A competing stimulus assessment is used to identify stimuli that are associated with a low level of challenging behavior and a high level of engagement. These stimuli are often used as a treatment component for challenging behavior that is maintained by automatic reinforcement. One limitation of implementing competing stimulus assessments is that…

Sensory processing differences are widely reported in autism. However, our understanding of sensory profiles in this population has been complicated due to the heterogeneous presentation of sensory symptoms. We addressed this by using latent profile analysis, allowing for the identification of more homogeneous sensory classes in a large cohort (n…

This triple-arm, double-blind, randomized clinical trial investigated the effect of multisession prefrontal transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) on social functioning in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). A total of 105 individuals (age 14-21 years) diagnosed with ASD were randomized into the active-tDCS, sham-tDCS, and…

Despite its advantages, discrete-trial instruction (DTI) has been criticized for producing rote responding. Although there is little research supporting this claim, if true, this may be problematic given the propensity of children with autism to engage in restricted and repetitive behavior. One feature that is common in DTI that may contribute to…

Antecedent choice and consequence choice procedures are often used as interventions to increase on-task behaviour and reduce problem behaviour. This systematic literature review considers the conditions under which individuals show a preference for choice. Results suggest that preference for choice is variable, with some individuals preferring…

The current study extends the literature on task interspersal (TI) by comparing the effects of four different TI ratios on the efficiency of skill acquisition and on levels of problem behavior in children with autism spectrum disorder and related disorders. The four ratios of TI were 3:1, 1:1, 1:3, and 0:1 mastered-to-acquisition tasks. An adapted…

When a functional analysis indicates problem behavior is reinforced by socially mediated consequences, functional communication training (FCT) is a commonly prescribed and well-established intervention (Carr & Durand, 1985; Tiger & Hanley, 2008). One limitation of FCT is that although problem behavior decreases, the functional…

Individual differences in emotional reactivity emerge early in development and predict important child outcomes. Unfortunately, methods used to assess these often fail to tap dynamic changes in emotion, obscuring nuanced relationships between maladaptive emotional reactivity and early internalizing psychopathology. We therefore explored the…

Early studies evaluating the relative preference for leisure compared with edible items suggested that, for most participants (>80%), edible items are more preferred than leisure items. Recent studies suggest more variability in the percentage of participants with this preference. The rationale for this variability could be sampling, setting,…

Purpose: Feeding challenges in children are common, at times reaching a severity that requires the placement and long-term use of enteral feedings. A significant barrier to advancing the oral eating of some tube-dependent children is the presence of oral aversion. Although some research exists regarding the treatment of tube-dependent children who…

The primary aim of this study was to evaluate and compare alternative modalities and stimuli used to measure receptive vocabulary skills in autistic children who are minimally verbal. This study systematically compared participants' outcomes on three different receptive vocabulary assessment conditions: a low-tech assessment that used a stimulus…

Commonly used in research settings, noncontingent reinforcement (NCR) is a function-based intervention for decreasing challenging behaviors (Carr, Severtson, & Lepper, 2009). Function-based interventions effectively change behavior through detailed analysis of why the behavior occurs (Lane, Kalberg, & Shepcaro, 2009). Practitioners…

The Good Behavior Game (GBG) is an effective intervention to reduce disruptive behavior. The GBG typically involves immediate stimulus presentation (e.g., delivery of a token) following disruptions; however, experimenters have also removed tokens contingent upon disruptions. In the present study, we compared the effects of the GBG-stimulus…

The objective of this study was to analyse the relations between the function of openness to the world, family functioning and child behaviour. In order to do that, a quantitative research was conducted with 171 biparental families from the South Region of Brazil, with children from four to six years of age. Two association hypotheses were…

Atypical sensory and repetitive behaviors are defining features of autism spectrum disorder and are thought to be influenced by environmental factors; however, there is a lack of naturalistic research exploring contexts surrounding these behaviors. This study involved video recording observations of 32 children with autism spectrum disorder (2-12…