The investigation systematically assessed whether four autistic children (5 to 7 years old) would improve their learning of discrimination tasks if they observed normal children perform the task correctly. In each case, the peer modeling procedure produced rapid achievement of the acquisition criterion which was maintained after the peer models…

Twelve proficient peer models without disabilities demonstrated a response chain for a targeted learning task each day and described the steps to three classmates with developmental disabilities, who observed. The peer models performed the response chains accurately and quickly and the students with disabilities acquired the response chains. (DB)