Giovana Escobal

Aquisição de conceito de número por pessoas com deficiência intelectual

This study investigated the process involved in the acquisition of number concepts by intellectually disabled adults. Two individuals, aged between 16 and 20 years old, attending a special education school participated. A computer program assessed the participants’ initial repertoire based on a stimulus-stimulus and stimulus-response relational network, identifying present and absent relations, which served as a basis for the teaching and testing of conditional relations thereafter. Next phase consisted of teaching the necessary relations, followed by immediate tests to evaluate emerging relations. The results showed the efficacy of the suggested computer-based curriculum and the efficacy of the used teaching procedures, due to the concept number acquisition in a reduced period of time. A complex relational network involving number, digits and values was formed through direct teaching of only two relations. The computer based teaching procedures optimized the learning process, increased data collection and procedural reliability and controlled contingencies that allowed precise teaching.

Programa de suporte comunitário: alternativa para o trabalho do adulto deficiente mental

This research attempted to develop a community program planning to meet the needs derived from the development, training, placement and support of mentally retarded adults working in the natural environment. Community program planning requires the integration of several agencies in the community in order to plan, implement and assess services. Representatives of several community agencies participated. Seven steps leading to the organization of the proposed group were implemented: 1) starting the team; 2) defining community needs; 3) identifying team members; 4) starting the planning meeting; 5) defining the mission of the community program planning group; 6) evaluating the opportunity to change; 7) proposing objectives and activities. The results showed that the objectives proposed were partially met. However, great difficulties were observed in group maintenance. The proposal had to be interrupted before the end of the program. The reasons for such difficulties were analyzed and publication and discussion of the concept of community program planning teams was proposed to meet the needs involved in supporting the work of mentally retarded adults. It was also proposed that the procedure be replicated in different communities, to control for local variables, and as an incentive to the development of new work groups.

Effects of choice opportunities between activities with high- and low-reinforcement values on self-control behavior in children with typical development: a pilot study

ABSTRACT Self-control is evident in the choice of a delayed consequence with greater magnitude over an immediate one of lesser import. Impulsivity opts for the reverse, i.e., immediate gratification. Two studies were conducted of the enhancement of self-control behavior in a 5-year-old boy with typical development. The objective of the first study was to train the participant to choose between consequences based on their comparative magnitudes and delays. The initial study involved three training phases: simple discrimination, reinforcement magnitude, and delayed reinforcement. In the first study, the participant chose the delayed consequence of greater magnitude 90% of the time. Following the first study, the participant took part in a second. Its objective was to examine the effect on self-control responses of providing choices between high- and low-preference activities. The second study comprised four phases: abrupt increase in reinforcement delay (AIRD), choice opportunity with high-preference activities (CO-HPA), no choice opportunity with high-preference activities (NCO-HPA), and no choice opportunity with low-preference activities (NCO-LPA). In the AIRD phase, the response rate to the delayed consequence of greater magnitude averaged 20%. In the CO-HPA and NCO-HPA phases, the response to the delayed consequence of greater magnitude was 100%. During the NCO-LPA phase, the response rate to the delayed consequence of greater magnitude averaged 50%. The results suggest that reinforcement values play a greater role in self-control behavior than choice opportunity.

Aparato experimental de elección: desarrollo de sistema informatizado para el estudio del comportamiento de elección

Perform choice is fundamental to adaptive behavior of any individual in his/her social environment, especially for intellectually or developmentally delayed people that often lack these skills in their re

Aparato experimental de escolha: desenvolvimento de sistema informatizado para estudo de comportamento de escolha

Perform choice is fundamental to adaptive behavior of any individual in his/her social environment, especially for intellectually or developmentally delayed people that often lack these skills in their re

Experimental apparatus of choice: development of computerized system for the study of choice behavior

Perform choice is fundamental to adaptive behavior of any individual in his/her social environment, especially for intellectually or developmentally delayed people that often lack these skills in their re

Comparação entre avaliações de preferência com itens tangíveis e com itens digitais

Computer-based digital picture preference assessment tests may have boundaries over table-top formats, such as time and effort economy and reduction of manual error. The purpose of this study was to examine the use of a computer-based digital picture preference assessment with 14 children with typical development and nine with intellectual disabilities. Two preference assessment formats were conducted to compare preference hierarchies generated with digital pictures and tangible items. These formats included presenting digital pictures in a computer screen and tangible items on a table. Results of the preference assessments indicated that the two methods yielded same top-ranked items for most participants. Many variables still need to be scrutinized in further experimental studies. The implications of these results for digital stimulus preference assessments are discussed.

O Papel da Função Reforçadora das Relações Verbais de Tato e Textual, em Contexto de Equivalência de Estímulos, em Universitários

Learning tact verbal relations may present characteristics of emergence and maintenance different from learning textual relations. These differences arouse particular interest when the stimuli that control such verbal operant belong to the same equivalent class and the response topography is similar. The objective of this study was to investigate the role of reinforcing function of each of these relationships in the emergence of new relations. Initially, six students participated in the study. First, we taught, through matching-to-sample tasks, listener relations between dictated words and pictures, and between dictated words and printed words. After training, we tested equivalence relations, and the emergence of tact and textual relations which are considered speaker relations. Then, the participants were submitted to concurrent schedules of reinforcement to evaluate preference for tasks. The results showed indifference in preference for tasks, which is consistent with the establishment of equivalence relations and with the fact that participants show similar performance on tact and textual tests. The absence of preference can be observed because of the indifference in those operant reinforcing functions, but also, because of the vast and sophisticated verbal repertoire of the participants.

The Flight From Experimental Analysis: Remarks on Catania (1981)

The argument put forth by Catania (1981) is a valid one mainly when the “consequences of generating mathematical models or evaluating the fit of equations” (p. 49) compete or are incompatible with conducting an experimental analysis. Catania describes very clearly how this takes place and illustrates with seminal papers involving the practice of converting absolute rates of responding into relative measures; data transformations conducted to show conformity of behavior to the matching relation; interpretations of data variance; preferences for free choice over forced choice, and interpretations of instructional variables versus curve-fitting exercises on human concurrent performances. Ever since the publication of Catania’s 1981 paper, mathematical description of behavior has been a topic of interest in the experimental analysis of behavior literature (Shull, 1991) and the current trend for mathematical analysis seems to be upwards as suggested by Mazur (2006). Mathematics offers a more precise, unambiguous and economical language to describe natural phenomena. The use of mathematical models in other areas of research or other sciences has paid off and many authors posit that mathematical models can be developed from basic behavioral research and also that these models can be successfully used to predict and control behavior in applied settings. The issue raised by Catania is indeed current and has the potential to become more serious in the future. Behavior analysis has, therefore, the genuine interest and perhaps the obligation to bring it up for a thorough discussion. As a matter of fact, the future of behavior analysis has been the concern of several papers (Fantino, 1991, 2008; Hopkins, 1987; Lattal & Harzem, 1984; Michael, 1980; Poling, 2010; and Skinner, 1986). Regarding specifically the use of mathematical models, it could be predicted that there will be a trend to increase even further in the future. Those who are working with and advocate the use of these models may currently find it difficult to get them accepted by psychologists or other specialists on the basis of the training most psychologists receive, which does not necessarily include mathematical reasoning or other related skills. But efforts towards the direction of getting the mathematical models accepted by psychologists are being developed, using verbal analogies, pictorial representations, or concrete examples (Mazur, 2006). If these efforts do succeed, then the trend towards using mathematical models may increase exponentially and it might be that the flight from behavThe Flight From Experimental Analysis:

Number concept acquisition by people with intelectual disabilities

This study investigated the process involved in the acquisition of number concepts by intellectually disabled adults. Two individuals, aged between 16 and 20 years old, attending a special education school participated. A computer program assessed the participants’ initial repertoire based on a stimulus-stimulus and stimulus-response relational network, identifying present and absent relations, which served as a basis for the teaching and testing of conditional relations thereafter. Next phase consisted of teaching the necessary relations, followed by immediate tests to evaluate emerging relations. The results showed the efficacy of the suggested computer-based curriculum and the efficacy of the used teaching procedures, due to the concept number acquisition in a reduced period of time. A complex relational network involving number, digits and values was formed through direct teaching of only two relations. The computer based teaching procedures optimized the learning process, increased data collection and procedural reliability and controlled contingencies that allowed precise teaching.