Evaluating direct and indirect reinforcement contingencies in children with autism

Document Type

Thesis

College

College of Arts and Sciences

Department

Psychology

Degree

M.S. Applied Behavior Analysis

Date Completed

2014

First Committee Member

Sassi, Jessica

Second Committee Member

Thompson, Rachel

Third Committee Member

Karsina, Allen

Abstract

"When teaching individuals with developmental disabilities, reinforcement delivery following task completion is often socially mediated, meaning the therapist delivers a reinforcer following task completion (indirect reinforcement), rather than the reinforcer coming as a direct consequence of the task (direct reinforcement). A few experiments have examined whether the relationship between the task and the reinforcer impacts the speed of skill acquisition with simple tasks such as container opening. Generally, these studies show that acquisition occurs more quickly under conditions of direct rather than indirect reinforcement. The purpose of this study is to examine whether a teaching arrangement that utilizes a direct reinforcement contingency would produce faster skill acquisition (using a receptive word identification task) than a more traditional teaching arrangement that uses indirect contingencies of reinforcement for four adolescents diagnosed with autism or a related developmental disability. In the direct condition, words were attached to cups and an edible was placed under the cup with the correct word, such that a correct response resulted in access to the reinforcer. In the indirect condition, the target response resulted in the experimenter handing the participant an edible. Results show no difference in rate of acquisition for 2 out of the 4participants. The remaining two participants did not learn at a rate fast enough to determine if one condition was superior to another. A discussion of the implications of these findings is included."

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