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Individuals who have been diagnosed with autism spectrum disorders can have difficulty acquiring new skills, and teaching procedures found to be efficient with 1 individual may not be efficient with others. However, relatively little research has evaluated methods to identify efficient, individualized response‐prompt and prompt‐fading procedures. We evaluated an assessment of multiple response prompts and prompt‐fading procedures with 10 individuals with an autism spectrum disorder. The prompt types assessed were verbal and gestural, model, and physical. Prompt‐fading procedures assessed were least to most, most to least, and a progressive delay. Each assessment was conducted at least twice, and the findings of both prompt‐type and prompt‐fading assessments were generally reliable. A final validity test showed the assessment outcomes to have generality that may extend to other clinically significant responses.

We evaluated resurgence of mands exhibited by 3 individuals with autism and histories of problem behavior. The experimental conditions consisted of (a) reinforcement of a mand, (b) extinction, (c) reinforcement of a 2nd mand, and (d) extinction to test for resurgence of the 1st mand. This 4‐component sequence was implemented 3 times with each participant, and resurgence occurred during 8 of 9 tests for resurgence. Results are discussed in terms of implications for the prevention of clinical relapse.

We evaluated the extent to which access duration during stimulus preference assessments affects preschool‐age children's preferences for leisure items. Results demonstrated that rankings for highly preferred items remained similar across both short‐ and long‐access durations; however, overall preference hierarchies remained more similar across administrations of long‐access‐duration assessments than short‐access‐duration assessments.

The preschool life skills (PLS) program (Hanley, Heal, Tiger, & Ingvarsson, 2007; Luczynski & Hanley, 2013) involves teaching social skills as a means of decreasing and preventing problem behavior. However, achieving durable outcomes as children transition across educational settings depend on the generalization and long‐term maintenance of those skills. The purpose of this study was to evaluate procedures for promoting generalization and long‐term maintenance of functional communication and self‐control skills for 6 preschool children. When the children's social skills decreased across repeated observations during a generalization assessment, we incorporated modifications to the teaching procedures. However, the effects of the modifications were variable across skills and children. Satisfactory generalization was observed only after the teacher was informed of the target skills and teaching strategies. Maintenance of most social skills was observed 3 months after teaching was discontinued. We discuss the importance of improving child and teacher behavior to promote generalization and maintenance of important social skills.

Abstract In the current investigation, we evaluated a method for increasing self‐feeding with 3 children with a history of food refusal. The children never (2 children) or rarely (1 child) self‐fed bites of food when the choice was between self‐feeding and escape from eating. When the choice was between self‐feeding 1 bite of food or being fed an identical bite of food, self‐feeding was low (2 children) or variable (1 child). Levels of self‐feeding increased for 2 children when the choice was between self‐feeding 1 bite of food or being fed multiple bites of the same food. For the 3rd child, self‐feeding increased when the choice was between self‐feeding 1 bite of food or being fed multiple bites of a less preferred food. The results showed that altering the contingencies associated with being fed increased the probability of self‐feeding, but the specific manipulations that produced self‐feeding were unique to each child.

To study the influences between basic and applied research in behavior analysis, we analyzed the coauthorship interactions of authors who published in JABA and JEAB from 1980 to 2010. We paid particular attention to authors who published in both JABA and JEAB (dual authors) as potential agents of cross‐field interactions. We present a comprehensive analysis of dual authors' coauthorship interactions using social networks methodology and key word analysis. The number of dual authors more than doubled (26 to 67) and their productivity tripled (7% to 26% of JABA and JEAB articles) between 1980 and 2010. Dual authors stood out in terms of number of collaborators, number of publications, and ability to interact with multiple groups within the field. The steady increase in JEAB and JABA interactions through coauthors and the increasing range of topics covered by dual authors provide a basis for optimism regarding the progressive integration of basic and applied behavior analysis.

El estudio se diseñó con el propósito de evaluar los efectos de pre exposición y nivel de privación de alimento sobre el peso corporal y la actividad. Dos grupos de ratas fueron privados de alimento al 80% de su peso, para uno de los grupos se mantuvo el peso al 80% (Grupo 80%), mientras que para el otro se inició una recuperación del peso hasta llegar nuevamente al 100% (Grupo 80-100%); un tercer grupo no tuvo esta fase de pre-exposición a la privación (Grupo 100%). Posteriormente, todos los sujetos se sometieron a un periodo de disponibilidad de alimento por una hora y el resto del día con libre acceso a una rueda de actividad en las cajas experimentales. Se encontró que los sujetos que recibieron pre-exposición al régimen de restricción de alimento tuvieron mayor actividad y menor pérdida de peso corporal. Los resultados se interpretan con base en la hipótesis del fallo adaptativo, sin embargo, interpretaciones alternativas hacen necesaria una mayor exploración sistemática.

It is possible to understand instructions and yet not follow them. In the current study, participants responded in accordance with derived instructions and then this relational repertoire was brought under over‐arching consequential control. Across two experiments, nine undergraduates, trained to respond in accordance with Same/Different and Before/After relations in the presence of arbitrary contextual cues, produced sequences of responses based on ‘instructions’ composed of novel stimuli and the previously trained relational cues. Consequences for following instructions were then manipulated. In Experiment 1, for all five participants that responded in accordance with derived relations, reinforcing and punishing instruction‐following generalized to novel instructions. In Experiment 2, reinforcing and punishing consequences were varied systematically in the presence of two novel antecedent stimuli and antecedent control was observed for all three participants. These findings demonstrate that understanding instructions and following them may be subject to independent sources of stimulus control.