INSTRUCTION‐FOLLOWING BEHAVIOR OF A RETARDED CHILD AND ITS CONTROLLING STIMULI¹

Abstract

A combination of positive reinforcement and fading of physical guidance was used to teach a profoundly retarded boy specific responses to specific verbal instructions. The design consisted of a multiple baseline of probe data across different verbal instructions. The subject started responding correctly to each verbal instruction as that item was trained in a multiple-baseline order. Generalization did not occur to items that had not yet been trained, nor did it occur to items included to assess generalization. Probes of variations in the verbal instructions, conducted after training was completed, revealed that generalization was minimal except in those cases where the variation consisted of the verb only, the noun only, the noun plus preposition, or where the verb of the instruction was presented last. Training a profoundly retarded 11-yr-old subject to respond to specific verbal instructions did not adequately facilitate the development of a generative instruction-following capability, nor did all verbal elements of the instruction control a specific response.Instruction-following behavior can be defined as the ability to make the appropriate response to a verbal command. Whitman, Zakaras, and Chardos (1971) used a combination of reinforcement and physical guidance to increase the instruction-following behavior of two severely retarded children. Increases in such behaviors occurred for both trained and untrained items. In the discussion, they mentioned that it was unclear whether the increases seen in instruction-following behavior were due to a lack of motivation on the part of the subjects before training, to the subjects' learning specific responses, or to having responses come under the control of specific stimuli. In addition, if the subject continually failed to respond to an in1Appreciation is expressed to David Gast for the time he spent conducting training sessions, to Janet

TRANSFER OF STIMULUS CONTROL FROM MOTOR TO VERBAL STIMULI1

“…When a generalization item (consisting of a combination of a verb from one training item and a noun from a different training item) was presented, the present subjects performed a motor response that had been trained to one of its components during training. Striefel and Wetherby (1973) (1973) and are congruent with those of . found that after being trained on a response in the presence of a complex stimulus containing three components, not all components controlled the response.…”

“…They indicated that physical guidance was initially used to ensure a target response because the correct response or approximations of it might never occur on its own. Striefel and Wetherby (1973) obtained similar results using a similar procedure.…”

“…The subjects seemed to "lock in" on one portion (noun or verb) of the new instruction and performed the response that had been associated with that part of the instruction during training, e.g., when trained on Blow on Feather and Drop Ball, and then requested to Blow on Ball, the subject might "lock in" on the word Ball and would drop the ball. Striefel and Wetherby (1973) obtained similar results in that their subject did not respond to all variations of the verbal instruction, nor did he respond appropriately to generalization items.…”

“…The present results do not seem to be due to motivational factors, because (1) correct responses during the initial baseline were followed by reinforcement, and (2) correct responses to items that were not performed correctly during the initial baseline did not occur until after the specific behaviors had been trained in a specific order. Striefel and Wetherby (1973) and Whitman et al (1971) also established functional relationships between specific motor responses and specific verbal instructions; however, they used a combination of positive reinforcement, physical guidance, and fading procedures. Thus, the present findings provide a second method for establishing instruction-following skills.…”

“…After training, control over the response was exerted by only one stimulus component for the autistic children, but both stimulus components exerted control over the response in normal children. Striefel and Wetherby (1973) found that after being trained on verbal instructions, not all components of the instruction controlled a response in an 11-yr-old retarded boy. The lack of stimulus control exhibited by some components of the verbal instructions might well interfere with the acquisition of instructionfollowing skills.…”