Substantial experimental evidence indicates that behavior reinforced on a denser schedule is more resistant to disruption than is behavior reinforced on a thinner schedule. The present experiment studied resistance to disruption in a natural educational environment. Responding during familiar activities was reinforced on a multiple…

Top-ranked items were identified during 30-min free-operant preference assessments for 9 individuals. Data from each session were analyzed to identify the item (a) that was engaged with first in each session and (b) to which the most responding was allocated after 5 min, 10 min, 15 min, 20 min, and 25 min had elapsed in each session. The results…

The choice-making behavior of 2 typically developing children who engaged in problem behavior maintained by negative reinforcement was evaluated within a concurrent-operants assessment that varied the quality of attention across free-play and demand conditions. The results demonstrated that it was possible to bias responding towards academic…

A functional analysis for a boy with Down syndrome and autism suggested that vocal stereotypy was maintained by automatic reinforcement. The analysis also showed that instructions and noncontingent attention suppressed vocal stereotypy. A treatment package consisting of noncontingent attention, contingent demands, and response cost effectively…

Multiple schedules of reinforcement have been used to teach children to recruit attention only when it is available, thereby minimizing disruptive requesting during instructional activities. This procedure involves alternating periods of continuous reinforcement (CRF) with periods of extinction and correlating each period with a distinct and…

Children who are diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (or who engage in behavior consistent with such a diagnosis) are often prescribed stimulant medications for hyperactive or inattentive behaviors. However, the mechanisms by which stimulant medications affect individuals' behavior are rarely evaluated. The purpose of the…

The self-injurious behaviors of nine subjects with developmental disabilities were observed in settings in which play materials, experimenter demands, or social attention were systematically varied. Although there was much between-subject and within-subject variability, higher levels of self-injury were consistently associated with a specific…

The initial purpose of the present study was to replicate procedures for teaching preschool children to recruit attention at appropriate times by having an experimenter signal the availability and unavailability of attention (i.e., arrange a multiple schedule involving reinforcement and extinction; Tiger & Hanley, 2004). Following the development…

This paper summarizes basic research on response effort in diverse applied areas including deceleration of aberrant behavior, attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder, oral habits, littering, and problem solving. The paper concludes that response effort as an independent variable has potent effects, and research exploring the applied benefits of…