The literature on the use of physical restraint with adults and children with mental retardation is reviewed, including person-to-person restraint, mechanical devices, and voluntary self-restraint. Conclusions regarding outcomes of contingent and noncontingent restraint, maintenance, reinforcing effects of restraint, and risk of injury are…

This review discusses the history of noncontingent reinforcement (NCR) and summaries findings from treatment research. It describes the use of NCR as a control procedure, NCR as a function-based treatment, considerations in the programming of NCR schedules, behavior-change mechanisms underlying NCR effects, and directions for future research.…

A brief negative-reinforcement assessment was conducted with five children (ages 4 to 14) with developmental disabilities with severe destructive behavior. Children were trained to engage in an escape response and were presented with a variety of stimuli. For each child, several stimuli were identified that may serve as effective negative…

A study investigated the validity of the Questions about Behavioral Function, a checklist designed to assess antecedent behavior, using a sample of 398 persons with mental retardation and self-injurious behavior, aggression, or stereotypies. The checklist was used successfully to derive clear behavioral functions across all three target behaviors.…

The study investigated the effectiveness of an instructional program designed to promote independent walking in a mentally and physically handicapped (cerebral palsied) preschooler involving a collaborative effort between a behavior therapist and a physical therapist in an interdisciplinary setting, a public school. (Author/DB)

This paper reviews the literature on functional assessment in the behavioral treatment of aggression in persons with mental retardation or developmental delays. Increased use of functional assessment and skill training is noted but no concomitant decrease in the use of intrusive procedures. (Author/DB)

Forty-one special education professionals and classroom aides, 47 residential care staff, and 74 high school students rated the treatment acceptability of three forms of physical restraint. A chair method of restraint was rated as more acceptable than other floor restraint methods by all three groups. (Contains references.) (Author/CR)

A study tested whether four students with mental retardation would substitute task-related behaviors for stereotypic behaviors when opportunity for active responding did or did not match level of motoric responding in a free-operant baseline. Students did substitute behaviors, with stereotypic behaviors occurring 1.5-14 times as much in the…

This article reviews applications of the applied behavior analysis ideas of B. F. Skinner and others to persons with both mental retardation and emotional disturbance. The review examines implications of behavior analysis for operant conditioning and radical behaviorism, schedules of reinforcement, and emotion and mental illness. (DB)

A study developed a systematic functional assessment package to reduce the stereotypy and self-injurious behaviors maintained by nonsocial reinforcement in two individuals with mental retardation. Differential reinforcement of zero rates of responding (DRO) procedures using stimuli within the targeted sensory classes were successful in eliminated…

This review focuses on correspondence training procedures, in which a subject makes statements about intended positive behavior and the statements are reinforced. The paper examines early research, generalization, maintenance, application to mentally retarded individuals, and the concept of self-control. (Author/JDD)

This analysis of the effects of self-management training on the acquisition, maintenance, and generalization of skills of persons with mental retardation found self-management training to be useful in promoting the maintenance of behavior change first effected by external control procedures. Training effectiveness may depend upon the cognitive and…

This study analyzed and compared the behavioral procedure standards of 39 state departments of special education and 41 state departments of developmental disabilities/mental retardation. Results are discussed in terms of systematic monitoring of procedures, staff training, procedures to increase behavior, prohibiting/restricting procedure use,…

A mindfulness-based, self-control strategy was developed for an adult with mental retardation and mental illness whose aggression had precluded successful community placement. He was taught a simple meditation technique that required him to shift his attention and awareness from the anger-producing situation to the soles of his feet. (Contains…

Two experiments to replicate P. E. Touchette's findings on the delayed prompt effect, with 34 subjects having mental retardation, found more variable results, with all five of the possible outcomes occurring with some subjects. The paper concludes that successful use of the delayed prompt technique depends on such factors as difficulty of target…