ACHIEVEMENT PLACE: DEVELOPMENT OF THE ELECTED MANAGER SYSTEM 1

103

Applied behavioral researchers develop useful innovative technologies experimentally, and yet few of these technologies enjoy widespread adoption by our society. This paper analyzes several instances in which government agencies adopted behavioral technology, identifies 10 manipulable variables that could increase the rate of adoption of such technological innovations, and relates them to the field of knowledge diffusion. Unifying theory and experimental analysis are lacking in that field, yet an implicit technology may exist.

Section: Examples Of Dissemination and Adoptionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Adoption of Innovations From Applied Behavioral Research: “Does Anybody Care?”

Stolz

1981

103

“…Additional consideration should be given to the effects of group versus individual delivery of reinforcement to subjects under manager control. In the present investigatiosn, both the teacher and manager dispensed consequences contingent upon individual subjects' behavior as, for example, in Phillips et al, 1973. However, the use of a peer-managed contingency system where the manager provides consequences to the entire group rather than to individuals (Packard, 1970) seems worthy of investigation.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 94%

“…Surratt, Ulrich, and Hawkins (1969) trained a peer to operate an apparatus that differentially reinforced "working" behavior of four subjects. Phillips (1968) and Phillips, Phillips, Wolf, and Fixsen (1973) reported training a "peer manager" to dispense and remove points contingent upon appropriate cleanup behaviors of individual subjects in a home for predelinquent boys. Bailey, Timbers, Phillips, and Wolf (1971) used both group and individual methods of peer control to modify articulation problems of predelinquents.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

TRAINING ELEMENTARY AGED PEER‐BEHAVIOR MANAGERS TO CONTROL SMALL GROUP PROGRAMMED MATHEMATICS¹

Greenwood

Sloane

Baskin

1974

The effects of a training procedure and two maintenance contingencies on consequencedispensing behavior were investigated. Four peer behavior managers were trained to supervise small groups of subjects (four to six per group) working in programmed math materials and were compared with a teacher skilled in the use of social and point reinforcement and response cost. Manager training was differentially effective in accelerating manager's rates of appropriate social and point dispensing. Having manager reinforcement contingent upon manager consequence-dispensing resulted in moderately higher rates of appropriate social and point dispensing for three of four subjects than did having manager reinforcement contingent upon group study behavior. Two managers exposed to the group performance contingency before the manager performance contingency increased inappropriate social and point-dispensing behaviors to pretraining baseline levels. Subsequent change to the manager performance contingency was effective in reducing the inappropriate dispensing behavior of only one of the two managers.Researchers concerned with the problem of maintaining treatment effects produced in natural settings have suggested the training of social agents within the natural setting to initiate and carry out behavioral intervention (Hartmann, 1970;Patterson and Brodsky, 1966;Patterson, Cobb, and Ray, 1973). Social agents (e.g., parents, teachers, and peers) who are "naturally" in control of reinforcers and punishers, remain in the life setting after treatment is completed and can foster maintenance of gains due to their natural and continuing proximity to the target subject. Wetzel (1969) formalized a triadic intervention model whereby the experimenter trained a "mediator", (e.g., parent, teacher, or peer) to implement a behavioral program designed to modify the deviant behavior of the target or referral subject. With such an intervention model, it was possible for the experimenter to forego interaction with the change target since treatment was implemented and monitored completely by the trained mediator.Early use of the "triadic intervention model" was demonstrated by Ayllon and Michael (1959) and by Williams (1965). In the Williams study, parents were trained to ignore tantrum behavior of their child at bedtime. This -procedure rapidly extinguished that behavior. Ayllon and Michael (1959) trained the nursing staff of a mental hospital in the use of extinction, record keeping, and in administering social reinforcers. These procedures were effective in modifying numerous patient behavior problems; i.e., magazine hoarding, self-feeding, and psychotic talk.More recent utilization of the triadic model has involved the training of teachers to effect behavioral change efficiently in their classrooms.

“…For example, Reese, Howard, and Reese (1978) asserted that "people will be more interested in maintaining a program that they have helped to design than one to which they have contributed nothing" (p. 36). Although there is little empirical evidence to support this assertion, other behavior analysts have recommended practices that increase participation by consumers (e.g., Christophersen, Cataldo, Russo, & Varni, 1984;Phillips et al, 1973;Stolz, 1981;Wolf, 1978).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Participatory Management: Maintaining Staff Performance in a University Housing Cooperative

Johnson

Welsh

Miller

et al. 1991

To apply behavior analysis to normal adults in non institutional settings, we may have to encourage their participation in the design and implementation of behavioral technology. This study evaluates a technology by which the members of a student housing cooperative manage their own staff with a minimum of supervision by one of the program designers. This staff management system consisted of prompts, self-reports, spot checks, and contingent rent reductions. Six resident staff members performed substantially more of their assigned tasks when this system was used. In addition, the management system was acceptable to the members, was affordable, and maintained high levels of staff performance during a 5-year follow-up. Participation by the members in the design and implementation of this system appears to have been useful in helping the behavior analysts to develop an unusually durable management system.