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This study is a replication and extension of Reeve, Reeve, Townsend, and Poulson (2007) evaluating the effects of a treatment package that included multiple‐exemplar training, video modeling, prompting, and reinforcement on helping of 3 adolescents with autism. Results demonstrated that all participants acquired the helping responses. Probes before and after intervention also demonstrated generalization of helping across settings and categories of helping behavior.

We examined the effect of equipment proximity on the safe performance of 3 assembly workers in a manufacturing setting. After a baseline period in which protective eyewear was kept 6.1 m from employee workstations, task clarification was used to inform participants to wear their eyewear while they worked. Next, the eyewear was moved to 1.5 m from employee workstations. After a return to the 6.1‐m condition, the eyewear was again positioned 1.5 m from workstations. Results indicate that task clarification alone was ineffective, but safe performance increased when eyewear was stored in close proximity to employees. A social validity measure suggested that safe performance among the employees increased to levels comparable to that of an exemplary employee.

Abstract Writing is one of the primary skills that children learn in school. Interventions that address performance deficits and skill deficits have been shown to improve aspects of elementary school children's writing. This study demonstrates performance‐based interventions (goal setting, feedback, and contingent reward) and a skill‐based intervention (instruction) on the writing skills of a 10‐year‐old child. Results indicated that the performance intervention increased the number of correctly spelled words, and the combination of performance and instructional intervention increased the number of complete sentences.

We evaluated the effects of listener training on the emergence of categorization and speaker behavior (i.e., tacts) using a nonconcurrent multiple baseline design. Four children with autism learned to select pictures given their dictated category names. We assessed whether they could match and tact pictures by category. After training, 3 participants tacted and categorized all pictures, and 1 participant failed both tests. After tact training, this participant categorized. These results suggest that listener training may be an efficient way to produce speaker behavior and categorization in children who have been diagnosed with autism.

We examined relations between self‐control responding and environmental variables with 3 children with behavior disorders. Differential delays were presented before or after task completion in a single‐session reversal design. Delays presented before task completion produced more impulsive responding than those presented after task completion for all participants.

This study examined the effects of presession attention on tacting. Presession intervals of deprivation and satiation of attention were followed by a progressive‐ratio assessment in which the number of tacts was measured. For 2 participants, deprivation resulted in increased tacting compared to satiation. The 3rd participant showed no differential responding. These results suggest that antecedent‐based interventions could increase the efficiency of tact training.

Results of previous research indicate that the delivery of positive reinforcement (e.g., food) for an appropriate, alternative target response (e.g., compliance) or delivery of food on a time‐based schedule can decrease problem behavior reinforced by escape, even when problem behavior continues to produce negative reinforcement (e.g., Lalli et al., 1999; Lomas, Fisher, & Kelley, 2010). In this study, we compared the levels of both compliance and problem behavior when food and praise were delivered either contingent on compliance or on a time‐based schedule. Results for 3 of the 4 participants showed that contingent delivery of preferred edible items and praise was more effective in both reducing problem behavior and increasing compliance compared to variable‐time delivery of these same items. These findings are discussed in the context of motivating operations and competition between positive and negative reinforcement.

We examined the effects of behavioral skills training with in situ feedback on safe responding by children with autism to abduction lures that were presented after a high‐probability (high‐ p ) request sequence. This sequence was intended to simulate a grooming or recruitment process. Results show that all 3 participants ultimately acquired the safety response to abduction lures presented after a high‐ p sequence and maintained the safety response at a 1‐month follow‐up.

Linked activity schedules were used to establish appropriate game play in children with autism during a game of hide‐and‐seek. All 6 participants demonstrated acquisition of appropriate play skills in the presence of the activity schedules and maintained responding during subsequent phases. When the schedules were removed, responding decreased to baseline levels, demonstrating that the schedules controlled responding. Implications for future research on the use of activity schedules to teach social behavior are discussed.

We examined whether adults with dementia could learn to emit a picture‐based communication response and if this skill would maintain over time. Three women with moderate to severe dementia were taught to exchange a picture card for a highly preferred activity. All participants quickly learned to exchange the picture card and maintained this response without practice.