Extra Credit 1

Hall, R. V., Lund, D., & Jackson, D. (1968) Effects of teacher attention on study behavior. Journal of   Applied Behavior Analysis, 1, 1-12

Study Design: This was a quasi-experimental multiple baseline across participants design. The authors used purposive non-probability sampling. The participants were recommended by their respective principals due to their 'disruptive' or 'dawdling' behavior. It was an ABAB design with a post-check to determine generalization.

Participants: The studies were conducted in two elementary schools in low SES areas of Kansas City, MS. Teachers were selected by their principals and the students were nominated by their teachers. It's interesting to see how much information was offered in 1968. Here is a direct quote, "Robbie was chosen because he was considered a particularly disruptive pupil who studied very little". "Rose" was a classmate of Robbies and was selected because of her poor study behavior which included lying her head on her desk, taking off her shoes, talking and getting out of her seat. Ken and Gary were also chosen due to their disruptive behavior."Joan" was chosen due to her 'dawdling' behavior and finally "Levi" also emitted high levels of disruptive behavior. 

Data Collection: Data was recorded on, "recording sheets lined with triple rows of squares. Each square represented an interval of 10 sec.". Row 1 was used to record student behavior, row 2 was teacher verbalizations and row 3 was teacher proximity. A symbol was used for notational purposes.

Data Analysis: Data was graphically displayed by transferring data from the data collection sheets to graphs. Percent of study behavior, intervals of teacher attention and percent of disruptive behavior were graphically displayed. Interobserver agreement (IOA) was analyzed by having a second observer periodically made simultaneous observation records. Agreement was checked interval by interval. The percentage of the of agreement of the records [# of agreements X 100 /(# of agreements + # disagreements)] yielded the percentage of IOA

Conclusion: The study found that contingent use of teacher attention, "..can be a quick and effective means of developing desirable classroom behavior". It was found that many of the "poor study" students were being reinforced for poor study habits and that when the contingencies shifted and they received teacher attention for studying their study habits improved. It was noted that these teachers did not have formal training in reinforcement principles and generally had good instructional control over their classrooms. The teachers found the reversal phases aversive and were happy when they went back to reinforcing good study habits. They finally noted that the materials the students were being asked to study were within their skill set and that if this were not the case then gains would be unlikely. Due to the fact that they incorporated not one but two reversals I do think the conclusions are valid.

Rehfeldt, R. A., & Root, S.L. (2005) Establishing derived requesting skills in adults with severe developmental disabilities. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 38, (101-105)

Study design: This was also a quasi-experimental design but this was a multiple probe design across participants with repeated probes for derived stimulus relations and derived requesting skills.

Participants: There were three participants who were diagnosed with severe mental retardation and were reported to have "rudimentary or no functional communication skills". "Sam" was 20 years old with a reported IQ of 21. Kenny was 34 years old with a measured IQ of 30 and Carl was 27 years old with an IQ of 25. He was also nonvocal. All three took medication. The medication doses were stable throughout the study.

Data Collection: The dependent measures were the proportion of correct responses during derived request and derived relations probes. Average IOA was 98% across all phases. The materials used included: a three-ring binder with 4 strips of Velcro. digital photos of preferred items, text of the preferred items and a stimulus placement board.

Data Analysis: Data was analyzed visually by graphing all of the results.

Conclusions: The authors stated that the results,"...illustrate that a reinforced history of relational responding is sufficient for the emergence of derived requesting skills in individuals with severe developmental disabilities". They went a little further by stating, "a history of reinforced relational responding may facilitate the emergence of novel forms of requesting and other verbal skills." This is a bold claim as the production of 'generative language' skills is the holy grail of any special educator. I am not going to engage in the debate raging about whether or not 'Relational Frame Theory' is useful or just is a re-packaging of stimulus equivalence theory but I will say that this study is not designed to support the claim that the participants emitted 'novel' forms of requesting. They did demonstrate that a well-known intervention is effective on adults with severe disabilities though.


(I put these here not to pad my word count but to follow the letter of the prompt:)


Hall, R. V., Lund, D., & Jackson, D. (1968) Effects of teacher attention on study behavior. Journal of   Applied Behavior Analysis, 1, 1-12

 

Rehfeldt, R. A., & Root, S.L. (2005) Establishing derived requesting skills in adults with severe developmental disabilities. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 38, (101-105)