Investigation of the reinforcing properties of vestibular stimulation with five multiply disabled severely retarded young children indicated that vestibular stimulation (10 seconds of swinging) was reinforcing to all subjects and was preferred (over food, praise, visual, and auditory stimulation) by four of the five children. (Author/DB)

To identify the most potent reinforcers for 10 young children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, the relative treatment utility of a verbal forced-choice questionnaire, child nomination, and direct observation was evaluated. Results demonstrated that all three methods were more likely to disagree than agree and that a forced-choice…

Monolingual children were assigned to two groups to examine the role of reinforcement in language acquisition. One group was differentially reinforced for use of foreign vocabulary. The other group was first reinforced nondifferentially for use of either native or foreign language and later differentially reinforced for foreign language use. (PCB)

The reactivity of normal preschool children's peer praising behavior to observer presence was investigated during baseline and intervention conditions. Evaluation of an intervention package designed to increase peer praising suggested reactivity to observation during intervention. Results have implications for evaluation of internal validity of…

Five children with autism participated in learning sessions involving trials of an acquisition task interspersed with trials of three maintenance tasks. Correct responses to acquisition tasks were continuously reinforced throughout all conditions; reinforcement for competent performance of maintenance tasks differed systematically. All children…

The behavior of special education students (age 12 and 16) was evaluated as they were presented with 2 academic response alternatives on concurrent reinforcement schedules. Both subjects allocated higher rates of responses to the richer schedule of reinforcement, although only 1 responded exclusively to the richer schedule. (Author/JDD)

Based on observations of children ages 21-25 months in play groups, investigates reactions of both peers and teachers to behaviors that could be identified and coded as male, female, or neutral. (Author/NH)

This study compared the effects of unequal and equal reinforcer duration during a functional analysis of aberrant behavior in an 11-year old with moderate mental retardation. Results showed that reinforcer duration affects the rate of aberrant behavior and may potentially alter functional analysis interpretation. (DB)

Noncontingent reinforcement (NCR) was applied to reduce the destructive behaviors of five-year-old quadruplets diagnosed with mental retardation and pervasive developmental disorder. Findings suggest that the effectiveness of NCR may be dependent on the use of a dense schedule of reinforcement initially and that systematic fading can increase the…

This study found that use of music as a reinforcer was highly effective in increasing productive and decreasing nonproductive behavior of 6 competitive swimmers (ages 12-16) during the dry-land portion of a practice session. Subjects rated the musical reinforcement favorably and elected to have the procedure continued. (Author/DB)

Two experiments with 15 individuals having profound mental retardation found difficulties in identifying reinforcers that were actually effective in treatment of chronic training needs. Research needs in evaluating training alternatives for people with profound multiple disabilities who move very little or who respond with very long latencies are…

This study evaluated the effectiveness of a brief, 2-minute pre-session stimulus preference assessment in predicting the levels of responding of four students (ages 6-9) with profound multiple disabilities. Use of the identified preferred stimulus resulted in higher levels of student responding during the instructional condition across all four…

We used functional communication training to teach Bob, a 10-year-old student with autism and severe language delays, to reject items by touching an icon. Our initial assessment revealed that Bob's behaviours serving a rejecting function consisted of pushing away, yelling, bear hugging-grabbing, and leaving. We used prompting, differential…

Three studies investigated environmental correlates of self-injurious behavior in seven developmentally disabled children and adolescents which were then later used for treatment. Correlates investigated included positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement, automatic reinforcement, and control. "Escape extinction" was successfully…

The study evaluated the effects of a time-efficient reinforcer assessment package with three preschoolers with autism. Systematic assessment of children's reinforcers for correct responding virtually eliminated nontargeted maladaptive behaviors, and yielded expected improvements in accuracy. (Author/DB)