Association for Behavior Analysis International

Behavior analysts are working in a time in which the manualization and protocolization of assessments and intervention procedures is ever intensifying. At the same time, behavior analysis courses seem to be resulting in technical, uncritical repertoires: behavior analysts seem to lack skills to assess data and explanation present in conceptual and empirical studies. The purpose of this symposium is to present how instructional design can support behavior analysts in designing, building, implementing and monitoring teaching and assessment procedures. In the first symposium, learners will describe (a) overlaps between Instructional Design and Behavior Analysis; (b) contingencies that might prevent behavior analysts from looking at procedures from different instructional design approaches and (c) possible consequences of the separation between different niches within behavior analysis. In the second symposium, a specific example on how instructional design might inform teaching procedures for children with autism spectrum disorders will be presented. The differences between concept teaching and multiple exemplar training will be presented and behavior analytic research that aimed at concept teaching for children with autism.

Intermediate. Pre-requisite skills. Prior to the symposium, the audience should be able to (a) define instructional design; (b) define behavior analysis; (c) define and describe contingencies

Instructional design and behavior analysis have a long history together. Overlaps between these areas include, but are not limited to, setting measurable, observable learning objectives, analyzing what needs to be taught in order to reach the objectives, designing and implementing effective teaching procedures, choosing stimuli, monitoring and assessing results, and making data-based decisions. However, studies that bring together these areas, empirical or theoretical, are sparse. This presentation aims at presenting some of the overlaps between these areas and possible contingencies that might be responsible for a detachment between them. Financial contingencies, professional recognition within behavior analysis, increased probability of publication and funding are contingencies that could be responsible for the separation. In addition, consequences of this separation such as the creation of several verbal communities within behavior analysis, which might result in communication difficulties and probably in the misuse of several intervention packages by those who do not consume technical and scientific behavior analytic knowledge through analytic lenses, based on conceptual consistency will be discussed. Suggestions for future theoretical and empirical research that might bring the fields closer will be presented.

Concepts can be defined as a class of stimuli that share critical, essential or “must-have” features. The members of a class also have varying or “can-have” features that can vary across the members. It is important to highlight that concepts cannot be aprioristically defined; they are dependent on the verbal community. For example, some exemplars of a class might belong to other stimulus classes in another verbal community. The boundaries of a given concept might be difficult to teach through discrimination procedures, so not only multiple exemplars are necessary; the features of each exemplar must be carefully selected to improve chances of boundary discrimination. And members of one class cannot belong to another class being taught. Based on this XXX, the purpose of this presentation is to present a literature review of behavior analytic studies that taught concepts to children with autism. Criteria for inclusion were: a) studies with people with autism spectrum disorders; b) applied empirical studies; c) that aimed at teaching concepts; d) instructional design had to be mentioned in the title or in the abstract. Six studies were found. Their analysis is presented and suggestions for future theoretical and empirical research are discussed.

Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA), has witnessed significant changes in the licensure and credentialing of professionals. This transformation is crucial for being able to address the growing demand for effective, evidence-based behavioral services for individuals affected by autism and related disorders. How can we be certain that a behavioral services provider possesses the knowledge and experience required for effective, evidence-based services? The historical development of behavior analysis credentials reflects the need for standardized qualifications. Credentialing emerges as a critical process that verifies these qualifications and establishes a standard against which professionals in the field can be evaluated. Accreditation provides a third-party verification that specific, relevant standards have been met. This shift in the field has led to some confusion regarding credential and job title, which has significant consequences, impacting legislators, insurance funders, service providers, and the individuals and families affected by autism. In conclusion, accreditation plays a crucial role in ensuring that qualified professionals can provide ABA services to those in need. Access to these services is a right that families deserve, and by addressing these challenges, we can work towards a more inclusive and effective system of care for individuals affected by autism and related disorders.

ABA therapists ABA service organization leaders

While the parallels between the science of life and the science of behavior are abundant, each field has developed unique systems for observing and recording data. Whereas ecologists focus on the richness and evenness of taxonomic relations, behavior analysts examine the frequency and duration of functional relations. Yet the scientific underpinnings and similarity in subject matter may allow for metrics to be applied across fields. Here we utilize common measures from the field of community ecology for the analysis of human behavior. Different environments support a range of distinct biological communities, and quantifying such biodiversity provides an understanding of how and why different biological communities are distributed. Ecologists define beta diversity as a measure of the degree of community differentiation in relation to environment gradients. The ratio between gamma and alpha diversities, beta diversity quantifies the effective number of distinct ecological communities within a region. In this symposium, we extend the concept of beta diversity to the field of behavior-analytic intervention for individuals with autism spectrum disorder. Across three papers, we show how beta diversity can be used to sample the frequency and variety of destructive behavior, stimulus preference, and verbal behavior. We demonstrate the utility of beta diversity for measuring behavior change over time, and discuss the implications of calculating beta diversity as a measure of efficacy.

Board Certified Behavior Analysts (Doctoral) and researchers who are interested in studying complex behavior-environment interactions. Attendees should have working knowledge of different types of functional analyses and stimulus preference assessments.

In physics, the study of dynamics is concerned with how forces act on bodies to change their movement—from this stems concepts involving Newton’s laws of motion, mass, inertia, momentum, kinetic energy and more. In behavior analysis, the study of dynamics is concerned with how consequences act on behavior via contingencies of selection over time. In this paradigm, behavior participates in a dynamic system with operant contingencies to produce emergent outcomes that are analyzed across multiple response dimensions, time scales, and units of analysis. Behavior dynamics provides a framework for investigating how operant behavior changes due to variation in the environment, yielding insights into the variables that underlie complex patterns of behavior—it embraces the idea that behavior is not static, but constantly evolving. This tutorial will explore the emerging application of behavior dynamics to the study of self-injury among individuals with neurodevelopmental disabilities. This discussion will center on dynamics of response competition, time, and evolution. Throughout, my emphasis will be on making these concepts, along with selected analytic techniques, approachable for applied researchers.

This tutorial is geared towards board certified behavior analysts, psychologists, and graduate students.

Skinner (1932) was able to shape behaviors quickly and without trial and error because he first taught his rats all of the prerequisites they needed (Sidman, 2010). Behavior analysts who work with children with autism and developmental disabilities generally do not observe this fast, one-trial learning, perhaps because they are not following Skinner’s model. Instead, it is common to see repeated errors, variability in outcomes, prompt dependence, escape or avoidance behaviors, and inappropriate behaviors. In this symposium, we will examine how accelerated learning can occur when the therapist begins by building a reinforcement system consisting of an interconnected chain of therapist-student behaviors (Fernandez and Roasles-Ruiz, 2023; Rosales-Ruiz, Hunter, and Fernandez, 2023). The first paper discusses literature on shaping without the use of extra stimulus prompts, the second an experiment with students that measured the efficiency of instructional sessions using this approach, the third reducing high rates of problem behaviors without directly addressing them, and the fourth teaching students with profound discrimination problems to tact colors using shaping procedures. These four studies offer practitioners an alternative approach to designing and implementing instruction for children with ASD and other developmental disabilities.

Target audience should have studied behavior analysis at the undergraduate level and should be familiar with terms such as Reinforcement, Conditioned reinforcers, stimulus control, verbal operants.

Shaping is an effective and well-established gradual change procedure for teaching new skills that is sometimes combined with other strategies, such as prompting. However, to the best of our knowledge, no review has been published that provides an overview of applications of response shaping in interventions for persons with developmental disabilities. Results of the current scoping review include a description of the reviewed studies, and a synthesis of the findings. This includes a study of participant samples, experimental designs, teaching settings, assessments used, social validity, and shaping outcomes. A majority of the studies targeted persons with autism spectrum disorder, even though other diagnoses were also represented. Most studies employed single-case experimental designs and reported positive outcomes of response shaping, for a variety of target behaviors.While it is possible to combine response shaping with various prompts, it can also be used without prompts.This presentation will highlight and discuss the presence or absence of prompting in the reviewed studies.

Children with ASD and developmental disorders may learn at a slower pace when teachers use poorly-designed reinforcement schedules (Epstein 1985), the withdrawal of positive reinforcement (Ferster, 1957), intrusive prompting, and procedures that create poisoned cues (Pryor and Ramirez, 2014). Fernandez and Rosales-Ruiz (2023) and Rosales-Ruiz, Hunter and Fernandez (2023) proposed that learning can be accelerated if the teacher starts by building a reinforcement system consisting of an unconditioned reinforcer, a conditioned reinforcer (Ferster, 1975), and a reinforcement delivery system. In this approach, backward chaining is used to build interconnected chains of therapist-student behaviors. In this study, two students with ASD displayed high levels of escape and distress behaviors during baseline (90% and 40% of the sessions). Using backward chaining, they first learned to access reinforcement systematically and then to perform low-response-effort tasks. As students’ affect improved and response latencies reduced, new instructional stimuli were added. After treatment, both participants displayed relaxed affect during sessions and zero escape behaviors. Experiments are continuing with more students. Additional data will be presented related to prompt-free instruction procedures that use shaping to increase the pace of instruction and learn units acquired.

A combined blocking procedure (Williams et.al., 2005) was effective in teaching colors discrimination to a 14-year-old boy with Autism. The current study used a shaping procedure with minimal prompts and interconnected behavior chains (Rosales-Ruiz, Hunter, and Fernandez, 2023). Four students aged 5 to 9 years with a limited repertoire of tacts (50-100) and listener responding (50-100) participated in this study. In assessments of colors discrimination, three students emitted correct responses at less than chance levels in baseline and a fourth slightly above chance levels with high variability. We selected six color targets for each participant. Each color was trained one at a time, presented on a table initially with no distractors. After mastery in step 1, second and third distractors were added on the table in steps 2 and 3 with the student pointing to and tacting the target color. After mastery in terminal step for a color, subsequent target colors were similarly trained, and the study concluded with successful performance in randomized presentations. At the time of submission, the first participant successfully met criterion for the first target color with intervention continuing. Replications with subsequent target colors and additional participants will be discussed.

We live in a complex time, socially, politically, and spiritually. Global and disciplinary paradigms are interrogated and challenged; questions about our human response to power, justice, knowledge, ethics, and suffering emerge daily. The science, practice and training of behavior analysis is at the nexus of this complexity. How does a young professor of applied behavior analysis find their place, purpose, and effort in this context? Through a series of examples and drawing on the wisdom of social activists within and outside of the field, as well as her own experience, Shahla shares reflections and advice for young professors, who are often concurrently serving as teachers, researchers, and practitioners. Through stories and data, loving and responsible possibilities are explored and examined.

New professors and advanced graduate students and researchers, and practitioners and advanced professors that are interested in supporting and nurturing the development of new professors in applied behavior analysis

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and epilepsy are both neurological conditions that can significantly impact a child's development and overall well-being. While they may appear to be independent diagnoses, there is a higher co-occurrence rate than chance would predict. This presentation will explore the complex relationship between ASD and epilepsy, equipping therapists with the knowledge and tools to better support their clients who experience both conditions. The presentation will delve into the following key areas: • Prevalence and Risk Factors: We will examine the co-occurrence rates of ASD and epilepsy, exploring potential risk factors and underlying biological mechanisms. • Clinical Presentations: We will discuss the diverse ways in which epilepsy can manifest, including potential challenges in identifying and diagnosing epilepsy in individuals with ASD. • Treatment Considerations: We will explore the evidence-based practices for treating epilepsy to address the unique needs of this population. Here, we will also discuss potential side effects of anti-seizure medications and how they may impact behavior or learning, equipping ABA therapists to collaborate with the medical team for optimal treatment. • Emerging Technologies: We will explore the potential of using new technologies including AI analysis of EEG (electroencephalogram) data for early detection of ASD. This discussion will highlight the promise and limitations of new technologies, emphasizing their role as potential tools to support informed clinical decision-making. • Collaborative Care: We will emphasize the importance of collaboration between ABA therapists, neurologists, and other healthcare professionals in developing comprehensive treatment plans.

Therapists and physicians taking care of individuals with ASD.

Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) is a field that has yet to extend globally. Diversity in cultural and socio-economic contexts create barriers to straightforward replication of ABA systems from more industrialized countries. Extensive supervision and collaboration between local and international providers are vital to foster growth, uphold standards, and ensure effectiveness in developing nations. Government agencies play a vital role in establishing new disciplines within its country. In the Philippines, a considerable portion of the population live in poverty with limited access to essential services. A lack of public and private funding and only 7 Board Certified Behavior Analysts serving the 13th most populated country in the world exacerbate the struggle for accessible behavioral healthcare. In response to the challenges, the city of Paranaque was the first to enact an ordinance including ABA in its provision of free services to the community. The local government unit and international behavior analysts collaborated to provide on-going training for families with special needs in a pilot program aimed at establishing an infrastructure of sustainable behavioral support in the tenth largest city in the Philippines. Initial outcomes and barriers will be presented alongside recommendations for further action and replication in other developing cities and countries.

BACB and QABA certified clinicians

Current theories suggest that mechanisms for language development change over the course of infancy and early childhood. In neurotypical infants, initial perceptual processing mechanisms essential for word learning give way to more advanced social strategies critical for the development of social language. Language intervention for autistic children often leverages perceptual processing by creating an association between a referent (i.e., object or picture) and the corresponding word, thereby promoting word learning. However, this intervention strategy often fail to facilitate social language needed to share information and for interpersonal communication. Recent research suggests that naturalistic developmental behavioral interventions (NDBIs) that encourage early dyadic social interactions may stimulate the social brain networks, thereby improving fundamental social attention (i.e., social orienting and joint attention) and social language in young autistic children. This presentation will discuss the theoretical underpinnings of these claims, emphasize the importance of social language as an intervention outcome, and provide empirical evidence supporting the efficacy of NDBI approaches in promoting social attention and reciprocal social language development in young autistic children from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds.

Interventionists who work with young autistic children

An overarching goal of ABA services is to empower individuals to ask for what they want and make choices about their own life. While this skill may be commonplace for many individuals, several barriers begin to surface for individuals with severe disabilities and in regions with few trained behavior analysts. The authors of Study 1 will contextualize ABA services to the UK and highlight unique cultural and societal considerations for successful programs. Study 2 will evaluate the impact of modified TalkTools to facilitate speech in minimally-verbal children with developmental disabilities. The authors will highlight the efficacy and acceptability of their intervention. The authors of Study 3 will present data on the effectiveness of functional analysis and functional communication training using manual signs for an autistic adolescent. They will discuss the barriers to intervention and how these were addressed. The authors of Study 4 will present data on how an AAC device was used to train choice-making in an adolescent with brain injury. Specific implications for quality-of-life measures and happiness indicators will be highlighted. Finally, Lina Slim will discuss these studies with a focus on interprofessional collaboration and advocate for programs that directly target quality-of-life in individuals.

Intermediate

ABA interventions were largely developed in the United States, in settings with relatively more trained professionals compared to the United Kingdom. Data retrieved from the BACB website showed that as of October 18, 2023, there were a total of 214,817 certified behaviour analysts in the USA compared to 837 such professionals in the UK. When this number is juxtaposed against the estimated 1.6 million individuals with special and complex needs in the UK who could benefit from the services offered by behaviour analysts, it becomes apparent that there is a critical shortage in the number of trained professionals available. Nevertheless, the past few years have seen growth in the number of professional behaviour analysts in the UK, the establishment of a local accreditation body, and increases in the demand for ABA services. This talk will offer a snapshot of how ABA services are offered in the UK, a five-year perspective on demand for these services, and trends in the types of services offered (e.g., home-based, consultancy) by one organization during this period. The feasibility of funding, designing and implementing an ABA intervention program in the UK will be discussed.

TalkTools is an intervention designed to target functional speech. We undertook a preliminary investigation to explore the efficacy and the feasibility of an adapted version of TalkTools for improving speech in minimally verbal young learners with autism and intellectual disabilities. Ten participants with minimal functional speech or speech clarity difficulties and diagnosis of autism who were receiving clinic-based services were randomly allocated baseline and intervention durations in an AB phase design. Over an 8-month period we explored the impact of the intervention on speech sound through weekly probe assessments of individualised speech sounds. Standardised measures were also administered at the beginning and the end of the intervention period, measuring speech sound inventory, oral motor imitation, functional speech, oral motor fluency, and motor imitation. We evaluated the feasibility of the intervention through acceptability, adherence, and fidelity of implementation measures. The results of the study will be discussed, highlighting how our findings might usefully inform future large-scale evaluations of TalkTools.

Over the last few decades, the provision of ABA services to individuals with disabilities has had a flourishing literature base. Several successful studies have demonstrated the effectiveness and acceptability of functional analysis and functional communication training to address self-injurious and aggressive behavior. A limitation of prior research is that a majority of these studies have been conducted with young children in North America most of whom were vocal and sessions were conducted in short weekly meetings. The current study was conducted with a 16-year-old non-vocal adolescent in the UK diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder, convulsive seizures, and a partial visual impairment. In this study, we report on the assessment and treatment process offered by behavior analysts in the home setting. We used a functional analysis to develop a function-based treatment to reduce severe self-injurious behavior and increase communication using manual signs. Over the course of 15 months, we observed reductions in challenging behavior to near-zero levels and a substantial increase in manual signs. Areas for future research and clinical considerations for adolescents with complex needs are discussed.

Being able to communicate and make choices about one’s life is a basic human right. Yet, these seemingly fundamental rights are unavailable, marginalized, or marked by profound dependency for some individuals with complex needs. Previous research has used children’s consumption of a food item, refusal, approach, or verbal statements about preferences as indicators of a valid choice. Identifying and training valid choice-making for individuals with limited motor and verbal skills may involve measuring other idiosyncratic behaviors that may demonstrate their happiness at a preferred choice being offered. In this study, we report on a 16-year-old girl with quadriplegia and brain injury in the UK being facilitated to make choices using a head switch mounted on her wheelchair. We describe the training phases beginning with a movement analysis, followed by shaping to teach head switch activation, and choice-making training with stimuli of varying preference levels. We will highlight the methods we used to assess preference, measure happiness indices, and how these data were used to successfully guide teaching sessions. Our training was effective in establishing socially-valid choice-making and adds to the literature on the scope of behavior analytic procedures to improve quality of life.

Explanations of complex human behavior, such as memory or problem-solving skills, in current psychological and educational research, rely heavily on explanatory fictions and hypothetical constructs. The concept of joint control (Lowenkron, 1989) provides a rich alternative explanatory mechanism, relying only on the principles of the science of behavior to account for some of these “executive function” skills. Most research on joint control involves teaching individuals to emit echoic and self-echoic responses that preserve a stimulus long enough to enter into joint control with a tact response of the same form. In contrast, Lowenkron and Colvin (1992) reported on a study that used an identity and non-identity matching experimental preparation, thereby demonstrating that the absence of joint control could also act as a stimulus to evoke unique selection responses. The purposes of the present study were to provide a conceptually systematic approach that relies entirely on behavior analytic principles to provide an alternative to cognitive explanations for a ubiquitous everyday “memory task” and to add to the current body of research on the study of the absence of joint control as an independent variable. The teaching procedures, informed by a joint control analysis, were shown to be effective in teaching children with autism to successfully respond to the question “What’s missing?” after having observed an array of items in which one item was subsequently excluded. Future research can rely on these findings to teach important functional and adaptive skills to children with autism.

Understanding complex forms of verbal behavior can be challenging for autistic people, and comprehension of figures of speech like metaphors can be especially challenging. Despite the manifold nature of the processes involved, previous studies have shown that autistic people can learn to respond appropriately to figurative language such as irony and metaphor, and these studies have offered important procedures for use in everyday clinical practice (Persicke et al., 2012; Persicke et al., 2013). Understanding metaphor specifically and non-literal language in general is clearly an important element in a full verbal behavior repertoire. Additionally, the fascinating characteristics of the environmental changes underlying the ability to understand metaphor add an appealing analytical challenge to radical behavior analysis, as well as providing an opportunity to refine assessment and intervention tools. The authors of the present study used a procedure based on the analysis of Joint Control to teach listener responses to metaphors to 4 autistic children and adolescents in a concurrent multiple baseline across participant design. The results of the study will be presented, together with a molecular, moment-to-moment analysis of the environmental and behavioral variables that the authors propose as a possibile explanation of the listener behavior.

As more and more behavior analysts are practicing within school settings, it is critical for them to have a clear understanding of the current educational model. Most elementary schools in the U.S. and abroad have adopted a differentiation model of instruction, called Multi-Tiered System of Supports (MTSS). To a lesser extent, preschool and middle and high schools have also adopted MTSS models. In this model, different layers of instruction and interventions are layered for students to increase the intensity of supports as indicated by screening and progress monitoring data. Intensifying supports only for those who truly need them and irrespective of disability, all students receive the “just right” fit of interventions to excel in school. This also ensures that financial and personnel resources are committed to those who will benefit most from them. In this invited talk, Dr. Spencer will provide a tutorial on the key ingredients of MTSS, explicating the elements necessary for equitable implementation and impact. She will also report on several research applications with culturally and linguistically diverse students and students with disabilities. Drawing from her own research, Dr. Spencer will present several innovative assessments and intervention tools that ensure students are identified as at risk early and provided with sufficient supports to prevent worsening difficulties.

N/A

Every individual belongs to a specific culture. It is, therefore, essential to understand cultural backgrounds to better address their needs. Collectivism stresses the importance of the group, while individualism focuses on the needs of each person. Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) is an evidence-based practice primarily used in countries with individualistic cultures. There is a need for cultural competence, especially in collectivist societies, to incorporate their cultural values into ABA practices if we want to extend the acceptance of our science in non-Western countries. This symposium offers viewpoints from Japan, the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Maori perspectives on navigating the unique needs of collectivist and indigenous backgrounds. It also emphasizes the interdependence between individuals within their social context. Collectivist cultures prioritize group harmony, family cohesion, and community integration. Therefore, practitioners must acknowledge these value systems, such as the role of family and community in the assessment and treatment process when designing behavior interventions. Cultural responsiveness is crucial in effectively navigating the dynamics of different cultural backgrounds to achieve effective outcomes. Integrating collectivist values in the application of ABA emphasizes the need for more inclusive and culturally competent approaches.

We are submitting in the "intermediate" instruction level because the audience should possess the following prerequisite skills, experience, and competencies: 1. Introductory knowledge of cultural competencies, cultural responsiveness, and cultural humility through behavior analytic literatures, courses, and/or other instructions, and 2. Having a first-hand experience as a behavior analyst, that required cultural responsiveness, and 3. Speak a second language, or learning a second language

Navigating cultural differences when applying Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) in collectivist and individualist societies requires a nuanced and adaptable approach. This talk explores both types of societies that can be employed to ensure the effective implementation of ABA services. The Philippines is a collectivist society that prioritizes group harmony and interdependence.Kapwa, Malasakit, and Pananampalatayaare strong Filipino values that emphasize interdependence between individuals within their social context. Adapting ABA interventions to fit within the cultural norms of strong family bonds and communal ties can increase acceptance and success. In contrast, individualist societies, where much of ABA research and technology originates, place a greater emphasis on personal autonomy, self-determination, and individual choice. In these societies, ABA programs focus on individual needs and preferences. This talk delves into the cultural competence and sensitivity required from practitioners to navigate the dynamics of collectivist cultures successfully. The collectivist mindset aligns with the collaborative nature of ABA, making it a natural fit for the cultural context. Recognizing the cultural influences on ABA implementation underscores the importance of cultural sensitivity and ethical practice in this field.

Behavior Analysts have a responsibility to promote inclusivity and acceptance within the field of ABA. First and foremost, analysts should recognize that individuals with differing educational backgrounds or certifications are not competitors, but rather colleagues and counterparts; a team whose goal is to have a positive impact on the lives we serve. With the perpetuation of negative attitudes towards differences and preferences of qualified professionals, a divide is created within the field of applied behavior analysis and has undoubtedly contributed to unnecessary barriers with collaboration, progress, and medically necessary treatment.The field of Applied Behavior Analysis has seen rapid and exponential growth in recent years, with a significant increase in demand for certified practitioners. For many years, the limited choices available in pursuing certification have been a significant hindrance to the growth and development of the populations we are all dedicated to serve. Families across the country have experienced service delays extending into months, and in some cases years due to the increase in need and plateau of available providers. Through embracing diversity and promoting inclusivity, we can create a more cohesive and effective person-centered community within the field of applied behavior analysis. Panelists will discuss the presence of clinical bias and preconceived notions which stand to threaten the very foundation behavior analysis was founded upon. Through meaningful discussion and the analyzing of cultural competency the panelists will identify the need for acceptance, tolerance and collaboration amongst providers to ensure practitioners provide their clients with the best possible treatment and outcomes.

Certificants of an accredited certifying entity such as the QABA Credentialing Board.

7% of US adults, and 1 in 5 members of Gen Z, identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and/or queer (LGBTQ, Gallup, 2022). These population data imply the presence of a large, and likely growing, number of LGBTQ+ behavior analysts. These individuals have much to offer our field, including a particular promise to address the clear need for LGBTQ+ affirming approaches to clinical service delivery. At the same time, LGBTQ+ trainees in allied health and science fields often report experiencing discrimination, non-acceptance, and/or non-inclusion in professional settings, which can decrease both professional engagement and personal wellbeing (Boustaini & Taylor, 2020; Hsueh et al., 2021). The goal of this panel is to catalyze behavior analysts’ thinking on how they can move toward more effective and culturally-responsive approaches to mentoring LGBTQ+ behavior analysts. Panelists from a range of career stages will speak to their lived experiences navigating mentor-mentee relationships in academic and clinical service settings. Both facilitators of and barriers to effective training will be discussed. Ample time will be devoted to audience Q&A, with an explicit invitation for LGBTQ+ mentees in attendance to pose questions that speak to their lived experiences.

Behavior analysts who serve as mentors or supervisors at any level of behavior-analytic practice, research, or training.

Sustaining a brain injury may result in the presentation of unique behavioral needs. Whether in the form of challenging behaviors such as socially inappropriate language and aggression which need to be decreased, equally as important are those skills which need to be acquired during rehabilitation. In this symposium, presenters will discuss a breadth of topics regarding behavior management needs in rehabilitation settings. In the first presentation, data collected from a survey among brain injury providers will highlight some of the challenging behaviors presented in rehabilitation settings and clinicians’ perspectives on efficacy of treatment. The second presentation will elaborate an example of a treatment to increase social skills implemented with a child who survived a frontal lobe injury. These presentations will serve to demonstrate application of behavior analysis within brain injury rehabilitation settings. Additionally, treatments or examples presented may serve as models for practices which can be applied within brain injury rehabilitation settings while highlighting the importance of behavioral intervention with this population.

Graduate students, practicing behavior analysts

In her 2006 memoir Strange Son, Cure Autism Now co-founder Portia Iversen described the “intact mind” she believed was buried within even the most cognitively impaired autistic individuals, like her son Dov. But the sentiment itself was not new. Emerging largely out of psychoanalytic theory dating back to the mid 20th century, the intact mind was amplified in parent memoirs even as biomedical discourse consolidated in the 1970s around a very different depiction of autism: as a biologically based, intractable neurodevelopmental disorder. With as many as 1 out of every 36 American children now affected, according to the CDC, discourse originally unique to autism has come to inform current debates at the heart of intellectual and developmental disability practice and policy in the United States – including ongoing battles over 14(c) subminimum wage programs, guardianship, and facilitated communication.

Honestly, I think everyone needs to understand the intact mind – from researchers, clinicians and providers, to policy makers, to families, to the general public.

The panel discussion will encourage audience to participate in an active discussion on how our science of behavior and its practice can evolve to induce the well-being of individual organisms, organizations, cultures, and societies, interdependently. This panel, initiated by the Evolutionary Science Special Interest Group, will explore how and why evolutionary theory can help our field analyze the reciprocal complexities of human behavior and cultural phenomena from a natural science perspective. We will also explore how such analyses and nurturing cultural designing will induce more humane behavior of individuals and more socially responsible actions in organizations. Finally, we aim to discuss how such evolutionary and cultural engineering can help advance, disseminate, and integrate the science of behavior analysis across diverse disciplines, and foster collaborations that can ameliorate current societal and global threats. We invite all who are dedicated to advancing the science of behavior at any level of their careers and education.

Behavior analysts from various backgrounds and different areas of expertise at any level of learning and self-evolution.

Once children begin to learn names incidentally, studies have shown that they learn faster and in new ways that catalyze their verbal development. This has led some researchers to call incidental naming a verbal developmental cusp and emphasize its critical role in teaching language to young children, particularly those with developmental delays. However, the conceptual debate surrounding naming, and the variability in testing and training strategies mean that incidental naming is currently being studied by only a handful of laboratories and classrooms around the world. The lack of clear recommendations regarding the critical variables in incidental naming may further discourage clinicians and applied researchers from approaching this topic. In my talk, I will highlight key challenges in the literature specifically with respect to naming tests, proffer potential solutions, and describe why practitioners and applied-researchers should care about incidental naming. I will also highlight examples of researchers studying concepts functionally similar to incidental naming but using other terminology and advocate for more collaboration between these perspectives.

The current study focused on identifying the behavioural processes that are involved when children learn to name objects by employing the non-simultaneous naming procedure, similar to that used by Sivaraman et al. (2021). Only one published study has used this procedure with children, who were all typically developing toddler participants, but no research has been conducted with adults. Additionally, the current study explored the potential impact of specific relational contextual cues for naming, including pointing, mutual eye gaze, and linguistic terms (e.g., “this is a”). The study thus sought to determine the relative impact of these relational cues on the learning of novel names in human adult participants. In other words, would the learning of specific novel names be impacted negatively when these typical naming cues are absent? Preliminary findings from two of four conditions indicate that such relational cues do indeed play an important role in naming. Overall, the results of this work may inform other research in terms of highlighting the potential importance of contextual cues when adults and indeed children are learning to name.

Few randomized controlled trials (RCT) have analyzed evidence-based educational practices delivered through a social media environment. This study used a multi-arm RCT to evaluate the critical components of the Behavioral Education and Social Media (BE-Social) intervention package: self-management skills training delivered through video modeling, cooperative learning, and semi-immediate feedback. We evaluated social media engagement and academic performance among 141 students in a graduate-level applied psychology program. Students were randomly assigned to five groups: control (n = 27), self-management (n = 27), cooperative learning (n = 33), BE-Social without semi-immediate feedback (n = 27), and complete BE-Social intervention program (n = 27). Results indicated that participants receiving the complete BE-Social program showed the highest levels of engagement and academic performance. The analysis revealed that the semi-immediate feedback component was critical to the package effectiveness, whereas the impact of the self-management skills training intervention could not be verified. The conceptual, methodological, and practical implications of the study are discussed.

Precision Teaching (PT) has most recently been defined as a system for precisely defining and continuously measuring dimensional features of behavior and analyzing data on the Standard Celeration Chart (SCC), allowing for timely and effective data-based decisions that accelerate behavioral repertoires. The potential for PT to support efficient learning environments presents an opportunity for educators to adopt a well-established system to accelerate student learning, particularly in a post-pandemic era when students have experienced significant learning loss due to extended absences from education during pivotal learning years. This is even more vital for students at risk and in areas of socio-economic disadvantage who experienced the most significant learning loss during this time. The emphasis placed on achieving high frequency performances, or fluency, with pinpointed behaviors aligns well with educators’ goals who are tasked with supporting students to achieve proficiency with literacy and numeracy skills. Although a growing body of literature is emerging that demonstrates positive outcomes associated with PT, there exists a research to practice gap. PT is not used in educational settings to the full extent possible. The purpose of this paper is to present the current evidence for PT in supporting the mastery of academic skills and to discuss the potential that PT has to make an impact in educational settings whilst acknowledging the limits of PT findings to date. Future directions for conducting impactful research in this area are suggested within the context of closing the research to practice gap.

N/A

Contemporary approaches to language instruction acknowledge the value of contextualized and generative learning. Specifically, the manner in which instruction is provided (e.g., context-specific cues, exemplars used) determines the extent to which generalized outcomes can be expected and desired skills occur only under relevant circumstances. Relational Frame Theory (RFT) is a contextual behavioral account that offers a framework to teach relational responses under the control of contextual cues to produce generative language. This symposium will present two applications of RFT in (a) oddity, a foundational skill, and (b) increasingly complex relational responses including deictics and analogy. The authors of paper 1 will describe applying multiple exemplar training to teach three children to respond in accordance with the contextual cues “same” and “different” by selecting identical and nonidentical stimuli respectively. They will highlight specific procedural aspects to promote stimulus and response generalization. The authors of study 2 will present data on using the relational evaluation procedure and multiple exemplar training to teach increasingly complex derived relational responding across various frames, including comparison, analogy, and deictics (perspective-taking). Finally, Maithri Sivaraman will discuss the scope of these RFT-based training programs and review considerations to promote flexibility in derived relational responding.

Intermediate

Identifying similarities and differences between stimuli has been widely recognized as an important skill in early childhood development. This skill has held a prominent place in preschool academic curricula, and early intervention programs rightfully place an emphasis on identity matching in young children. However, previous research with children with developmental disabilities has shown that those with generalized identity matching do not always demonstrate oddity responding. Teaching children to identify identical and nonidentical stimuli along concrete physical dimensions is a key foundation to more complex relational responding involving abstract stimuli. Three young children with language delays enrolled in an ABA centre in India participated in the study. During baseline, all three children always selected identical pictures irrespective of whether the contextual cue presented was “same”, “different”, or a nonsensical cue “blah blah”. We conducted conditional discrimination training across multiple exemplars and found that the intervention was effective. All three children matched identical and nonidentical stimuli based on relevant contextual cues, and did not select any stimulus when the nonsensical cue was presented. These responses transferred to untrained stimuli and were maintained over time. The authors will discuss practical considerations to teach identity matching and oddity responding in early intervention programs.

Relational Frame Theory (RFT) has shown that arbitrarily derived relational responding (ADRR) is operant behavior, and that teaching ADRR produces flexible, functional, and meaningful language development in children with language delays. Furthermore, RFT sees operant acquisition of various patterns of relational framing as crucial to cognitive and linguistic development, and it has explored the emergence of a range of psychological phenomena (e.g., analogy, perspective-taking) in these terms. This talk examines a novel, RFT-based curriculum using the relational evaluation procedure and multiple exemplar training to teach increasingly complex derived relational responding across various frames, including comparison, analogy, and deictics (perspective-taking). Participants included 8- to 15-year-old autistic children who did not demonstrate arbitrary relational responding at intake. All participants successfully generated derived relational responses across frames and levels of complexity. Protocol training sequences from nonarbitrary to arbitrary relations will be described, and data showing the efficacy of the RFT-based language intervention will be shared.

Racial microaggressions are chronic insults and slurs committed against non-White individuals based on their race/ethnicity. This study aimed to expand this literature by interviewing Black Brazilian women living in Australia. Eight participants were interviewed three times each. The prompts inquired about their experiences of racial microaggressions, the contexts they occurred, and how they reacted and dealt with them. All participants declared having experienced racial microaggressions by White Australians on multiple occasions. The most common categories found were "not being a real citizen", "assumptions about intelligence, competency, or status", "second-class citizen/ignored and invisible", "avoiding and distancing", and “environmental exclusion”. Most microaggressions happened in the work environment, followed by daily interactions with strangers, acquaintances, and/or friends. All participants tended to respond to those in a non-confrontational manner (refraining from replying or pointing out that the person was being racist) to avoid conflict, especially in the work environment. Two participants also responded in a confrontational manner at times by telling the perpetrator that their behavior was racist. To deal with the situation, participants: a) do not share those experiences with anyone to avoid making them worry about them, b) share those occurrences with their family and some Black friends, and/or c) avoid going out with people who are perpetrators.

Junior BCBAs, and behavior analysts within their first 5 years of practice, including practitioners, supervisors, etc., individuals currently enrolled in or recently completed graduate-level work interested in race relations and prejudice.

Mental health and chronic invisible illness are issues that many practitioners deal with on a daily basis, yet little emphasis on having a discussion around these occur in the field of applied behavior analysis. The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration reported in 2021, that “57.8 million people in the United States suffer from mental health conditions” and the American Hospital Association says that 133 million American’s suffer from “at least one chronic illness”. Based off this information, we can easily conclude that there are practitioners in the field of applied behavior analysis are not immune from these statistics. Unfortunately, these labels can be stigmatizing on a number of levels. At times, many with mental health and/or chronic illnesses may experience judgement on the ability to practice effectively by employers, clients that they serve, and colleagues. This panel discussion will focus on defining mental health illness, chronic illness and how to navigate removing the stigma around practitioners with mental and chronic illnesses. Concepts that will be explored will be: learning self-compassion by clinician’s with identified mental and/or chronic illness, advocacy in the workplace using the American’s with Disabilities Act to set accommodation’s, creating work-life balance, and boundary setting using tools such as the ACT matrix.

Prerequisite skills should include: foundations in acceptance and commitment therapy and self-monitoring.

This presentation will highlight the tenets of effective instruction as they align to a behavior analytic framework. Direct, explicit, and intentional instruction will be showcased. Further, leaders, no matter the organization, can work more effectively with students, staff, and faculty using the principles of effective instruction and can interpret performance through a behavior analytic lens. Scenarios will be shared.

Behavior analysts, educators, higher education administrators

Verbal behavior extends the speaker’s ability to operate on the environment by transcending the boundaries of mechanical reinforcement across time and space. Moreover, a fluent speaking repertoire presupposes the establishment of one’s own self identity. The use of modern technology has led to various judgmental aids that may facilitate behavior-analytic intervention for individuals with autism and related disorders, for whom verbal behavior is a core deficit. This symposium focuses on the future of verbal behavior research and intervention through the use of: (1) Telehealth technologies to enhance the outreach and dissemination of behavior-analytic intervention, (2) Novel ways of producing stimuli for the visual analysis of developing verbal behavior repertories, and (3) Artificial intelligence to facilitate discrimination training between children with autism who will and will not develop verbal behavior. Across three papers, we describe a series of technological innovations along with their implications for enhancing behavior-analytic intervention for individuals with autism.

Participants should already be familiar with the elementary verbal operants described by Skinner (1957).

Among the heterogeneous population of individuals with autism, as many as ? are functionally nonverbal. The failure to develop functional language has been attributed to a paucity of resources for families combined with a lack of direct services, and a dearth of research on individuals with profound autism. However, even with early intensive behavioral intervention some children with autism will continue to present with significant language deficits. The ability to develop phrase speech - consisting of non-echoed, spontaneous utterances of three or more words - is a critical milestone of language development. For children with autism, who do not show typical language development, a growing body of literature supports the use of echoic prompts toward the development of other verbal operants. Consequently, the ability to discriminate between individuals that will and will not develop an echoic repertoire would be helpful for behavior analysts and other service providers. With the help of a deep neural network, we created a machine learning model to predict the extent to which children with autism will echo the verbal behavior of others. Here we present the results of our predictive model, implications for treatment, and questions about how artificial intelligence may shape the future of behavior-analytic intervention.

Wide-reaching health promotion interventions are needed in influential, trusted community settings to address the disproportionate burden of disease in communities of color. Leading health institutions, such as the National Institutes of Health (NIH), have recognized the importance of community engagement in designing, delivering, and evaluating large-scale health promotion interventions that can widely reach populations heavily burdened by debilitating health conditions, such as COVID-19. Also recognized is the importance of cultural tailoring to increase acceptability and “fit” with community norms, values, traditions, and infrastructure. Community-based participatory research (CBPR) provides an approach to enhance collaborative community-health-academic research partnerships that can influence uptake of new behaviors at the community level, particularly when community-led strategies are used. Here, the utility of CBPR to design, rapidly implement, and assess the impact of a large-scale, religiously tailored COVID-19 prevention intervention (A Faithful Response to COVID-19) on the uptake of COVID-19 testing in African American churches is described. This NIH-funded, clinical trial with 16 churches (N=981 church-affiliated participants) engaged African American faith and health agency partners in all phases of the research study – while taking place during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Outcome findings indicated the religiously tailored intervention had a significant impact on the number of COVID-19 tests completed. The successful intervention model was then used to rapidly develop and launch a citywide COVID-19 vaccination and health services initiative. Recommendations in designing and testing large-scale behavior change interventions with community and health partners to address health disparities, including those heightened by COVID-19, are also discussed.

Persons from multiple fields (e.g., psychology, health science researchers, healthcare, communications, and community and government organizations) who are interested in large-scale health promotion strategies and community engagement as a process to enhance health intervention feasibility, acceptability and impact, particularly with underserved populations.