Association for Behavior Analysis International

The developmental-systems perspective holds that behavior is an aspect of biology, and that like all biological characteristics, it can be understood completely only by analyzing the interaction of the components that contribute to its development. Biologists have concluded that all of our characteristics reflect gene-environment interactions; they never result from the unfolding of genetically controlled, deterministic developmental programs. Consequently, although detailed analyses of the causes of behaviors will invariably invoke genetic factors, even behaviors posited to emerge from species-typical mental organs, like language, will remain poorly understood until the contributions of experiential factors to their development are elucidated. This is because traits develop from interactions occurring at the levels of the genes, cells, organs, and environments, and because causation is bi-directional in biological systems; thus, higher-level (e.g., social) signals can affect events at lower levels (including genetic events), giving environmental factors the means to influence biological processes. Genes act only in collaboration with environmental information, major brain structures reflect experience, and on close inspection, traits that seem innate are not innate; thus, the emergence of behavioral characteristics can be understood only via analysis of their development, a unitary process that utilizes both genetic and non-genetic resources in its realization.

Findings from basic, applied, and translational research on conditioning and derived relational responding are presented. The first presentation describes a novel paradigm to investigate interoceptive conditioning, with implications for panic disorder. The second presentation describes researcn derived transfer of evaluative learning, with implications for generalised anxiety disorder. The third presentation describes a translational research model of derived avoidance behavior, with implications for anxiety and phobias. The final presentation outlines multiple-exemplar training strategies to facilitate derived relational responding, with implications for intellectual interevention.

Applied Behavior Analysis in home settings typically involves the application of data-based instructional or skill acquisition procedures such as discrete trials training. However, increasingly, referrals are made for behavior reduction. This symposium highlights advancements in functional analysis and behavioral interventions within home settings. One paper will present data on the use of a punishment procedure used following functional analysis when the identified reinforcer, attention from a young child, could not be controlled due to development and age limitations. The second paper will present data and discussion on a child failing to acquire a communicative response in FCT after her aggression was determined to have been maintained by attention. Several different approaches in the FCT training process will be included. The third paper will present a case example of home consultation for multiple referrals from the goal setting meeting through implementation of compliance training, FCT, and skill acquisition programs in a 7-year-old boy with autism. The final paper will present functional analysis and treatment analysis data in the home settings following similar analyses in the school setting. The reduction of SIB in a 6-year-old girl with autism will be presented from both settings.

Chronic prompt dependency is a common obstacle to mastering skills for many students with autism. The inability to respond in the absence of a prompt often requires the teacher to "go back to the drawing board" so to speak, undoing weeks or months of teaching. There is a strong research base for strategies such as visual, physical, or positional prompts in teaching children with autism, but a lack of sufficient research regarding what to do when these popular strategies fail. Multiple baseline and changing criterion designs were used to evaluate the efficacy of several prompting strategies not widely explored in the literature, such as shaping acoustic properties of stimuli or using vocal responses to prompt receptive language. Participants were adolescent boys with autism who repeatedly failed to acquire a variety of skills when taught using conventional prompting methods. Data show that altering the topography of the prompts themselves (rather than changing the fading procedure) was effective in teaching these students receptive language skills, matching skills, intraverbal responses, and appropriate transition behavior. In each case the alternative prompt was successfully faded to allow independent responding to occur, breaking the pattern of chronic prompt dependency previously displayed by these students.

A frequent criticism of precision teaching in the field of applied behavior analysis is that this method of instruction has not undergone the rigors of empirical research. There is a growing interest, in particular, about the potential effects achieved by precision teaching with frequency building procedures with children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). At present, there are no widely available empirical reports of precision teaching with frequency building procedures with students and adults with ASD. The limited research documenting the significant benefit of this teaching strategy has implications for education and the field of applied behavior analysis. Marlene Cohen and her colleagues at the Douglass Developmental Disabilities Center at Rutgers University have conducted three years of empirical research in precision teaching with frequency building with older learners with ASD. Specifically, their research has addressed the impact of precision teaching with frequency building procedures for the Big 6 plus 6 motor skills on the functional skills of adolescents and adults with autism receiving applied behavior analysis treatment. They have also evaluated the impact of frequency building for component language skills on the conversation complexity of an adult with autism. Current research focuses on the selection of aims for this population and evaluating which aims will produce the most efficient results. While a modest beginning, the empirical evidence suggesting that precision teaching is both efficient and effective with adolescents and adults with ASD has important implications. Dr. Cohens research uses single subject designs to assess the impact of precision teaching with individuals with ASD. Dr. Cohen will address the need for additional research examining other empirical questions regarding precision teaching with this population, and will offer suggestions for further research.

A hallmark of behavior analysis is a focus of intervention at the level of the individual. Interventions occurring at the organizational or facility-wide level may have significant effects at the level of individual clients and Staff. The presentations in this symposium all represent behavior analytic work with implications for application at the program-wide level.

Recently, increased attention has been directed at analysis of effects of secondary level or targeted group interventions with students who require additional social behavioral and/or academic support. Although these interventions have been demonstrated to be effective in some situations, more research is needed. This symposium addresses this need by examining further variables that affect outcomes of secondary interventions. In sum, studies to be presented suggest that secondary level interventions play a critical role in preventing the development of more serious problem behavior in schools. In the first presentation, Rodriguez and colleagues present data from First Steps to Success, a secondary intervention designed for children who begin school exhibiting antisocial behavior. Rodriguez et al. present data useful for identifying variables affecting the success of the program and for identifying students likely toand not torespond to the intervention. The second presentation by Fairbanks et al focuses on data obtained from a response to interventions model of behavior support, summarizing results of three studies conducted across multiple elementary classrooms. In this study, students first received a general, classroom restructuring intervention. Students who were not successful received progressively more individualized and intensive interventions. Fairbanks et al. will discuss how such a tailored model of interventions requires fewer resources from a school and may lead to improved student outcomes. The third presentation, by MacLeod, et al presents the results of secondary level intervention, the Behavior Education Program (BEP) in two parts: Part 1 is an evaluation of the effectiveness of the BEP with approximately 37 elementary school children exhibiting behavioral challenges in school. Part 2 examines the effectiveness of function-based interventions with a subset of the students who did not respond to the BEP. The final presentation is by Kauffman et al., and evaluates effectiveness and stimulus fading in a secondary level intervention similar to the BEP, Check n Check out. Although there is a growing research base supporting the efficacy of this intervention, further examination of maintenance of effects is needed. This study looks at maintenance over time and evaluates as well effects of removing intervention components systematically.

This symposium presents research on comparing different types of preference assessments in varying populations. In the first study, verbal and tangible paired-stimulus preference assessments were compared in 4 preschoolers with autism. In the tangible assessment, on each trial 2 stimuli were placed in front of the participant. In the verbal assessment, participants were asked, Do you want x or y. The two assessments identified the same most- and least-preferred item for only 2 of 4 participants, suggesting that verbal assessments may not reliably identify reinforcers for young children with autism. In the second study, preference assessments were conducted using differing stimulus modalities (pictures, written words, and spoken words) with 9 typically-developing elementary students. Results indicated that assessments using pictures and written words most closely approximated results from tangible assessments, and vocal stimuli least approximated results using tangible stimuli. In the third study, paired-stimulus and multiple stimulus without replacement preference assessments were conducted across a large number of participants to determine how often preference assessments were associated with problem behavior. Results indicated that different types of assessments were associated with varying amounts of challenging behavior. Results from all studies add to the literature on accurately identifying reinforcers in various populations.

This symposium will present papers on advancement of school-based functional analysis and treatment studies. Increasingly, behavior analysts rely on experimental methodologies to elucidate the reinforcing effects of multiple potential variables that occur simultaneously in classroom settings. One paper will present functional analysis and treatment of escape and attention maintained aggression. Using DNRA, the student increased rate of academic problem completion as aggression was eliminated. The second paper will present data on multiple functional and follow-up functional analyses in which SIB was found to be evoke by simultaneously touching the child and interrupting ongoing activities and reinforced by continued access to those activities. The third paper will present two case examples of how a Direct Behavioral Consultation (DBC) Model was applied to behavioral referrals for severe behaviors in a classroom setting. The examples will present the DBC model from FBA, functional analysis, preference assessments, controlled treatment evaluations, and generalization of treatment to multiple teachers and multiple settings. Follow-up data are also presented.

Many individuals with autism and or developmental disabilities present with strengths in learning skills and behavior when the instruction is supported with visual materials, particularly when compared to verbal cues alone. This symposium will highlight how control of adaptive responses can be effectively established using visual supports and then control of those responses can be transferred to other more natural environmental stimuli. Three case examples will be presented emphasizing the careful establishment of stimulus control and then the systematic transfer of that control.

Behavior Analysis is defined by its pragmatic approach to understanding and changing human behavior. The application of behavior analysis to the design of learning programs means that designers collect data on the learning produced by their programs and use those data to develop programs that improve that learning. Three case studies describing how learning data were collected and used to improve the design of a learning program will be presented.

Our discipline has been criticized as too focused on data and paying little attention to values that define our culture as human beings. Values are an inherent part of basic science, education, and organizational behavior management. Our methodologies, our analyses, and our approach to dealing with the contingencies we face when working in schools and in organizations, and conducting research projects are discussed in this panel. This panel will present the challenges as well as the strategies that are/could be implemented to ensure that in each of these areas behavior analysis can meet the societal challenges we face as we make our contributions to the betterment of the general culture.

A number of myths have been promulgated within the language acquisition literature. Of these myths, three have had a particularly deleterious effect on attempts to promote a behavior analytic approach to language acquisition. These myths are: Myth#1: Brown and Hanlon (1970), in their classic study, claimed that they were offering evidence that parents do not reinforce their children's grammatical utterances. This myth appears in the published works of psycholinguists, developmental psychologists, and even some behavior analysts. Myth#2: In his paper "Language Identification in the Limit," Gold (1967) proved that, without negative evidence (e.g., corrective feedback), a child cannot acquire a language. As with Myth#1, this second myth is widely and frequently cited. Myth#3: There is a single, valid definition of "verbal behavior." This myth is at the heart of the current call by proponents of relational frame theory to replace Skinner's definition with one they propose. In this paper, arguments and supporting evidence will be offered for rejecting these three myths.

Defining cigarette smoking as operant behavior that is maintained by both pharmacological-based (e.g., nicotine) and conditioned (e.g., taste) reinforcers leads to a number of interesting conclusions and implications. First, it may explain why relapse is such a problem when people try to quit smoking. Second, it suggests that treatment strategies designed to help individuals stop smoking need to prevent exposure to smoking and related cues or at least attenuate the reinforcing efficacy of cigarette smoking if exposure occurs. This could be accomplished through both behavioral and pharmacological means. Finally, it suggests that cigarette smoking prevention may be accomplished by keeping individuals from ever coming in contact with the reinforcing aspects of smoking (e.g., through educational programs or immunotherapy). The address will provide discussion of all of these areas.

Todays children confront parents with daily problematic behaviors involving repetitive inattention, forgetting, and manipulative clinging, whining, and emotional meltdowns. In addition, their communication with parents is often emotionally-laden involving back-talking, defiance, and in-your-face, confrontational, argumentative, and disrespectful interactions. Problematic children have low frustration, are oppositional, moody, and pay little attention to rules. While parents favor reasoning and logic in talking to a problematic child, he is impervious to such efforts. Instead, his learning style favors hands-on rather than word-oriented experiences. He needs concrete, reality-based experiences because he learns through active, two-way interaction with his parents. As it happens, parental responses to problematic behavior have unintended consequences that tend to maintain it. The focus of this workshop is two fold: first, to increase the clinical practitioners effectiveness by including a behavioral systems framework that looks at problematic behavior. The second objective is to familiarize the practitioner with the art of designing therapeutic interventions that respect the parents socio-cultural expectations and motivate them to collaborate and serve as the behavior change agents par excellence. Case studies illustrating functionally-driven strategies and tactics will be included in the workshop.

The Caring Kids project is designed to provide services to preschool children with classroom skill deficits, or behavioral problems. The project will be described and data shared.

Demonstrating reliable improvement in children with Autism as a result of behavioral intervention is crucial to advancing the science of ABA. Scientific and accurate representation of treatment benefits is necessary to show others the value of ABA for this population. The 3 presentations in this symposium present data that increases the psychometric knowledge, and thus the utility, of the most widely used measures of intelligence and behavior problems in the autistic population. Data were collected from comprehensive assessments of a large sample of children diagnosed with autistic disorder as they participated in behavioral treatment programs. Sample sizes for the data analytic procedures are thus much larger than usually seen in this area. The first presentation examines change scores on the most popular comprehensive intelligence test, the WPPSI-III, in terms of reduction in variability across cognitive skills. The second presentation looks at a beginning large scale normative base for the WPPSI-III for children with autism. The third presentation investigates the interobserver agreement for an efficient behavior report instrument, the CBCL, for this special population. Together, these presentations advance our ability to demonstrate the effectiveness of behavioral interventions.

Applied behavior analysis provides a framework through which evidence-based procedures can be designed, measured, and replicated to assure the effectiveness of teaching for typically developing and at risk students in general education, and students with disabilities in inclusion and special education classrooms. CABAS International research and development programs and the programs in applied behavior analysis at Columbia University Teachers College provide research-based graduate level training for teacher mentors, teachers, teacher assistants, researchers, and parents. The training consists of the completion of Personalized System of Instruction (PSI) modules based on increasing levels of verbal complexity and provides complete accountability through a systems-wide summary of data. Teachers complete a minimum of 30 modules (Teacher I, II, and Master Teacher), which include multiple exemplars of the vocabulary of the science and research-based approaches to best practices and problem solving. Mentor-supervisors complete three additional ranks (Assistant, Associate, and Senior Behavior Analyst) focused on research-based outcomes that produce significant contributions to practice. Teacher-mentors and teachers continually work toward mastery of skills related to professional performance and student acquisition. The CABAS Professional Advisory Board assures the quality of programs and training through Board Certification of credentials and provides university affiliation for all CABAS Certified Programs.

This panel will consist of a dialogue concerned with peeling back the layers of complex environment-behavior relationships to determine what a science of behavior can tell us about how such relationships occur. Among the phenomena addressed will be memory, problem-solving, rule-following, function-altering operations, verbally-mediated events, cascades of imagery, and verbal composition.? Such phenomenon cannot be analyzed as simple responses under the control of a discriminative stimulus or setting, nor can they be adequately understood at a molar level. Rather, this panel will discuss these problems as programs of behavior under multiple control of both environmental antecedents and other behavior; stimulus control in such cases can be thought of as a web of concurrent influences. Behavior analysis gives us the tools to untangle the web, strand by often covert strand, without appealing the to the mind and internal "causes" such as thinking, perception, memory, and morality, suggesting a truly radical behaviorism.