Teaching Children With Autism Spectrum Disorders to Mand for the Removal of Stimuli That Prevent Access to Preferred Items

Abstract

Mand training is often a primary focus in early language instruction and typically includes mands that are positively reinforced. However, mands maintained by negative reinforcement are also important skills to teach. These include mands to escape aversive demands or unwanted items. Another type of negatively reinforced mand important to teach involves the removal of a stimulus that prevents access to a preferred activity. We taught 5 participants diagnosed with autism spectrum disorders to mand for the removal of a stimulus in order to access a preferred item that had been blocked. An evaluation was conducted to determine if participants responded differentially when the establishing operations for the preferred item were present versus absent. All participants learned to mand for the removal of the stimulus exclusively under conditions when the establishing operation was present.

(Im)posturas jornalísticas: incompreensões da revista Veja sobre B. F. Skinner

“…Tal afi rmação foi feita sem qualquer tipo de parcimônia, como se esse fosse um fato banal e bem estabelecido. Havia, certamente, por parte do autor, o desconhecimento sobre respostas dadas por analistas do comportamento (e.g., MacCorquodale, 1970) às críticas de Chomsky e as pesquisas realizadas na área de comportamento verbal (e.g., Catania, Matthews, & Shimoff, 1982;Davison & Kirkwood, 1968;Shillingsburg, Powell, & Bowen, 2013).…”

Teaching Mands to Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder Using Behavior Chain Interruption Strategies: a Systematic Review

“…These studies were capable of providing a high certainty of evidence for a positive intervention effect because the intervention (a) was evaluated using a proper experimental design, (b) included adequate interobserver agreement checks with a high resulting percentage of agreement, (c) had operationally defined dependent variables, and (d) included sufficient procedural details to enable replication (e.g., Duker et al 1994, Shillingsburg et al 2013Still et al 2015). The remaining four studies (i.e., Roberts-Pennell and Sigafoos 1999;Sigafoos and Littlewood 1999;Sundberg et al 2002) were classified as providing less certain evidence, but in two of these studies (Roberts-Pennell and Sigafoos 1999;Sundberg et al 2002), the only concern was that a lower percentage of sessions (15 to 19% of sessions) had been checked for interobserver agreement.…”

“…The Sidener et al (2010) study was unique in that it focused on teaching both mands and tacts. Further, two studies (i.e., Choi et al 2010;Shillingsburg et al 2013) taught mands that were negatively reinforced. Choi et al (2010) taught a requesting and rejecting sequence that involved a re-request in the context of the participant being offered the incorrect item following the initial request.…”

“…Choi et al (2010) taught a requesting and rejecting sequence that involved a re-request in the context of the participant being offered the incorrect item following the initial request. Shillingsburg et al (2013) taught mands for the removal of an item that was blocking access to a preferred item.…”

“…For example, Albert et al (2012) used the missing item format to target a mand for glitter, which was needed to complete an art project. Withholding an item, or limiting or blocking access to an item, was used in five (18%) of the studies (e.g., Lechago et al 2013;Shillingsburg et al 2013;Sigafoos et al 2013). For example, Sigafoos et al (2013) interrupted engagement with preferred toys to create opportunities for the participants to request more toy play.…”