A-5 DESCRIBE AND DEFINE THE DIMENSIONS OF APPLIED BEHAVIOR ANALYSIS (BAER, WOLF, & RISLEY, 1968) ©

 Target Terms: Generality, Effective, Technological, Applied, Conceptually Systematic, Analytic, Behavioral 

Generality

Definition: Behavior change that lasts over time, appears in environments other than the environment which it was taught and/or spreads to other behaviors not targeted by the intervention. 

Example in everyday context: As a child, you learned how to use the microwave (and the toilet, and the sink, and the doorknob, and the remote control…). Throughout the years, you have used different microwaves (and other items) in various locations without being taught again. This represents generality, since you were not explicitly taught how to use every microwave you have ever encountered. 

Example in clinical context: An RBT® at a residential treatment facility is implementing an intensive toilet training procedure with a client. The RBT teaches the child how to request “toilet” and using the bathroom at the facility. The client masters using the restroom in this setting. When the client is at school, they demonstrate the same behavior of requesting to use the toilet and successfully voiding without being taught at school. Data demonstrate that the client is 100% successful in requesting and using the toilet even six months after toilet training. This behavior change has generality because it has lasted over a long amount of time and is reported to occur in different environments without explicit instruction. 

Example in supervision/consultation context: You teach a paraprofessional how to run manding sessions with Client A. Without further instruction, the paraprofessional then demonstrates the ability to run manding sessions with Client B. This behavior change demonstrates generality because the paraprofessional was able to perform the behavior outside of the original learning parameters.

Why it matters: Generality is an important outcome of behavior programs because it demonstrates additional dividends in terms of behavioral improvements. The more generality a behavior program has the more successful a person can be across environments and over time. A great deal of our day-to-day success relies on our ability to apply skills we have learned in related, but different, circumstances.

Effective 

Definition: Behavior that changes in a practical manner that result in clinical or social significance. 

Example in clinical context: A behavior analyst is researching an appropriate intervention designed to target tolerance for non-preferred activities for a particular learner. Two interventions are trialed with the learner. Both of them are acceptable to the client and caregivers, and realistic given their needs. Intervention A was found to be increase tolerance by 30% over baseline and Intervention B was found to increase tolerance by 45% over baseline. The behavior analyst concludes that Intervention B should be implemented, and continues to monitor the client’s behavior data related to their tolerance goals.

Example in supervision/consultation context: You begin supervising a new trainee, and decide to implement the same supervision curriculum as you have been using with former trainees. In the past, this curriculum has yielded 100% pass rates on the board exam, and your trainees in the past quickly demonstrated skill increases. However, after two weeks, you review your new trainee’s progress and find that their skills have not significantly changed. Guided by ABA’s commitment to being effective, you must investigate the problem further and make changes to ensure that your supervision services are effective.  

Why it matters: Behaviors targeted for intervention must be meaningful, significant and promote long term, positive changes in the participant. The goal is to improve the quality of life of individuals across settings. The great emphasis placed on effective treatment for each individual client is sometimes at odds with the philosophies of other professional disciplines with whom we collaborate.

Technological 

Definition: All procedures of an intervention, data and results of an experiment or study are clearly outlined in detail so they can be understood, replicated and implemented by anyone with the prerequisite skills. 

Example in everyday context: You find a recipe for a cake on the internet. The recipe lists the ingredients and how to use them to make a cake. This recipe is technological because it includes the information needed to complete the task. 

Example in clinical context: You have conducted a research study with several children who engage in self-injurious behavior and find a combination of a reinforcement and punishment procedure that worked well with all of the children in the study. You prepare your procedure, data, results and analysis in a professional paper to share with colleagues. After your colleagues review your research, they report to you that it was so well written they could implement the same procedure in their own practice. Your research paper demonstrates the dimension of technology, as it included all elements that were required to complete your study as well as provide sufficient detail in terms of analysis and results. 

Example in supervision context: A behavioral consultant is training a newly hired paraprofessional on a student’s behavior plan. The behavioral consultant outlines each step with sufficient detail and clarity for the paraprofessional. The paraprofessional acts out the implementation of the behavior plan without making any mistakes. This demonstrates that the behavioral consultant wrote the plan out technologically since it was clearly understood and performed by another person. 

Why it matters: Behavior changes methods will not be effective if practitioners cannot replicate them. Therefore, descriptions of procedures must be teachable and easy to understand by others so they can be implemented with fidelity. 

Applied

Definition: The commitment to supporting improvements in people’s behaviors to enhance their quality of life. 

Example in clinical context: A behavior analyst “inherits” a learning plan for a high school student with Autism. The plan involves learning goals such as sorting pictures, copying sight words, and labeling colors and numbers. None of these skills are meaningful given the client’s characteristics, so you collaborate with others and change the plan to include skills that will make a difference in the person’s life, such as manding for wants and needs, self care, community safety, and leisure skills.  

Example in supervision context: You are a new consultant in a classroom for children with challenging behaviors. You make sure to assess the skills and needs of the teacher, and then provide skill-building sessions for the teacher, based on what they need to be able to do in order to do their job more effectively. 

Why it matters: The applied dimension of applied behavior analysis must target to improve the social, academic, language, daily living skills and day to day experiences of the client and other stakeholders. In other words, we should often ask, “Is this meaningful?”

Conceptually Systematic

Definition: All procedures used in practice should be related to the basic behavioral principles of behavior analysis from which they were derived. 

Example in clinical context: A behavior analyst is reviewing their client’s treatment plan with the parents. When describing how the behavior analyst will teach replacement behaviors for escape maintained aggression, the parent suggests, “Why can’t we redirect them with deep pressure and using a weighted blanket?” The behavior analyst kindly explains that this would be entirely inconsistent with the nature of the problem, and would therefore be unlikely to help the family reach their goals. Therefore, the suggested strategies cannot be written into the plan.  

Example in supervision context: A teacher tells you that their 10-year-old client “Isn’t repeating many words yet, because they’re not there developmentally.” You suggest that a closer look at the specifics of the problem, rather than assuming that the skill will eventually happen in time, would be appropriate. After your coaching, the teacher uses shaping procedures to systematically enhance the student’s echoic repertoire. This teacher is now demonstrating the use of conceptual systems in their teaching of echoic behavior. 

Why it matters: Relating specific behavioral procedures to basic principles enables the practitioner or researcher to derive other similar procedures from the same principles. These systems of behavioral procedures become an integrated discipline rather than a collection of “behavioral tricks”, with the ability to lend themselves to systematic expansion. 

Analytic 

Definition: The demonstration of a reliable functional relationship between environmental changes (assessment/intervention) and target behavior changes. Most basically, being analytical means making data-driven decisions.

Example in clinical context: A functional analysis is conducted with a client who engages in hitting others. The results demonstrate that the behavior of hitting others occurs almost exclusively when a demand is placed on the client, and that hitting increased over time when staff removed demands contingent on hitting. Results of a subsequent treatment evaluation indicate a functional relationship between hitting others and the removal of demands.  

Why it matters: In order to do our work, we need to know if there is a reliable functional relationship between our interventions and the client’s behavior change (skill acquisition or behavior reduction).

Behavioral 

Definition: Observable and measurable behavior should be the focus of our work. 

Example in clinical context: A behavioral consultant takes frequency data on a client who engages in several types of appropriate social interactions (greetings, responding to questions, nodding when others are speaking, saying goodbye before leaving, etc). Each type of behavior has an operational definition. The consultant records the data as they are observing the client by following the operational definitions.  

Example in supervision/consultation context: You assign your supervisee to collect data on a student’s out of seat behavior during instructional time. The supervisee comes back and reports they did not observe the target behavior, but instead recorded every instance the student appeared to be daydreaming. You explain to your supervisee that “daydreaming” means different things to different people, and is not an observable or measurable behavior. You encourage your supervisee to continue to observe the student and to collect data on the target behavior.

Why it matters: This dimension requires behavior analysts to be precise and objective in their measurements of the target behavior. We cannot do our work unless we know exactly what we are working on!

A-4 DISTINGUISH AMONG BEHAVIORISM, THE EXPERIMENTAL ANALYSIS OF BEHAVIOR, APPLIED BEHAVIOR ANALYSIS, AND PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE GUIDED BY THE SCIENCE OF BEHAVIOR ANALYSIS ©

 Target Terms: Behaviorism, Experimental Analysis of Behavior (EAB), Applied Behavior Analysis, Professional Practice Guided by the Science of Behavior Analysis 

Behaviorism

Definition: The philosophy of the science of behavior. It emphasizes objective methods of investigation and is rooted in the assumption that behavior results from interactions between the environment and individual variables (such as prior learning history).

Example in everyday context: Your friend is uncharacteristically “snappy” with you over the phone one night. In deciding how to respond to the situation, you operate from the assumption that there is a scientific explanation for this behavior. (You do not assume that “She’s just being mean for no reason!”) 

Example in clinical context: You are teaching a client self-management strategies to help them with their overeating behavior. You instruct them to remove all junk food from their home, since you know that when the client sees junk food, they are more likely to eat it. You also instruct your client to avoid the junk food aisles at the grocery store and to only shop the perimeter of the store since that is where the healthy options are. Behaviorism is at work, since you are assisting the client with altering their environment to reduce stimuli that occasion overeating behavior, while providing them with alternative options to meet their goals. 

Example in supervision/consultation context: A teacher is making the classroom schedule for the day. They make sure to proactively structure reinforcement following transitions, since this is a time that the students in the class historically have engaged in the most problematic behavior. The teacher is exercising an understanding of behaviorism, since they are taking precautions to arrange the environment in such a way to promote the most success from their students. 

Why it matters: Behaviorism encourages that hypotheses be tested using experimental methods and that environmental conditions be explored. Behaviorism is understanding how the environment works so that behavior can be understood in context.  

Experimental Analysis of Behavior (EAB)

Definition: The scientific study of behavior to study behavior for its own sake. 

Example in clinical context: A researcher in a lab is studying the effects of various reinforcement schedules using mice as subjects. The mice complete a maze and receive food along the way. The researcher finds that mice complete the maze faster when they used a variable ratio schedule of reinforcement rather than a fixed interval schedule of reinforcement. 

Why it matters: EAB does not investigate the social validity or relevance of behavior. Though it provides a solid scientific foundation for behavior principles to be used in real word settings outside of the laboratory, it is not in itself applied research.

Applied Behavior Analysis

Definition: The application of behavioral principles to human subjects as it related to areas that matter to people (e.g., classroom management, instructional methods, generalization and maintenance of learning, health and fitness, communication, etc). 

Example in clinical context: A clinician is studying the effects of a token economy with a group of subjects in a clinic who all present with aggressive outbursts. The hypothesis of the study is that the implementation of a token economy will decrease the amount of verbal aggressive outburst the subjects. 

Example in supervision/consultation context: A doctoral student is conducting their dissertation research in a school setting on learning outcomes of students using direct instruction verses an alternative instructional method. They want to compare which instructional method has the greatest learning outcomes for students. 

Why it matters: Applied behavior analysis uses the methods of experimental analysis of behavior and applies it to human subjects. Participants of this research benefit by learning new behaviors which improves their quality of life. The integration of scientific inquiry and person-centered clinical programming is central to the practice of ABA.

Practice Guided by the Science of Behavior Analysis 

Definition: Delivery of interventions to clients that are guided by the principles of behaviorism and the research of experimental analysis of behavior and applied behavior analysis. 

Example in clinical context: A behavioral psychologist is implementing a chaining procedure to teach a client how to interact safely with a sibling. The intervention steps, including when to provide reinforcement, are guided by the research in applied behavior analysis. 

Example in supervision/consultation context: A behavior specialist is demonstrating to a teacher how to conduct a functional communication training by teaching a student to say “No”. The intervention is guided by the research in applied behavior analysis.  

Why it matters: Behavioral principles can be applied to real world situations, in order to help people, in a wide array of contexts and by a variety of different interventionists.

A-3 DESCRIBE AND EXPLAIN BEHAVIOR FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF RADICAL BEHAVIORISM ©

Target Term: Radical behaviorism 

From a radical behaviorist’s perspective, there is no meaningful differences between public events (observable, measurable behaviors) and private events (covert behaviors such as emotions and thoughts). This has extremely profound implications.

Radical Behaviorism 

Definition: A branch of behaviorism that includes thoughts and feelings in addition to observable behavioral events. (Distinguished from methodological behaviorism.)

Example in clinical context: Your client engages in intense ritual behaviors which include wearing certain clothing items at certain times of the day. When you try to interrupt the client’s engagement in the ritual, they become extremely aggressive toward you. A team member suggests that this behavior is caused by feelings of frustration. As a radical behaviorist, you do not operate under the assumption that feelings cause behaviors. Rather, feelings can make things in the environment more or less valuable.

Example in supervision/consultation context: A BCBA ® is observing a teacher deliver instruction to a small group of students. As the BCBA is observing, they notice the teacher seems less enthusiastic in their delivery of the content and has trouble sticking to the classroom reinforcement plan. The teacher later explains this by stating that, “I keep thinking that I’ll do a bad job whenever you observe me, so then I mess up the plan.” From a radical behaviorism perspective, the BCBA does not accept that thoughts cause behavior. Rather, thoughts are behavior. Now that this important information from the consultee has been revealed, it will be important for the BCBA to consider how to address the problem in a manner consistent with the laws of behavior. 

Why it matters: A radical behaviorism perspective, in addition to knowledge of principles of behavior, can help scientists and practitioners consider the role of private events without drifting to mentalistic explanations for behavior. 

A-2 EXPLAIN THE PHILOSOPHICAL ASSUMPTIONS UNDERLYING THE SCIENCE OF BEHAVIOR ANALYSIS (E.G., SELECTIONISM, DETERMINISM, EMPIRICISM, PARSIMONY, PRAGMATISM) ©

Target Terms: Determinism, Empiricism, Experimentation, Replication, Parsimony, Philosophical Doubt, Pragmatism, Selectionism 

When we engage in scientific inquiry, we are accepting a set of assumptions about how the world works. Without these shared assumptions, we would not be able to agree on any resulting findings, and it would be impossible to build a body of scientific evidence.

Selectionism (Phylogeny and Ontogeny)

Definition: All life forms naturally and continually evolve through their learning history and evolutionary development. This happens at an individual level, and also on a species level.

Ontogeny: How the environment changes one individual over their lifetime. 

Example in everyday context: An ultra-marathoner may be able to run without stopping for many hours, without any harm to their health. Environmental variables related to exercise behaviors shaped this ability over the person’s lifetime.

Phylogeny: The natural evolution of a species which includes the inheritance of survival characteristics passed down from one generation to the next. 

Example in everyday context: Humans long ago evolves to be bipeds (walk on two legs). The vast majority of human individuals ambulate this way, and prefer walking to other forms of forward movement (such as crawling or slithering). The preference for walking, and physical adaptation to it, was shaped by millions of years of evolution.

Why it matters: Behavioral scientists must take into account how the environment impacts living organisms individually and as a species. The laws of behavior go beyond discrete occurrences of behavior.

Determinism

Definition: Events that occur in the universe do not happen “out of the blue.” Instead, they occur in an orderly and predictable manner. 

Example in everyday context: It is springtime and the rain showers have begun. The flowers in your garden begin to grow. Rather than thinking the seeds germinated by accident, you should assume that something (the frequent rain and change of seasons) was the catalyst which resulted in vegetation growth. 

Example in clinical context: A direct support professional working with a client observes them engaging in self-injurious behavior seemingly “out of nowhere.” The direct support professional decides to seek further support from a supervisor, as they do not accept the possibility that self injury could arise for no reason. The supervisor then designs an assessment process to help determine what might be contributing to the self injury.

Example in supervision/consultation context: A teacher requests an observation of a student in their room. He seems eager to work with you and wants to collaborate and receive feedback. When you arrive to begin the process at the appointed time, however, the teacher appears to resist your involvement and does not cooperate, despite your best attempts at building rapport. Puzzled, you consider how to better understand what might be responsible for this change in the teacher’s behavior.

Why it matters: Essentially, determinism means that we assume events are related in systematic ways that can be investigated scientifically. Without determinism guiding scientific practice, it would be impossible to discover functional relations (i.e., cause and effect) between events because we would be happy to accept that things happen for “no reason.”

Empiricism

Definition: Objective observation of events in our environment, using information from (and only from) one or more of our five senses. Empiricism rejects the option of accepting things as truth that are only “known” through channels outside of our five senses (such as mystical powers) or someone “feeling” a certain way and presenting that as evidence for claims outside of their own experience.

Example in everyday context: You are chatting with a friend, who asks you what you feel is the most efficient way to burn calories. Whipping out your best scientific thinking, you reply, “That sounds like an empirical question, because observable evidence can be used to answer it. I wonder what the existing research says about this.” (If your friend’s question had been slightly different – for example, “What is your favorite way of exercising?” – an answer about your opinion would have been perfectly acceptable and not a violate of the principle of empiricism. Opinions are valid as answers when the question was about opinions.)

Example in clinical context: You are conducting a parent behavioral skills training session with parents of a teenager who engages in severe problem behavior and has been placed in a residential facility. The parents share that they believe their child engages in problem behavior due to “having a condition called Pathological Demand Avoidance.” They want to know if this condition can be cured so that the child can come home. You respectfully listen to their concerns, then explain that your role focuses on developing understanding of variables contributing to problem behavior, developing treatment interventions, and evaluating the effects of treatment in an ongoing manner using objective criteria. In this way, you informed the parents that your practice relies on empiricism.

Example in supervision/consultation context: You are working with a supervisee who is accruing their supervision hours in a school. During supervision, you review a case involving reading instruction. The supervisee says, “I am not sure which instructional strategies I should use to teach this student. Ms Gray said that she likes whole language instruction, and Mr Jones told me that he swears by a reading program that kids use on their tablets.” You help the supervisee develop a strategy to evaluate instructional practices that would be most beneficial for the student’s needs, using empirical methods rather than opinion.

Why it matters: Empiricism requires scientists to draw upon demonstrable phenomena rather than personal opinions. Essentially, empiricism states that knowledge comes from experimentation and experience (hence the term “empirical” used as a way to describe research or classify certain questions – an “empirical question” is one which can be answered using experimentation).

Experimentation

Definition: Requires the manipulation of the independent variable to see the effects on the dependent variable in order to demonstrate a functional relation. 

Example in clinical context: During therapy sessions at the residential treatment facility, your client perseverates on when their parents are coming to visit. This behavior has become very difficult to redirect using simple verbal statements. You introduce the use of a visual calendar to show your client what day of the week their parent comes to visit. Before you begin your therapy sessions, you start by reviewing the visual calendar with your client. The client does not ask when their parents are coming to visit for the entirety of your session. Then, you remove the visual calendar and the target behavior returns. You then reintroduce it, and the target behavior goes down once more. The introduction of the visual schedule (independent variable) appeared to have an effect on the amount of time the client spends perseverating on their parent visits (dependent variable).  Please see the sections of this site focused on experimental design to learn more about research methods.

Example in supervision/consultation context: A principal works with a consultant to increase first grade teachers’ use of opportunities to respond (OTRs) during their reading block. The intervention (independent variable) is 20 minute behavioral skills training (BST) session, followed by live coaching within the classroom. The behavior targeted for change (dependent variable) is the rate of OTRs during reading. The principal and consultant use a multiple baseline design across participants to demonstrate experimental control and inform the question of whether their intervention was effective. Please see the sections of this site focused on experimental design to learn more about research methods.

Why it matters: Experimentation is the basic strategy behind scientific inquiry. It involves manipulating variables to explore the relationships between them. Experimentation contributes to the knowledge base our work relies on. 

If you’re struggling with dependent versus independent variables, this may help: the INdependent variable is the INtervention.

Replication

Definition: The repeating of already-completed experiments in order to determine the reliability and usefulness of findings. We often think of repetition across empirical studies (for example, Dr Doe and colleagues replicate the previously published study conducted by Dr Smith, which was an extension of a study by Dr Jones). That is certainly one form of replication. Conceptually, however, replication is about bringing about a phenomenon more than once under similar conditions. In this sense, we can observe within-session replication within a few minutes, for example, if a client engages in a response every time a particular environmental change occurs. The examples below do not include replication across published studies, as it is the easiest form of replication to understand.

Example in clinical context: A standard functional analysis is scheduled to be completed with a new patient. The behavior analyst selects forms of aggression (specifically punching and biting) as the target behaviors. They test four conditions: tangible, demand, attention and a control condition. Each condition yields the same results, zero occurrences of the target behavior during the tangible condition, 20-23 occurrences of the target behavior during the demand condition, three to five occurrences of the target behavior during the attention condition and zero occurrences during the control condition. During the demand conditions, in addition to overall high rates of aggression, the aggression also occurred more reliably as a result of work presentation over the course of the session. (In other words, aggression appeared to come under the control of the presentation of work as this pattern was observed multiple times in succession.) Results of the FA suggest that aggression is maintained by escape.

Example in supervision/consultation context: You just started providing consultation to a group home manager. The two of you have agreed that the manager should start by working on implementing effective feedback with their staff members. Last week, you role played in-vivo feedback situations with the manager, and gave your own feedback on their performance in the simulated environment. This week, you observed the manager demonstrating the skills with their staff members with high fidelity. Since you understand the importance of replication, you do not leap to the conclusion that your feedback session last week was solely responsible for this week’s performance. You instead work with the manager to shape other skills, using the same process of role play and feedback, and evaluate the target skills (in other words, you replicate the intervention and take data on the outcomes).

Why it matters: Replication is the primary method which scientists use to determine the reliability and usefulness of their findings, as well as identify mistakes. This is why science is often called a “self-correcting” process. Several repetitions of the same experiment must be done in order for the scientific community to accept the findings into theory and practice. 

Parsimony 

Definition: Ruling out all simple, logical explanations before considering more complex or abstract explanations. “The simplest explanation should be the first explanation.”

Example in everyday context: You are walking down the hallway at school and you pass by a friend. You say, “Hello!” The friend continues walking and does not respond. You assume that the friend did not hear you, since this is the simplest explanation. (You would be willing to accept less likely explanations, such as your friend being suddenly mad at you, if you had additional evidence to suggest this.)

Example in clinical context: A consumer at a group home was recently up all night, disturbing other consumers. Staff assumed that the overnight worker forgot to give the consumer their nighttime medication. The staff nurse at the group home reviewed the consumer’s medication administration record and saw that they received their nighttime medication on time, so this could be ruled out as an explanation as to why they had disrupted sleep. A staff member recalls that night there was a heavy thunderstorm that lasted all night, which may have caused the consumer to have sleep disruption. The group home staff exhibited parsimonious thinking since they ruled out a simple explanation first (the possibility of missing nighttime medication) before they considered a more complex explanation (the loud thunderstorm that occurred during the night). 

Example in supervision/consultation context: You are conducting supervision with your supervisee who is a BCBA ® candidate. During this supervision, you are reviewing the supervisee’s caseload. The supervisee tells you that one of their clients engages in off task behavior after lunch and thinks it is because the client has too much sugar in their lunch, causing them to be more hyperactive. You encourage your supervisee to look for a simpler explanation for the client’s engagement in off task behavior. At your next supervision meeting, the supervisee tells you that they observed their client’s off task behavior after lunch and, after collecting data, determined that the client receives significantly less staff attention in the afternoon. This is a simpler explanation for the off-task behavior, and should have been considered (and possibly ruled out) first. 

Why it matters: Parsimony helps us guide our reasoning and decision- making processes in a logical and orderly manner, ruling out more likely explanations before exploring more complex possibilities. It helps us to identify reasonable explanations and solutions to the phenomena of interest. 

Philosophical Doubt 

Definition: Continue to question the truth of what is regarded as fact. Exercising philosophical doubt means having a very open, and very critical, mind about everything all the time!

Example in everyday context: Lucy does not generally drink caffeine. When she has been up very late studying, however, she has coffee the next morning before going to work. Lucy therefore only experiences the effects of sleep deprivation and the effects of caffeine together. She understandably misattributes certain effects; for example, she believes that feeling flushed and overly warm (an effect of caffeine for Lucy’s sensitive system) is instead due to being sleep deprived. However, one day she goes out with a friend and has coffee after a great night’s sleep. She is surprised to find that she experiences some of the bodily sensations which she previously thought were the result of sleep deprivation. She adjusts her thinking on the effects of sleep deprivation accordingly. Lucy practiced philosophical doubt by continuing to refine her perception of “the truth” as more information became available to her.

Example in clinical context: A newly hired behavior analyst reviews a patient’s records, including their functional behavior assessment data, dating back three years from the current date. The results of the functional analysis indicate that aggression toward others served a function of attention. However, interventions have not been successful at reducing aggression. Rather than relying on records that are three years old, the new behavior analyst conducts further assessment to determine if the original assessment still holds true. This new behavior analyst is operating under philosophical doubt, since they are demonstrating a healthy amount of skepticism about the results of a previously conducted functional analysis. 

Example in supervision/consultation context: A veteran behavioral consultant attends a learning seminar which describes a new instructional technique for individuals with multiple disabilities. The presenter claims that this method could be more successful than errorless teaching for certain learners. The behavioral consultant is skeptical, since errorless teaching has a large evidence base and has been practiced for many years. They conduct their own research and find more evidence that supports the new instructional technique under certain situations. The behavioral consultant has exhibited philosophical doubt in this instance, because they demonstrated a healthy amount of skepticism with regard to the new instructional technique, while not completely disregarding it simply because it was novel. 

Why it matters: Science, by definition, cannot be static (unmoving). It is dynamic because we our level of knowledge is constantly expanding. As practitioners, we frequently come into contact with all kinds of claims and information regarding both new and familiar “truths.” Scientists and practitioners need to continually adopt a critical eye when evaluating treatment claims, research results, and so forth. 

Pragmatism 

Definition: The philosophical attitude that something has value, or is true, to the extent that it leads to successful outcomes when practically applied. (“Truth is an effective action.”)

Example in everyday context: Bryan is interested in improving his general health through diet. He becomes familiar with the broad findings of the empirical research in nutrition, and finds that a diet rich in vegetables and lean protein sources has been linked to health improvements. Bryan changes his diet to be in line with these recommendations. He does not worry about which attributes of the foods he eats are the most impactful to his health, because this information would not further inform his actions. For example, the question of whether tomato seeds are disproportionately responsible for the nutritional value of tomatoes as a whole, while empirically answerable, is completely irrelevant to Bryan. He just eats whole tomatoes and moves on with his life.

Example in clinical context: You have been providing teletherapy via video to a family who need support with managing their children’s behavior. You have taken data on the beneficial effects of your praise on parent cooperation with you recommendations within sessions. When you praise, you always smile, nod, and look directly at the camera. Your supervisor has asked if you think the family is ready to transition to a consultation model where they record themselves implementing the interventions, and you respond with feedback via email. In this situation, a pragmatic consideration would be the extent to which your praise without the smiles, nods, and eye contact would continue to function as reinforcement.

Example in supervision/consultation context: You happen to like wearing blazers, and you always wear some form of blazer at work. You also, of course, make other choices consistent with professionalism. For the past several years, you have been providing consult to a team of community-based mental health workers. Measures of social validity and client outcomes indicate that your consult services are acceptable and valuable to the team and their clients. The question of whether your “business attire” contributes in some way to your success as a professional, while technically something you could investigate empirically, is irrelevant and not a pragmatic concern as long as it would not inform practice.

Why it matters: The science of applied behavior analysis has a focus on improving socially significant behaviors that will impact a person’s life in a positive way. Although there are various types of behaviorism, the practice of applied behavior analysis focuses on both private and public events as environmental variables which contribute to the meaningful analysis and treatment of problems. ABA has value to the extent that it is used effectively to improve peoples’ lives.

B-15: DEFINE AND PROVIDE EXAMPLES OF DERIVED STIMULUS RELATIONS ©

Target Term: Derived Stimulus Relations 

Derived Stimulus Relations 

Definition: A relation between two or more stimuli that is not directly trained and not based on physical properties of the stimuli. If A, B, and C all correspond to the same thing, and only A-B and B-C are directly trained, the relation drawn between A and C is derived.

Example in everyday context: A person is taught that the spoken word “dog” (stimulus A) corresponds to an actual physical animal (stimulus B). The person also learns that the animal (stimulus B) corresponds to the word “chien” in French (stimulus C). The relationship between “dog” and “chien” was never directly taught; it was derived.

Example in clinical context: A client is taught to read, and makes connections between the written word TRUCK and a real physical truck without having been directly taught this connection. Relations were derived between A and C through the following learning: written word (A) = spoken word (B) and spoken word (B) = physical object (C).

Why it matters: Derived stimulus relations can be used to teach complex verbal behavior as well as treat emotional and behavior problems. 

B-14: DEFINE AND PROVIDE EXAMPLES OF THE VERBAL OPERANTS ©

Target Terms: Mand, Tact, Echoic, Intraverbal 

Verbal operants are kinds of verbal behavior. They are not defined by how they appear (nouns, verbs, etc) but rather by how they function (what need they serve). Verbal Behavior Theory is a way to think about human language, including non-spoken communication and thoughts, in functional terms. “Speaker” and “listener” in ABA refer to broad roles not limited to spoken vocal language.

Mand

Definition: A type of verbal operant in which the speaker asks/requests what they need or want. 

Example in everyday context: You text a friend, “Hi! How’s it going?” This is a mand for attention from the friend in the form of a text response (and perhaps other forms of attention based on your history of texting this person).  

Example in clinical context: A client is experiencing hunger. She has a history of receiving food from staff members in her group home when she asks. The client goes to her picture icon book, locates the “I want” and “pretzels” icons, arranges them on the sentence strip, and finds a staff member to hand it to.

Example in supervision context: A consultee has been sitting in a training meeting with a consultant for over an hour. Based on past experience, she knows that the consultant will keep talking for a long time if he is not prompted to give participants a break. She glances at the clock and kindly says, “Wow, we’ve been talking for an hour! Time flies.” This is a disguised mand, because the speaker did not specify exactly what she wanted the listener to do. It was still a mand, however, because based on these two individuals’ learning histories, the consultant will respond by giving the participants a break (“Oh is that the time? Let’s take a break! I get so excited talking about verbal operants that I forget about that!”)

Why it matters: Human beings communicate their wants and needs through the process of manding. People of any age who have difficulty with requesting in an appropriate, understandable way can benefit from intervention designed to help them learn to do so. A variety of evidence based strategies, as well as alternative means of communication for individuals who do not speak, exist. It is extremely important to know what is controlling a behavior before determining that it is a mand, particularly in clinical practice with individuals learning to communicate. For example, a client who only asks for “cracker” when it is snack time and their teacher says, “It’s time for crackers. Go ahead and ask,” is not communicating! That behavior is under the control of the teacher’s prompt, not the client’s deprivation of crackers (which should be the MO if the client were manding for crackers). It is imperative that we teach mands that correspond to the MO our clients are experiencing in the moment.

Tact

Definition: A type of verbal operant which the speaker names things and actions that the speaker has direct contact with through any of their senses (e.g., see, feel, smell, touch). Tacts are essentially labels.

Example in everyday context: You smell a baked goods as you walk down your street. You say to yourself, “Wow, it smells like blueberry pie!” 

Example in clinical context: A clinician working in early intervention is targeting joint attention for a toddler with a developmental delay. One day, the toddler sees a new toy horse in the classroom, looks back at the behavior analysts, points to the toy, and says, “Look! Horsey!!”

Example in supervision/consultation context:  A supervisee correctly labels vignettes as describing situations either in alignment with the ethics code or in violation of it.

Why it matters: We use tacting skills to communicate about our public (outside the skin) and private (inside the skin) environment frequently. As a clinical target, tacting skills should be approached with caution. Tacting programs help very young individuals working towards average language functioning to develop rich repertoires. For individuals with are older and have limited communicative repertoires, it makes sense to focus on manding as much as possible, and teach skills in a meaningful way first. For example, teach a person what blue means by teaching them to ask for “blue cup” with their favorite snack in it, rather than labeling blue picture cards.

Echoic

Definition: A type of verbal behavior that occurs when the speaker repeats the word of another speaker. 

Example in everyday context: You meet someone new at a party. As you shake hands, they say their name. You immediately repeat their name.

Example in a clinical context: A teacher is conducting an intensive teaching session with a student. The teacher says, “iPad”. The student says “iPad”. 

Why it matters: The ability to echo words and sounds is an essential aspect of learning to speak and produce a full range of sounds and words. Toddlers begin to expand their verbal behavior by first repeating words they hear from adults and other caregivers. Echoic behavior also plays an important role in more complex forms of verbal behavior such as incidental verbal learning, derived relational responding and joint control. For individuals who have echoic repertoires but few manding skills, an “echoic to mand transfer” protocol can be used to teach the use of language in a more functional way.

Intraverbal 

Definition: verbal behavior that is under the control of someone else’s verbal behavior.  

Example in everyday context: You friend asks you what you had for breakfast. You say, “I actually do not remember what I had for breakfast.” You would not have said that unless your friend had asked you that specific question.

Example in clinical context: A teacher is using intensive teaching methods to teach a student’s intraverbal repertoire. The teacher says to the student, “Row, row, row your…” The student responds, “Boat”.

Example in supervision/consultation context: Your supervisor asks you “What does the A stand for in the three-term contingency?” You respond, “Antecedent”. 

Why it matters: Our communicative repertoires would be pretty narrow if we didn’t have a way to respond linguistically based on other people’s language!

This page does not comprise a complete list of verbal operants; rather, it lists the best known and most clinically relevant categories.

B-13: DEFINE AND PROVIDE EXAMPLES OF RULE-GOVERNED AND CONTINGENCY SHAPED BEHAVIOR ©

 Target Terms: Rule Governed Behavior, Contingency Shaped Behavior 

There are two kinds of operant behavior: rule governed and contingency shaped.

Rule governed behavior gets pretty complex fast! If you’re interested in this topic, it makes sense to check out learning resources about Verbal Behavior Theory, Relational Frame Theory, and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy.

For our purposes, one important thing to note is that “verbal” in ABA does not mean “spoken” or “vocal.” I means, broadly, “communicative.”

Rule Governed Behavior 

Definition: Behavior that is under the control of a verbally mediated rule; behavior insensitive to immediate contingencies. 

Example in everyday context: You have always looked both ways before crossing a street, even though you have never been hit by a car or seen anyone else being hit by a car. Your behavior is not under the control of immediate contingencies, since nothing bad has ever happened to you in the context of crossing the street. Rather, your behavior is under the control of the verbally mediated rule, “If I cross the street without looking, I may be hit by a car and be hurt or killed.” 

Example in clinical context: An individual diagnosed with an eating disorder engages in many behaviors under the control of a set of weight-related rules, such as “If I gain 5 pounds, no one will want me anymore.” this behavior continues despite numerous direct contingencies aligned to incentive eating behavior (access to lots of appetitive food, loved ones telling the patient that they don’t care how much she weights, the patient’s own physical pain when very hungry, etc). 

Example in supervision context: A supervisee gets support and study help from a supervisor prior to practice quizzes, but still misses some ABA terminology questions. He feels that the supervision process is unfair, that others have an advantage, and decides to quit supervision. This supervisee’s behavior is under the control of rules related to “Things need to be completely fair for me in order to engage in them.” 

Why it matters: It is obvious, as we move through our daily lives, that many people engage in behaviors that are not under the control of immediate contingencies. The development of culture would be impossible without verbally mediated rules (for example, concepts of what it means to behave “ethically,” which often is not in the person’s immediate best interest!) We often encounter behavior patterns that are problematic, either because they are under the control of direct contingencies when they should be rule governed (overeating for example) or because they are under the control of rules when they should be guided by direct contingencies (adhering rigidly to a workout routine even after fracturing a bone). Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is beyond the scope of this definition, but is a modality based on ABA that helps shift behavior patterns by examining how to teach individuals to respond flexibly and adaptively to their environment using both contingencies and rules.

Contingency Shaped Behavior 

Definition: Behavior selected by direct consequences. 

Example in everyday context: We have a history of reinforcement via the presentation of water when we turn the shower on, so we continue to turn the shower on when we want to take a shower. Many, many of our daily behaviors fall into this category! 

Example in clinical context: A patient in an inpatient setting tried to elope from the unit. When they reached the door and attempted to open it, a loud alarm went off. It was very aversive, and functioned as a punisher for touching the door.  

Example in supervision/consultation context: A teacher wants to decrease their student’s calling out behavior during science class. The consultant coaches the teacher to provide differential reinforcement in the form of praise and points towards the school store contingent on hand raising. The students shifted the allocation of their behavior towards hand raising and away from calling out due to the new contingencies.  

Why it matters: We could not make it through our days, as individuals or as a species, without contingency shaped behavior. As clinicians, it is important to understand how direct contingencies shape behavior so that we can problem solve existing interfering behavior, as well as plan for skill acquisition programming.

B-12: DEFINE AND PROVIDE EXAMPLES OF MOTIVATING OPERATIONS ©

Target Terms: Motivating Operations, Conditioned Motivated Operations Reflexive (CMO-R), Conditioned Motivating Operations Transitive (CMO-T), Conditioned Motivating Operations Surrogate (CMO-S)

It can help to think of any MO as being along the “deprivation/satiation” continuum. For example, deprivation of attention from a friend increases the reinforcing value of attention from friends. Satiation on sleeping reduces the value of sleep as a reinforcer. Some environmental events are aversive in any amount (very loud noise or incredibly boring homework) and in those cases, it makes sense to think of the MO as “presentation of…” rather than “satiation on…”

Motivating Operations (Establishing Operations and Abolishing Operations)

Definition: MO is an umbrella term that captures both EOs and AOs within it. MOs are environmental variables that alters the reinforcing or punishing effectiveness of a stimulus. Essentially, MOs alter the value of things for a particular person in a particular context and time.

Establishing Operations (EO): A type of motivating operation that makes a stimulus more desirable (more effective as a reinforcer). 

Example in everyday context: The reinforcing effectiveness of water is established when you are very thirsty. Each time you are thirsty, you will increase the behavior that allows you to gain access to water. If you were not in a state of water deprivation, the value of water as a reinforcer would be low.

Abolishing Operations (AO): A type of motivating operation that makes the stimulus less desirable (less effective as a reinforcer). 

Example in everyday context: You just ate a very large meal, so you are satiated on food and food is not reinforcing to you for the next several hours. Your behavior changes to stop seeking food since you are no longer hungry. 

Why it matters: Motivating operations are antecedent variables that alter the value of something as reinforcement. When engaging in clinical problem solving, it is essential to follow a hypothesized behavioral function “upstream” and identify the corresponding MO.

Motivating Operations can be unconditioned (UMO) or conditioned (CMO). An unconditioned MO is one that did not require any learning to have a value altering effect. For example, deprivation of warmth establishes the value of warmth as a reinforcer, throughout the person’s lifespan and regardless of learning history. UMOs are basically motivational states that help us not die.

Conditioned MOs (see below) are learned, and depend on the person and their context. They also fluctuate across the lifespan.

Conditioned Motivating Operation Reflexive (CMO-R)

Definition: A condition or object that signals a worsening or improving of conditions. 

Example in everyday context: You start to feel tightness in your left eye (worsening condition), which you know from experience will lead to a blinding migraine in 15 minutes. The value of your migraine medication goes up.

Example in clinical context: A client sees their behavior analyst walk through the door and sit down in the free play area (improving condition). This client loves working with their behavior analyst, so the value of the free play area increases. 

Example in supervision/consultation context: A student is doing independent seat work. The teacher bring out the phonics books (worsening condition). The value of escape increases for the student, as phonics is associated with aversive contingencies for them.

Conditioned Motivating Operation Transitive (CMO-T)

Definition: An environmental variable that establishes/abolishes the effectiveness of another stimulus as a reinforcer.

Example in everyday context: Your house is locked. This establishes the reinforcing value of a key to unlock your house. 

Example in clinical context: A client wants to play with a light-up toy, but it is emitting a very weak light. This establishes the value of a new battery.  

Example in supervision context: A supervisee is completing an assignment and cannot remember the definition of CMO-T. They are motivated to be done with the assignment, so the value of their ABA textbook (which will give them the answer) increases.  

Conditioned Motivating Operation Surrogate (CMO-S)

Definition: A stimulus that acquired its effectiveness as an MO by being paired with another, previously established, MO.

Example in everyday context: During workdays, your scheduled lunch is 12:00 pm, and you are usually quite hungry by then. Today, you had a very filling breakfast and don’t feel very hungry at noon. However, when you look at the clock and see that it is noon, the presentation of the 12:00 on the clock serves as a CMO-S because it has been paired so often with being very hungry, so just seeing the clock display the time increases the value of food as a reinforcer.  

Example in clinical context: A patient engages in seeking medical treatment when no medical conditions are present. In this person’s past, pain from an untreated intestinal disorder was paired with benign everyday muscle soreness. Now, the pain from the intestinal disorder is gone, but the presentation of any muscle soreness establishes the value of medical care, just as intestinal pain did.  

Example in a supervision/consultation context: A consultee has a learning history involving the pairing of the presentation of aversive tasks (complex graphing assignment) with a particular supervisor. Now, the presentation of that supervisor’s directions serves to increase the value of escape, even if the task being assigned is quite interesting and easy.

B-11: DEFINE AND PROVIDE EXAMPLES OF DISCRIMINATION, GENERALIZATION AND MAINTENANCE ©

Target Terms: Discrimination, Generalization, Maintenance 

Discrimination

Definition: Occurs when a limited number of stimuli occasion a response. Discrimination skills are what we’re demonstrating when we put our food in the oven and not in the dishwasher. 

Example in everyday context: A child says “daddy” when they see their father but does not say “daddy” when they see other men. 

Example in clinical context: A behavior specialist is teaching their client to put away their laundry. The client sorts clothing by type (e.g., shorts, shirts, socks, etc.). The client sorts their clothing correctly without making any mistakes according to the clothing type. The client demonstrated discrimination based on clothing type. 

Example in supervision/consultation context: A BCBA candidate is learning to discriminate between the two types of operant conditioning. After many hours studying, the student learns the difference between the two types of operant conditioning behaviors and can demonstrate this by sorting multiple examples into the correct categories.

Why it matters: Discrimination is an important aspect of learning that enables the learner to contact reinforcement. Some forms of discrimination (blue versus green) are fairly easy for most people to master, while other examples of discrimination skills (such as labeling all the countries on a blank word map, or telling the difference between the truth and a lie) can be more challenging.

Generalization 

Definition: Occurs when a variety of stimuli occasion a certain response. generalization occurs across different individuals, environments, and times.

Example in everyday context: Greeting people in a variety of settings, times, and people (cashier at grocery store, librarian, person you pass while jogging, your spouse when they get home from work, etc).

Example in clinical context: A direct support professional is conducting a functional communication training with a client at a residential facility. The client begins to make requests with other direct support professionals who have not conducted the formal training with them. This is generalizations across individuals.

Example in supervision/consultation context: You are studying hard learning your ABA terminology. You begin to use these terms in your everyday language. This is generalization across settings.

Why it matters: Generalization is a critical element of learning. It is the reason why the human species have survived and been able to thrive in different environments. It can be helpful to think of generalization as discrimination’s counterpart. (Discrimination is at play when you select the brown ice cream rather than the white one when you want chocolate, and generalization is what’s involved in having little regard for which brown ice cream you choose, since they are all chocolate.)

Maintenance 

Definition: Following the removal of an intervention, the extent to which a response remains in an individual’s repertoire over time. 

Example in everyday context: A person learns how to ride their bike in their childhood and continue to maintain that skill into adulthood even though they may have not ridden a bike in many years. 

Example in clinical context: A client is taught to read using evidence based interventions, and then maintains the ability to read over many years. 

Example in supervision/consultation context: A supervisor teaches  a group of supervisees how to use Habit Reversal Training/Comprehensive Behavioral Intervention for Tics. The supervisor teaches discrimination between examples and non-examples of each component skill, and supervisees learn to generalize the intervention by practicing across multiple individuals. Months later, the supervisor observes the supervisees demonstrating use of the intervention. The extent to which the skills are being done as taught is the extent to which those skills maintained.

Why it matters: Maintenance of learned skills promotes further learning opportunities since basic skills can be taught, mastered and built upon. It is absolutely crucial to consider naturally occurring reinforcement in the client’s goal environment when programming, since ultimately, we aim for the client’s behavior to maintain over time while relying as much as possible on naturally occurring forms of reinforcement.

B-10: DEFINE AND PROVIDE EXAMPLES OF STIMULUS CONTROL ©

Target Term: Stimulus Control 

Stimulus Control 

Definition: Rates of responding happen exclusively, or at a higher rate, in the presence of a stimulus rather than in its absence.

Example in everyday context: You stop your car when you have arrived at your destination, as well as at red lights and stop signs, at crosswalks in the presence of pedestrians, and at yield signs when other vehicles are present. You do not stop your car at random points during your drive on the freeway. Your car braking behavior is under the control of specific stimuli.  

Example in clinical context: A client says “Hi!” when staff members prompt her by saying, “Say hi!” The client does not ever initiate greetings without this prompt. The client’s behavior of saying hi is under the control of the staff’s directive prompt. (This is a problem! For a greeting behavior to have social significance, it typically needs to be under the control of at least one of the following: (1) a person coming into the environment, and (2) a person stating a greeting, which can then be returned).  

Example in supervision/consultation context: A teacher engages in high rates of behavior specific praise statements when the behavior analysts consultant is in the room. The teacher uses few praise statements when the consultant is not there. 

Why it matters: Understanding the environmental variables controlling both interfering and adaptive behavior is very important when designing clinical programming. It is particularly applicable when considering how to teach independence and how to use prompting strategies.