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Failure to reinforce appropriate behavior could result in resurgence of previously extinguished problem behavior and degradation of previously effective treatments such as differential reinforcement of alternative behavior (DRA). We analyzed arbitrary responses (i.e., switch flipping) exhibited by 3 adults with developmental disabilities to compare the effect of a traditional DRA intervention against the effect of a serial DRA intervention on the magnitude of target response resurgence using a 2‐component multiple schedule. The target response served as an analogue to problem behavior, and alternative responses served as analogues to socially appropriate alternative responses. In all cases, the percentage of total responding allocated toward target response resurgence was less in the serial DRA component than in the traditional DRA component. Furthermore, we observed both reversion and recency for 2 of 3 subjects. Our data provide preliminary evidence suggesting that serial DRA may produce more durable and desirable outcomes than traditional DRA.

We investigated why violations to the constant‐ratio rule, an assumption of the generalized matching law, occur in procedures that arrange frequent changes to reinforcer ratios. Our investigation produced steady‐state data and compared them with data from equivalent, frequently changing procedures. Six pigeons responded in a four‐alternative concurrent‐schedule experiment with an arranged reinforcer‐rate ratio of 27:9:3:1. The same four variable‐interval schedules were used in every condition, for 50 sessions, and the physical location of each schedule was changed across conditions. The experiment was a steady‐state version of a frequently changing procedure in which the locations of four VI schedules were changed every 10 reinforcers. We found that subjects' responding was consistent with the constant‐ratio rule in the steady‐state procedure. Additionally, local analyses showed that preference after reinforcement was towards the alternative that was likely to produce the next reinforcer, instead of being towards the just‐reinforced alternative as in frequently changing procedures. This suggests that the effect of a reinforcer on preference is fundamentally different in rapidly changing and steady‐state environments. Comparing this finding to the existing literature suggests that choice is more influenced by reinforcer‐generated signals when the reinforcement contingencies often change.

Teenagers earn, save and spend large amounts of money. Therefore, understanding teenagers' time preference and how it affects their economic behavior is very important. The current study investigates time preferences of high school and middle school students, and the effect of different intertemporal choice scenarios on teenagers' subjective discount rate. One scenario used a standard intertemporal choice question while the other was a wage scenario. We found higher future orientation (lower subjective discount rate) among high school students than among middle school students when using a standard scenario but found no difference between groups in the wage scenario. For both groups, we found the subjective discount rates increased when the teenagers are asked to delay receipt of wages they earned by working (wage scenario). Other variables, like participation in sports and an allowance given by parents, were found to affect teenagers' time preferences.

Pigeons were trained on arbitrary (hue‐form) and identity (hue‐hue and form‐form) successive matching with center‐key samples and left‐key comparisons. Later, they were tested on form‐hue (symmetry) probe trials that were structured either in the different‐locations fashion as the baseline trials (viz., center‐key samples and left‐key comparisons) or with a constant location by using center‐key samples and center‐key comparisons. Three of four pigeons showed symmetry when the probe‐trial samples and comparisons appeared in center‐ and left‐key spatial locations, respectively, but none did when both appeared in one (center‐key) location. Subsequently, pigeons previously tested with center‐key samples and left‐key comparisons were tested with those form‐hue stimuli shown in the same (center‐key) location, and vice versa for the other pigeons. None of the former pigeons showed symmetry on the second test even if they had on the first test. By contrast, two of three pigeons that had not shown symmetry with single‐location samples and comparisons did so when those stimuli appeared in different (center‐ vs. left‐key) locations. Taken together, these results show that symmetrical relations between the same, nominal matching stimuli depend on where those stimuli appear in testing vis‐à‐vis in training and, more generally, confirm that spatial location is part of the functional matching stimuli.

We taught 4 participants with autism to discriminate between the reinforced and nonreinforced responses of an adult model and evaluated the effectiveness of this intervention using a multiple baseline design. During baseline, participants were simply exposed to adult models' correct and incorrect responses and the respective consequences of each. During discrimination training, in the presence of target pictures, we taught participants to imitate the reinforced responses of an adult model and to say “I don't know” when an adult model's response was not reinforced. Test sessions were conducted after baseline, discrimination training, and generalization sessions to measure responding to target pictures in the absence of the model, prompts, and reinforcement. All 4 participants showed acquisition in the discrimination of reinforced and nonreinforced responses of the adult model during test sessions. Generalization to stimuli not associated with training was variable across the 4 participants. Implications for teaching observational learning responses to children with autism are discussed.

Successful conversation requires that the speaker's behavior is sensitive to nonvocal listener responses. We observed children with autism spectrum disorder during conversation probes in which a listener periodically displayed nonvocal cues that she was uninterested in the conversation. We used behavioral skills training to teach conversation skills. First, we taught participants to tact nonvocal listener behavior (interested or uninterested), but this was insufficient to improve responding aimed at regaining listener interest. Participants were then taught to ask a question (Experiments 1 and 2) or change the topic (Experiment 2) when the listener was uninterested. Responding persisted over time and with changes in the stimulus conditions. The behavior change was also deemed socially valid by blind observers. In Experiment 3, participants learned to shift to the other trained response when exposed to extinction. This study illustrates a set of procedures for bringing speaker behavior under control of nonvocal listener cues.

Angelman syndrome is a neurogenetic disorder characterized by intellectual and developmental disability. Common behavioral characteristics of this disorder include a heightened interest in social interactions and frequent bids to initiate interaction. These bids can be problematic, for instance, when a child attempts to hug strangers in public places. The current study evaluated a discrimination training program to teach 3 boys with Angelman syndrome to discriminate appropriate from inappropriate times to initiate interactions. During baseline, we alternated periods in which attention was delivered following social initiations on a continuous reinforcement schedule with periods in which initiations were placed on extinction. We then implemented discrimination training by presenting a salient discriminative stimulus, prompting the occurrence of initiations, and providing reinforcement during reinforcement periods and withdrawing the stimulus during extinction periods. This resulted in discriminated approaches for each of the 3 participants; these results were replicated across caregivers and extended to the participants' homes.

Observational learning (OL) is critical for the acquisition of social skills and may be an important skill for learning in traditional educational settings. Although OL occurs during early childhood in the typically developing population, research suggests that it may be limited in children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The purpose of the present study was to develop an assessment to test for the presence of OL across a variety of tasks. If OL was deficient, we sought to teach it by training specific skills. Six participants who had been diagnosed with ASD demonstrated deficits in OL. After an initial assessment, a multiple‐probe design across OL tasks showed that training produced acquisition of these skills across multiple exemplars. After training, 5 of the 6 participants engaged in OL across multiple tasks and task variations, demonstrating generalization. For 1 participant, generalization of performance did not occur across tasks but did occur within task variations.

In the present study, equivalence‐based instruction was used to teach 2 4‐member classes representing high and low statistical variability to 10 college students. Computerized equivalence‐based instruction with multiple‐exemplar training was used to teach the classes. A pretest–training–posttest design evaluated performances on both computer‐based tests and written multiple‐choice tests. Scores improved from pretest to posttest on both the computerized and the multiple‐choice tests for all students following equivalence‐based instruction. Class‐consistent selections also generalized from training to novel stimuli and to a novel context (i.e., written test). Finally, class‐consistent performances maintained 1 week after equivalence‐based instruction was completed. The study demonstrated that equivalence‐based instruction can be used to teach labeling of statistical variability and that a selection‐based teaching protocol administered on a computer can promote the emergence of responses to a written selection‐based testing protocol.

The amount effect of delay discounting (by which the value of larger reward amounts is discounted by delay at a lower rate than that of smaller amounts) strictly implies that value functions (value as a function of amount) are steeper at greater delays than they are at lesser delays. That is, the amount effect and the difference in value functions at different delays are actually a single empirical finding. Amount effects of delay discounting are typically found with choice experiments. Value functions for immediate rewards have been empirically obtained by direct judgment. (Value functions for delayed rewards have not been previously obtained.) The present experiment obtained value functions for both immediate and delayed rewards by direct judgment and found them to be steeper when the rewards were delayed—hence, finding an amount effect with delay discounting.