Evaluating the paired stimulus preference assessment for identifying social interaction for skill acquisition

Document Type

Thesis

College

College of Arts and Sciences

Department

Psychology

Degree

M.S. Applied Behavior Analysis

Date Completed

2022

First Committee Member

Roscoe, Eileen

Second Committee Member

Bourret, Jason

Third Committee Member

Thompson, Rachel

Abstract

"Although social interaction has been found to function as a reinforcer for individuals with autism (Hanley et al., 2003), the type of social interaction may be idiosyncratic and difficult to identify (Roscoe et al., 2010). The purpose of the current study was to assess the generality of a pictorially based paired-stimulus preference assessment (Kelly et al., 2014) by conducting three reinforcer assessments of various complexity. In each reinforcer assessment, three consequences were assessed: a highly preferred social interaction, a less preferred social interaction, and a no-interaction control. In the first reinforcer assessment, the dependent variable was a simple arbitrary response, target touching. In the second and third reinforcer assessments, the dependent variable was a more complex task (i.e., correct completion of an eight-step response chain), using arbitrary (i.e., building LEGO structures) and socially relevant (i.e., completing vocational and hygiene responses) tasks, respectively. Highly preferred and less preferred social interactions were reinforcers for increasing simple and complex tasks. However, relative reinforcement effects for these stimuli differed across reinforcer assessments."

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