Search

Individualized treatment packages were developed for 3 children with high-rate severe pica using a discrimination training paradigm and a behavioral assessment-based procedure known as empirically derived consequences. Children received empirically derived reinforcers for eating under appropriate stimulus conditions (i.e., eating food only from a plate and placemat that served as a discriminative stimulus) and empirically derived punishers for attempts to engage in pica. This treatment package resulted in marked reductions in pica and an increase in appropriate eating for all 3 children in a 'baited' analogue condition. In addition, low rates of pica were maintained for 9 months for all 3 children. These results suggest that treatment effectiveness may be enhanced when behavioral assessment data are used to identify potent consequences.

The development of effective training programs for persons with profound mental retardation remains one of the greatest challenges for behavior analysts working in the field of developmental disabilities. One significant advancement for this population has been the reinforcer assessment procedure developed by Pace, Ivancic, Edwards, lwata, and Page (1985), which involves repeatedly presenting a variety of stimuli to the client and then measuring approach behaviors to differentiate preferred from nonpreferred stimuli. One potential limitation of this procedure is that some clients consistently approach most or all of the stimuli on each presentation, making it difficult to differentiate among these stimuli. In this study, we used a concurrent operants paradigm to compare the Pace et al. (1985) procedure with a modified procedure wherein clients were presented with two stimuli simultaneously and were given access only to the first stimulus approached. The results revealed that this forced-choice stimulus preference assessment resulted in greater differentiation among stimuli and better predicted which stimuli would result in higher levels of responding when presented contingently in a concurrent operants paradigm. DESCRIPTORS: assessment, concurrent operants, predictive validity, reinforcer preference, severely mentally retarded

The COVID‐19 global health crisis compelled behavior analysts to consider alternatives to face‐to‐face services to treat children with feeding disorders. Research suggests telehealth is one method behavior analysts could use to initiate or continue assessment of and treatment for feeding disorders. In the current paper, we conducted pilot studies in which we analyzed chart records of patients with Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder; who graduated from an intensive, day‐treatment program; and transitioned to an outpatient follow‐up program. In Experiment 1, we analyzed the data of participants who received follow‐up both in‐clinic and via telehealth. In Experiment 2, we analyzed goal attainment for participants who received outpatient follow‐up either in‐clinic exclusively or via telehealth exclusively. Results of both studies showed that outcomes were equivalent along most dimensions for in‐clinic and telehealth services. We provide recommendations for telehealth feeding services and discuss other considerations relevant to telehealth service delivery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Little is known about the food preferences of children with a feeding disorder and medical diagnoses. Therefore, we conducted repeated paired‐stimulus‐preference assessments with foods to which we either exposed or did not expose 3 children with a feeding disorder and medical diagnoses during clinical treatment. Responding was relatively equivalent for exposure and nonexposure foods throughout the preference assessments, suggesting that preferences for foods did not change due to exposure during treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Results of several recent translational studies have suggested that correlating contextual or discriminative stimuli with the delivery and withholding of reinforcement for the functional communication response (FCR) may mitigate resurgence of destructive behavior, but few, if any, have isolated the effects of those stimuli. In the present study, we first trained the FCR, brought it under stimulus control of a multiple schedule, and thinned its reinforcement schedule in one stimulus context. Next, we conducted resurgence evaluations (i.e., baseline, functional communication training [FCT], extinction challenge) in two novel contexts to test the effects of the discriminative stimuli on resurgence. We programmed one context to include the (a) SD during the FCT phase to signal the availability of reinforcement for the FCR and (b) SΔ during a subsequent extinction challenge to signal the unavailability of reinforcement for the FCR. The other context did not include the SD during the FCT phase, nor the SΔ during the extinction challenge. We expected to see greater persistence of the FCR in the context that included the SD during FCT and less persistence of the FCR and less resurgence of destructive behavior in the context that included the SΔ during the extinction challenge. Obtained results confirmed this latter prediction, but we observed no reliable difference when the SD was present or absent during the FCT phase. Our results have relevance for practitioners in that they provide further empirical support for the use of discriminative stimuli when treating destructive behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Children with feeding disorders may pack food when they lack the oral‐motor skills, the motivation, or both to swallow. Presenting bites on the tongue with a Nuk brush, or redistribution, replacing packed food on the tongue, are two treatments whose relative efficacy is untested. In the current study, we compared the effects of (a) presenting on an upright spoon, (b) presenting on a Nuk, and (c) redistributing with a Nuk on two product measures of swallowing, which we refer to as 15‐s and 30‐s mouth clean, for three children with feeding disorders. Nuk presentation produced the highest levels of 15‐s mouth clean relative to Nuk redistribution and upright‐spoon presentation across participants. Levels of 30‐s mouth clean were higher during Nuk presentation and Nuk redistribution relative to upright‐spoon presentation for two participants. We discuss the oral‐motor skills and motivational deficits that might account for the findings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We evaluated the extent to which the positive reinforcement of communication would reduce multiply controlled destructive behavior in the absence of relevant extinction components. When edible reinforcement for appropriate communication and nonfood reinforcers for problem behavior were available simultaneously, responding was allocated almost exclusively toward the behavior that produced edible reinforcement. DESCRIPTORS: differential reinforcement, multiple control, establishing operations, concurrent schedules

Applied behavior researchers should always acknowledge overlapping data in their studies which are published in academic journals. In one instance, data from an initial study on reinforcement on escape-maintained behavior was not cited in a subsequent study. Readers were not informed that the same functional analysis methodology was used in both articles. Acknowledgment of overlapping data will ensure that authors, editors and journals will be reproached and that interpretation of data will be accurate.

Few data exist on operant mechanisms associated with drug overdose. In this investigation, a functional analysis indicated that life-threatening drug ingestion exhibited by a dually diagnosed youth was maintained by negative reinforcement. An operant intervention, derived from behavioral assessment data, reduced drug ingestion to near-zero levels.