The purpose of this article is to outline the development of the Multiple Option Observation System for Experimental Studies (MOOSES), a flexible data collection package for applied behavioral research. Several data collection options are available to users of MOOSES. Event-based recording, interaction-based recording, duration recording, and interval recording are available to the users and can be used individually or together, depending upon the research question. The collection program can incorporate any of the keys on the keyboard. Function keys on the top or side are used for toggle (duration states) type data collection. Types of analysis include frequency and duration of discrete events, frequency of general behavior states, frequency and duration of events within behavioral states, percent interval analysis, sequential analysis, and interobserver agreement. Data obtained from MOOSES is easily incorporated with other data for further statistical analysis with standard statistical packages or popular spreadsheet programs. Applications of MOOSES and its uses in social interaction research are presented. Comparisons with other similar systems are provided.Over the past 30 years, the use of direct observation procedures has increasingly become integrated with the study of human behavior. In the past, relatively simple recording systems were used, but recent trends in the field of behavior analysis have established the need for more complex recording systems. Included among these trends has been the call for the continuous recording of target behaviors instead of less precise time-sampling procedures (Bakeman & Gottman, 1986;Sackett, 1978). The ongoing collection of streams of behavior enhances our ability to develop hypotheses about variables that control behavior.The collection of continuous data sets has been facilitated by advances in laptop computer technology over the last 5 years. Concurrent decreases in size and cost and increases in power have made laptop computers ideal for the collection of data in applied research settings (Denny

The purpose of this study was to identify significant social stimuli that were associated with prosocial and inappropriate behavior of children classified as severe behavior disordered (SBD). Two children from each of 19 classrooms–10 from integrated and 9 from segregated special classrooms (for children with SBD)–were observed. One student in each classroom was defined as aggressive and one student was defined as nonaggressive. The selection yielded four groups: integrated nonaggressive without SBD ( n = 10), integrated aggressive and SBD ( n = 10), segregated aggressive and SBD ( n = 9), and segregated nonaggressive and SBD ( n = 9). An exhaustive behavioral coding system was used to record sequentially the social responses between target students and their teachers and peers. The data from each group were pooled for analysis. Lag sequential analysis was used to identify the significant antecedent and subsequent social responses of each code for each group. The results indicated that most of the teacher/child interactions were composed of teacher mands followed by student compliance, with teacher positive consequences for prosocial behavior rarely occurring. All significant antecedent and subsequent social stimuli of students' aversive behaviors were identified. Results are discussed in relation to the reciprocal–coercive interaction hypothesis (Patterson & Reid, 1970), with implications for additional research.

The developmental course of rhythmic motor behavior was followed longitudinally for three groups of preambulatory children--normally developing, Down syndrome, and those with profound motor impairment. The groups differed in chronological age but were comparable with respect to motor age. The motor impaired subjects displayed significantly less rhythmic motor behavior than the nondisabled and Down syndrome groups. In comparing particular subtypes of rhythmic motor behavior, differences were found in both the average number of bouts and duration of subtypes among the groups. Longitudinal analyses of the data over the entire observation period revealed that the rhythmic motor behavior of the children with Down syndrome was more similar to that exhibited by the nondisabled children than was the rhythmic motor behavior of the children with motor impairment. However, there was considerable variability among the groups in several particular subtypes.

A peer-initiation training procedure was implemented across multiple peer trainers to investigate social interactions between severely withdrawn autistic children and their nonhandicapped peers. For one subject, substantial increases in spontaneous interactions with training and nontraining peers occurred after the peer-initiation procedure was applied across two training exemplars. Spontaneous social interactions continued even after the training procedure was removed. Although experimental control was established with the second subject during training, spontaneous interactions during nontraining periods were primarily with training peers. The results contribute to an emerging data base on the social interactions of autistic and severely withdrawn handicapped children and on peer-initiation training procedures.