Relational Operant Skills Training Increases Standardized Matrices Scores in Adolescents: A Stratified Active-Controlled Trial

Abstract

In recent years, small-scale studies have suggested that we may be able to substantially strengthen children's general cognitive abilities and intelligence quotient (IQ) scores using a relational operant skills training program (SMART). Only one of these studies to date has included an active Control Condition, and that study reported the smallest mean IQ rise. The present study is a larger stratified activecontrolled trial to independently test the utility of SMART training for raising Nonverbal IQ (NVIQ) and processing speed. We measured personality traits, NVIQs, and processing speeds of a cohort of school pupils (aged 12-15). Participants were allocated to either a SMART intervention group or a Scratch computer coding control group, for a period of 3 months. We reassessed pupils' NVIQs and processing speeds after the 3-month intervention. We observed a significant mean increase in the SMART training group's (final n exp = 43) NVIQs of 5.98 points, while there was a nonsignificant increase of 1.85 points in the Scratch active-control group (final n cont = 27). We also observed an increase in processing speed across both conditions (final n exp = 70; n cont = 55) over Time. Our results suggest that relational skills training may be useful for improving performance on matrices tasks, and perhaps in future, accelerating children's progression toward developmental milestones.

The impact of the SMART program on cognitive and academic skills: A systematic review and meta‐analysis

“…In three studies, SMART was compared to an active control. Two studies compared SMART to a coding training program called Scratch (Hayes & Stewart, 2016; McLoughlin et al., 2020b), and one involved a control condition in which participants played chess (McLoughlin et al., 2021).…”

“…Regarding the results of the present study, the wide confidence and prediction intervals should perhaps be interpreted with these factors in mind. In the two largest SMART studies to date (McLoughlin et al, 2020b(McLoughlin et al, , 2021, the authors found that attrition rates were related to baseline levels of trait negative emotion and trait agreeableness. It is possible that future large-scale SMART studies might benefit from providing additional supports for participants found to be relatively low in agreeableness or high in negative emotion to ensure that they stay motivated to take part.…”

“…To date, there has been no systematic attempt to critically review or appraise the available evidence for SMART. Given the burgeoning empirical research base (eg, Cassidy et al, 2016;Colbert et al, 2018;McLoughlin et al, 2020bMcLoughlin et al, , 2021 and increased interest in SMART, a review and meta-analysis of the existing literature is clearly warranted at this juncture. In this systematic review and random effects meta-analysis, we appraise the existing literature on SMART.…”

“…The putative effects of SMART have been independently replicated. Nonetheless, the largest of these independent replications (McLoughlin et al, 2020b(McLoughlin et al, , 2021 suffer from a number of important limitations that other studies do not, including higher attrition and lower training completion. Although these authors made a number of methodological improvements over previous studies and did not have a financial interest in SMART, their publication history also shows evidence of prior allegiance to a behaviour-analytic worldview (indeed, this cautionary note applies to all SMART studies to-date except Thirus et al [2016]).…”

Convergent validity and internal consistency of the PEAK pre-assessments: Direct correlations of intelligence and relational ability.

“…In Study 2, 30 typically developing participants demonstrated statistically significant improvements in educational aptitude, as measured by a standardized assessment, following relational training. Replication studies have also improved participant performance on full-scale IQ (FSIQ) compared to a waitlist control (Colbert et al, 2018) and on nonverbal IQ subscales compared to active controls (McLoughlin et al, 2020a, 2020b). Taken together, these findings suggest that derived relational responding is related to intelligence, that relational training improves scores on a wide range of standardized measures of intelligence, and that these changes may generalize to educational performance.…”