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Although much has been written on the importance of translational research for bridging the continuum of basic science to clinical practice, few authors have described how such work can be carried out practically when working with patient populations in the context of ongoing clinical service delivery, where the priorities for patient care can sometimes conflict with the methods and goals of translational research. In this article, we explore some of the considerations for conducting this type of work while balancing clinical responsibilities that ensure high-quality patient care. We also discuss strategies we have found to jointly facilitate translational research and improve routine, clinical service delivery. A primary goal of this article is to encourage others working in applied settings to contribute to the increasingly important role that translational research plays in our science and practice by helping to better characterize and potentially lessen or remove barriers that may have impeded such investigations in the past.

Science evolves from prior approximations of its current form. Interest in changes in species over time was not a new concept when Darwin made his famous voyage to the Galapagos Islands; concern with speciation stretches back throughout the history of modern thought. Behavioral science also does and must evolve. Such change can be difficult, but it can also yield great dividends. The focus of the current special section is on a common mutation that appears to have emerged across these areas and the critical features that define an emerging research area-applied quantitative analysis of behavior (AQAB). In this introduction to the "Special Issue on Applications of Quantitative Methods," we will outline some of the common characteristics of research in this area, an exercise that will surely be outdated as the research area continues to progress. In doing so, we also describe how AQAB is relevant to theory, behavioral pharmacology, applied behavior analysis, and health behaviors. Finally, we provide a summary for the articles that appear in this special issue. The authors of these papers are all thinking outside the Skinner box, creating new tools and approaches, and testing them against relevant data. If we can keep up this evolution of methods and ideas, behavior analysis will regain its place at the head of the table!

A functional analysis is a set of procedures in which a behavior analyst uses single-case designs to systematically manipulate antecedent and consequent stimuli hypothesized to influence problem behavior and measures the effects of those manipulations using reliable, direct observation methods. The information gleaned from a functional analysis can often be used to prescribe effective treatments for violent and aggressive behavior. In this chapter, we describe the essential components of a standard functional analysis of violent and aggressive behavior and how those components can be altered to address unique or idiosyncratic functions of problem behavior. We also discuss recent advances and alterations to a standard functional analysis, provide practical suggestions for practitioners who may wish to incorporate functional analyses into their clinical work, and recommend directions for future research on functional analysis.

Intensive behavioral intervention units are clinical settings typically housed within a larger university-based or medical campus that exclusively admit clients referred for the assessment and treatment of severe problem behavior. The urgent and complex nature of these cases places exceptional demands on behavior analysts and requires a unique therapeutic approach and clinical structure to provide safe and effective service delivery. The purpose of this chapter is to orient those interested in pursuing a training experience on an intensive behavioral intervention unit by (a) outlining the requisite skills for effective clinical application, (b) discussing the unique structure of service delivery, (c) describing the specialized training and supervision that goes into managing behavioral staff, and (d) reviewing some considerations for successfully navigating regulatory and funding frameworks.

Most verbal behavior curricula for children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) focus on teaching multiple mands during the early stages of training (e.g., picture exchange communication system; Bondy & Frost, 1994). However, few, if any, of those curricula train children with ASD to differentially mand only for reinforcers that are reasonable for a caregiver to deliver in a given context (e.g., mands to cuddle at bedtime) and to refrain from manding for reinforcers that would be inappropriate to deliver in that context (e.g., mands to play outside at bedtime). In this study, we first taught a boy with ASD two initial mands. Immediately thereafter we brought those mands under the conditional discriminative control of a four-component multiple schedule with (a) S(1) correlated with one reinforcer available (i.e., edibles), (b) S(2) correlated with both reinforcers available (i.e., edibles or drink), (c) S(3) correlated with another reinforcer available (i.e., drink), and (d) S(Δ) correlated with no reinforcer available. Following treatment, the child displayed conditionally discriminated manding in accordance with each of the four components of the schedule. We discuss these findings relative to the potential benefits of bringing mands under both evocative and discriminative control.

This chapter introduces the background on socially reinforced problem behavior and provides alternative approaches on how to treat such behavior. Motivations, reinforcement, and strategies of treatment are discussed.

Chlorpyrifos (O,O-diethyl O-(3,5,6-trichloro-2-pyridinyl) phosphorothioate; CPY) is a widely used, organophosphorus insecticide that was first registered in the United States in 1965. It is available in flowable and granular formulations under the trademark Lorsban® and is registered in many countries for control of pests in soil or on foliage. Birds are potentially at risk following application of CPY because: (1) they forage in areas that could be treated with the pesticide, and (2) CPY has been shown to be toxic to birds under laboratory conditions when they were exposed to ecologically relevant concentrations in the diet. Here we present a refined assessment of risk to birds from application of granular or flowable formulations of CPY to crops in the United States at rates and frequencies of use approved on the current product labels. This assessment focused on bird species that are known to frequently forage in crop fields treated with CPY.

This paper presents a real-time segmentation method for curved needles in biological tissue based on analysis of B-mode and power Doppler images from a tracked 2D ultrasound transducer. Mechanical vibration induced by an external voice coil results in a Doppler response along the needle shaft, which is centered around the needle section in the ultrasound image. First, B-mode image analysis is performed within regions of interest indicated by the Doppler response to create a segmentation of the needle section in the ultrasound image. Next, each needle section is decomposed into a sequence of points and transformed into a global coordinate system using the tracked transducer pose. Finally, the 3D shape is reconstructed from these points. The results of this method differ from manual segmentation by 0.71±0.55 mm in needle tip location and 0.38±0.27 mm along the needle shaft. This method is also fast, taking 5-10 ms to run on a standard PC, and is particularly advantageous in robotic needle steering, which involves thin, curved needles with poor echogenicity.