Association for Behavior Analysis International

The Association for Behavior Analysis International® (ABAI) is a nonprofit membership organization with the mission to contribute to the well-being of society by developing, enhancing, and supporting the growth and vitality of the science of behavior analysis through research, education, and practice.

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51st Annual Convention; Washington DC; 2025

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Paper Session #377
CE Offered: BACB/IBAO
A Conceptual Review and Contingency Analysis of Observational Learning
Monday, May 26, 2025
9:30 AM–9:50 AM
Convention Center, Street Level, 149 AB
Area: PCH
Instruction Level: Advanced
CE Instructor: Sydney J Berkman, Ph.D.
 
A Conceptual Review and Contingency Analysis of Observational Learning
Domain: Theory
SYDNEY J BERKMAN (Operants Magazine; B. F. Skinner Foundation), Rebecca P. F. MacDonald (New England Center for Children, Western New England University), David C. Palmer (Smith College)
 
Abstract: Behavior analysts have traditionally explained observational learning in one of two ways. Molar accounts involve appeals to historical consequence patterns: reinforcement for imitating reinforced responses and for not imitating punished responses and punishment for imitating punished responses and for failing to imitate reinforced responses. Molecular accounts involve appeals to stimulus control of the observer’s response established by observing the consequence of the modeled response. Lacking from these interpretations is sufficient detail of a single instance of observational learning to account for variability in the data and to remediate when observational learning does not occur. The central focus of this review is to review behavior-analytic theory and research on observational learning and present a moment-by-moment contingency analysis for four different patterns of observational learning: no consequence, imitative, nonimitative, and neutral. A molecular account of these different patterns of observational learning will allow behavior analysts to account for variability in data and to develop avenues of instructional remediation and empirical research.
 
Target Audience:

Attendees should have strong foundations in behavioral philosophy and basic familiarity with behavioral concepts and phenomena such as observing responses, automatic conditioned reinforcement, and establishment of covert behavior.

 

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