We report an experiment in which observations of peers by six 3-5-year-old participants under specific conditions functioned to convert a small plastic disc or, for one participant, a small piece of string, from a nonreinforcer to a reinforcer. Prior to the observational procedure, we compared each participant's responding on (a) previously…

This study sought to further investigate the effects of an observational intervention for two participants on the reinforcing property of pieces of string. Pre-observational intervention data showed that the neutral stimuli (strings) did not function to reinforce two participants' responding to a performance task or learning three new skills that…