Preschool Life Skills Training Using the Response to Intervention Model with Preschoolers with Developmental Disabilities

Previous research has examined a variety of methods for teaching young children important social skills in preschool to increase prosocial behavior and reduce classroom behavior problems. Preschool life skills (PLS) programming has taught young children to request teacher assistance, tolerate delays or denial in the delivery of materials, friendship skills, and functional communication skills. The purpose of the current study was to extend the PLS literature by assessing the intrusiveness of instruction necessary to teach children with developmental disabilities to response to their name, request attention and assistance, and tolerant delays and denial. A multiple-baseline across-behaviors design was used to demonstrate the effects of instruction, differential reinforcement, and error-correction procedures that systematically increased in intrusiveness as necessary for participants to acquire skills. Five participants acquired skills using general instructional strategies, and three participants required individualized instruction to learn skills. The training required varied across participants and skills. Pre-baseline and post-mastery probes were conducted in the classroom with adults and peers to test for generalization. In general, poor generalization of the acquired skills with peers and adults was observed

Sex offender registration and notification act with adolescents adjudicated for illegal sexual behavior: a therapeutic jurisprudence perspective

Adolescents adjudicated for illegal sexual behavior (AISB) are subjected to the same Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA) policies as adults with sexual offense histories despite current research documenting their relatively low likelihood of recidivism. Therapeutic jurisprudence is a framework which suggests the law should value psychological well-being and strive to avoid imposing anti-therapeutic consequences. The purpose of this article is to analyze the use of SORNA policies with AISB from a therapeutic jurisprudence perspective. Given the current literature documenting the collateral consequences of SORNA on AISB and their families and the lack of efficacy in reducing recidivism, we argue SORNA should not be applied to children and adolescents. We conclude with a discussion of future directions for the juvenile justice system and public policy reform

Authorship trends in the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis: An update

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/163399/2/jaba726.pdfhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/163399/1/jaba726_am.pd

Picture-Book Professors:Academia and Children's Literature

How is academia portrayed in children's literature? This Element ambitiously surveys fictional professors in texts marketed towards children. Professors are overwhelmingly white and male, tending to be elderly scientists who fall into three stereotypes: the vehicle to explain scientific facts, the baffled genius, and the evil madman. By the late twentieth century, the stereotype of the male, mad, muddlehead, called Professor SomethingDumb, is formed in humorous yet pejorative fashion. This Element provides a publishing history of the role of academics in children's literature, questioning the book culture which promotes the enforcement of stereotypes regarding intellectual expertise in children's media. The Element is also available, with additional material, as Open Access

Preference for Accumulated and Distributed Token Exchange-Production Schedules: Effects of Task Difficulty and Variable Token-Production Schedules

Organisms allocate behavior to simultaneously available schedules of reinforcement as a function of different dimensions of reinforcement (e.g., delays, magnitude, response effort). Previous research suggests that accumulated exchange-production schedules promote increased work completion and are more preferred than distributed exchange-production schedules despite the commensurate delays to reinforcement. The purpose of the present study was to evaluate whether the response effort or token-production schedules associated with token delivery influence preferences for exchange-production schedules. Tokens exchanged under accumulated schedules supported higher rates of responding and were more preferred, relative to distributed schedules, when they were earned for completing easy tasks (Experiment 1). When participants earned tokens for completing difficult tasks, they generally preferred accumulated exchangeproduction schedules, although accumulated schedules were not significantly more effective than distributed schedules in maintaining behavior (Experiment 2). Under dense token-production schedules, accumulated exchange-production schedules were preferred, but participant’s preferences switched to distributed schedules under increasing token-production (i.e., leaner) schedules (Experiment 3)

Response-Bout Analysis of Self-Injurious Behavior: A Test of the Evolutionary Theory of Behavior Dynamics

This project examines response-bout characteristics characterizing automatically maintained self-injurious behavior (ASIB). These characteristics will be examined among a clinical sample of inpatients and compared against predictions generated by the Evolutionary Theory of Behavior Dynamics (ETBD) with artificial organisms operating on the low-level Darwinian rules of the theory

Transition States in Single-Case Experimental Designs: A Retrospective Consecutive-Controlled Case Series Investigation

Behavioral interventions to decrease problem behavior often involve the use of single-case experimental designs in which an individual’s responding during a treatment condition is compared to responding during a control or baseline condition. It is possible that during the initial introduction of treatment, problem behavior continues to occur at baseline rates before behavior reduction is observed; this phenomenon is called a transition state. Evaluated the prevalence of transition states in the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis and found that they occurred within 5.3% of the published literature. The current study replicated and extended Brogan et al. by evaluating the prevalence of transition states in unpublished clinical data of patients admitted to an inpatient hospital for the treatment of severe problem behavior. Using a retrospective consecutive-controlled case series, transition states were observed in 3% of cases for an average duration of 4.8 sessions. We discuss factors that may affect transitional behavior between phases and relevant implications for practice and research. </jats:p