Some adults and children exhibit defensive behaviors to tactile or auditory stimulation. These symptoms occur not only in subsets of children with ADHD, autism, and Fragile X syndrome, but also in the apparent absence of accompanying disorders. Relatively little research explores the correlates and antecedents of sensory defensiveness. Using a…

Performance feedback has facilitated the acquisition and maintenance of a wide range of behaviors (e.g., health-care routines, seat-belt use). Most researchers have attributed the effectiveness of performance feedback to (a) its discriminative functions, (b) its reinforcing functions, or (c) the combination of the two. In this study, we attempted…

A. Pollatsek, E. D. Reichle, and K. Rayner argue that the critical findings in A. W. Inhoff, B. M. Eiter, and R. Radach are in general agreement with core assumptions of sequential attention shift models if additional assumptions and facts are considered. The current authors critically discuss the hypothesized time line of processing and indicate…

The effects of another person's gaze on physiological arousal were investigated by measuring skin conductance responses (SCR). Twelve able children with autism and 12 control children were shown face stimuli with straight gaze (eye contact) or averted gaze on a computer monitor. In children with autism, the responses to straight gaze were stronger…

The purpose of the present study was to extend previous research on reinforcer assessment by comparing effectiveness of stimuli identified by two preference procedures on teaching figure coloring to three children with disabilities in Turkey; and to find out what special education teachers think about social validation of the two preference…

The purpose of this study was to examine whether children with Asperger Syndrome and children with autism exhibit difference sensory profiles. The Sensory Profile (Dunn, 1999), completed on 86 individuals with Asperger Syndrome and 86 persons with autism matched for age, revealed differences in three of 23 areas evaluated: (a) Emotional/Social…

Objective: To examine in children the influence of maltreatment and associated psychiatric sequelae on behavioral responses to reward stimuli. Method: A computerized two-choice decision-making task involving probabilistic monetary gains was used to probe elemental processes of goal-directed actions. Using different risk contingencies, the authors…

College students (Experiment 1) and non-college adults (Experiment 2) studied a computer-based 31-frame lesson on electronics that offered help-screens containing text (text group) or illustrations (pictorial group), and then took a learning test. Participants also took a battery of 14 cognitive measures related to the verbalizer-visualizer…

This study examined effects of word writing on second language vocabulary learning. In two experiments, English-speaking learners of Spanish attempted to learn 24 Spanish nouns while viewing word-picture pairs. The participants copied 12 target words and wrote nothing for the other 12 target words being studied. Productive vocabulary learning on…

The present paper describes 2 studies that present a conceptual interpretation and experimental findings involving the developing and dismantling of equivalence classes consisting of terrorist stimuli. In the first study, 8 United States citizen participants were trained to match nonterrorist stimuli to American and terrorist images. Afterwards,…

While the noticing function of output has been increasingly researched by a number of applied linguists, the nature of such noticing and its effect on subsequent learning in the context of EFL writing have not been fully investigated. In a four-stage writing task consisting of output, comparison, and two revisions, this study examined what…

The principle of motivation has resurfaced as an independent variable in the field of behavior analysis over the past 20 years. The increased interest is the result of the refinements of the concept of the motivating operation and its application to the learning needs of persons with developmental disabilities. Notwithstanding the increased…

This paper looks at the acquisition of articles and related nominal functional properties (the status of classifier, the singular-plural distinction) in English and French by native speakers of Hong Kong Cantonese. Two experimental studies are reported. In the generative SLA literature, there is disagreement as to which properties of the grammar…

Objective: To compare neglectful and non-neglectful mothers on information processing tasks related to child emotions, behaviors, the caregiving relationship, and recall of child-related information. Method: A natural group design was used. Neglectful mothers (N = 34) were chosen from active, chronic caseloads; non-neglectful comparison mothers (N…

This paper presents evidence for the positive impact of television on 1,500 children, aged 6 to 16 years old, specifically concerning their conceptions of beauty. The role of television was repeatedly mentioned by the subjects although it was not the primary research goal of the researcher. Examples of children's descriptions of beauty as derived…