Association for Behavior Analysis International

Practitioners and researchers have effectively used a range of instructional techniques from applied behavior analysis to teach critical social, language, and academic skills to children with autism spectrum disorders. The collection of studies in this symposium will explore how different variations in instructional procedures can influence the acquisition and generalization of skills for children with autism. First, Sophie Knutson will present a study comparing varying task interspersal ratios on the efficacy and efficiency of discrete-trial teaching. Second, Natalie Jones will present a study comparing the effectiveness and efficiency of teaching procedures with secondary targets embedded into a demand and play context. Third, Shaji Haq will present a study assessing the acquisition, maintenance, and generalization of skills taught using prompting and reinforcement or instructive feedback procedures. Fourth, Bethany Hansen will present a study evaluating the effects of single-exemplar and multiple-exemplar training on the acquisition and generalization of third person pronouns. Finally, Bridget Taylor will discuss interesting components of each study, and describe future areas of research on skill acquisition.

Instructive feedback has been shown to vastly improve the efficiency of structured teaching procedures. Instructive feedback involves presenting secondary targets (i.e., extra non-target skills) in an instructional trial. Learners are not required to respond to these additional skills; however, previous studies show that learners may acquire secondary targets in the absence of direct teaching. In the current study we evaluated the conditions under which three children with autism acquired secondary targets in the absence of direct teaching. We used an adapted-alternating-treatments design to compare the effectiveness and efficiency of four teaching procedures with and without secondary targets embedded into demand and play contexts. The results showed that two participants acquired secondary targets presented across all conditions; however, learning was more efficient when secondary targets were presented within a demand context. Findings from this study suggest that instructive feedback may increase the number of skills that children with autism can learn without increasing instructional time, and that the demand context may mediate some of these effects.

Although instructive feedback is an effective and efficient approach for skill acquisition, there is limited research on generalization and maintenance of skills that are trained using this procedure (Nottingham, Vladescu, & Kodak, 2015). In this study, we taught intraverbal fill-ins using prompting and reinforcement (i.e., primary targets) or instructive feedback (i.e., secondary targets), and we assessed generalization of skills to novel therapists or to corresponding wh- questions. In addition, we assessed maintenance of a) primary targets, b) secondary targets, and c) generalization targets during two and four-week probes. Results indicated that all three participants acquired, generalized, and maintained skills in all conditions. Implications for research and clinical practice will be discussed.

Studies have found pronoun difficulties as a noted deficit for children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (Wilkinson, 1998). Stokes and Baer (1977) discuss the importance of programming sufficient exemplars to promote generalization when teaching a potentially generalizable skill, such as pronoun use. The purpose of this study is to assess the need for multiple exemplar training in facilitating generalization of correct pronoun use. A multiple baseline design across participants was used to evaluate the effects of single exemplar training on the acquisition of third person pronouns, followed by multiple exemplar training if generalization did not occur. Baseline data were collected for three sets, each consisting of nine targets that included three third person pronouns (i.e., he, she, and they) engaging in three different verbs (e.g., sleeping). Three targets in set one were initially targeted for intervention (e.g., each pronoun engaging in a different verb). Probes were conducted once mastery criteria were met. Untrained targets within and/or across sets were trained until generalization was observed. Results showed that one participant demonstrated generalization within and across sets following single exemplar training of one set, one participant demonstrated generalization within and across sets following multiple exemplar training of one set, and one participant demonstrated generalization following multiple exemplar training of multiple sets. These findings support the need for assessing the number of exemplars that require training to promote untrained, novel responses for learners with Autism Spectrum Disorders.