracruz, Mexico. A prospective, observational, descriptive study with 133 participants (77 women and 56 men), average age 19 years (SD 1.6) was performed. Participants signed a letter of informed consent. The self-evaluation of abilities and research competencies instrument that assesses six dimensions. The instrument of self-assessment skills and competencies for research that assesses six dimensions used investigation. The instrument consisted of 40 questions with a Likert scale. The scores were pooled in low, medium and high levels. The responses were similar in men and women. 12% of students were placed in low range, 35% medium and 53% high. It is important to encourage the development of research competencies since the beginning of the formation of the psychologist

Individuals with autism spectrum disorder may engage in perseverative speech that interferes with skill acquisition and social interaction (Dunlap, Dyer, & Koegel, 1983; Jones, Wint, & Ellis, 1990). The present study examines practical applications of clinical procedures for the assessment and function-based treatment of perseverative speech in two students enrolled in a non-public, special education school-based setting. Both students exhibited unique vocalizations that severely impacted their ability to access the educational curriculum and interact with peers and teachers. A functional analysis was conducted in the classroom setting for one of the students, revealing that vocalizations were maintained by attention from teachers. Functional assessment and data collection were conducted for the other student, revealing that vocalizations were maintained by automatic reinforcement. Differential reinforcement of lower rate behaviors (DRL) and differential reinforcement of other behaviors (DRO) procedures addressing each function were implemented, and treatment effects were evaluated using a reversal design. This study demonstrates the importance of function-based treatment in applied school settings.