Association for Behavior Analysis International

Skinner (1957) differentiated the roles of the speaker and the listener in a verbal encounter. Although not extensively emphasized, Skinner suggested an individual often behaves verbally even when responding as a listener. Children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and other language impairments often display the absence of important, and basic verbal repertoires that limit their ability to engage in a variety of social skills or problem- solving skills. Joint control suggests that multiply controlled verbal responding involves functional control of two 2 or more stimuli or verbal operants. This systematic literature review an introduction to the conceptual basis of the analysis of joint control, as well as provide a summary of publications specifying the relation and implications of the analysis of joint control and joint control training in the acquisition of multiply controlled, non-speaker behaviors (e.g., selection-based behavior; , se- quencing behavior). The synthesis suggests that joint control training presents as a promising analytic tool in guiding interventions to teach complex, multiply controlled verbal and non-verbal repertoires to children diagnosed with autism ASD and/or other developmental disabilities. Recommendations for future research in joint control, as well as the implementation of joint control training, are provided.

The purpose of this study was to conduct a systematic replication and extension of Causin et al. (2013) to assess the efficacy of a self-rehearsal procedure to teach five individuals with autism to follow multiple-step selection of stimuli. Within a multiple probe design across participants, participants were taught to echo and self-echo and then select multiple pictorial stimuli, in the order in which they were requested, from an array of directly-trained and untrained sets of stimuli. The self-rehearsal and accurate selection did not generalize to direction-following related to activities of daily living in the natural environment, so we taught it directly. Probes of novel multiple-step tasks were conducted. Implications for the role of joint control in developing skills sequences to teach generative responding, conceptual analyses of covert verbal behavior, and designing instructional goals related to transition from formal education settings are discussed.

In this first part of a two-part tutorial, basic component skills involved in establishing jointly controlled responding will be specified including echoic responding for vocal responders, imitative responding for sign-language responders, and critical tact repertoires. Included will be a discussion of strategies to specify sources of control for component responses and methods to establish response strength for rehearsal strategies. Joint control is one example of responding that is multiply controlled. One source of multiple control is the responders own verbal behavior. Implied in this analysis is the emission of previously acquired verbal responses that come to strength in certain stimulus conditions external to the responder, such as an antecedent mand for a selection response. Such previously acquired verbal responses may be covert and as such present ongoing challenges related to response documentation and in certain arrangements, response blocking. The tutorial will include demonstrations of teaching procedures to establish skill sets involved in paradigms to study joint control in applied settings.

In this second part of a two-part tutorial, various protocols relevant to sequences of skills that may involve jointly controlled responding will be described. Examples of forms documenting skill tracking within a hierarchy of listener responding sequences will be provided. Protocols and demonstrations of multiple item listener responding (manded-stimulus selection) will be iterated. The tutorial will also include considerations for establishing jointly controlled listener responding for practical life skills, academic performance, and employment skills. Considerations relevant to the necessary concepts involved in practical applications of jointly controlled responding including prepositional relations and tacts of actions will be presented. Joint control procedures may have a role in establishing yes-no responses relevant to antecedent conditions involving mands to discriminate motivation or the accuracy of an emitted tact as an antecedent stimulus. This session will review a protocol (Carbone, 2014, conference presentation) that identifies a procedure to teach tacting the presence of joint control by saying yes or no.