Association for Behavior Analysis International

Matrix training has been used to promote generalized responding in the demonstration of targeted object, action, language routines (Goldstein & Mousetis, 1989; Dauphin, Kinney, & Stromer, 2004) by presenting the learner with stimuli in pairs and then assessing generalization across novel combinations of the same stimuli. Although this procedure is effective in determining emergence of untrained relations given the presentation of pairs, it deviates from a typical play scenario in which all materials are available at once. The present study was conducted to design a method of evaluating to a practical degree, generalization demonstrated in matrix training. Using a 3x3 matrix, two participants were taught to perform motor actions and vocalizations with three pairs of toys with video modeling. Following acquisition of trained targets, participants were exposed to two generalization tests repeatedly. In one test, materials were presented to the participant in pairs as they typically are in matrix training. In the other test, all materials were presented to the participant at one time. Both participants demonstrated more motor actions and vocalizations across learned and unlearned targets when objects were presented in pairs as compared to being presented will all materials at once.