Jessica Singer-Dudek

A Long-Term Analysis of the Relationship Between Fluency and the Training and Maintenance of Complex Math Skills

In 2 experiments, each involving different mathematical operations, we compared 2 training procedures for teaching component math skills in terms of their effects on the learning and long-term maintenance of composite skills. The dependent variables were learn units to composite task mastery and performance on the composite task 2 months later. The independent variables were instruction in math facts under (a) fluency and (b) mastery conditions. The experiments used a simultaneous treatment design in which the students were selected for participation according to prerequisite skills and instructional histories and randomly assigned to receive 1 of the 2 training procedures. Four adolescents with developmental disabilities participated in each experiment. Instructional presentations were controlled by yoked learn units during component skill instruction. Results showed that fluency instruction did not result in fewer learn units to criterion on the composite task. However, 2 months later, the fluent students performed between 83% and 100% correct on the composite task, while the mastery students performed between 17% and 83% correct. The data are discussed in terms of fluency theory and educational practice.

ESTABLISHING BOOKS AS CONDITIONED REINFORCERS FOR PRESCHOOL CHILDREN AS A FUNCTION OF AN OBSERVATIONAL INTERVENTION

We tested the effects of an observational intervention (Greer & Singer-Dudek, 2008) on establishing childrens books as conditioned reinforcers using a delayed multiple baseline design. Three preschool students with mild language and developmental delays served as the participants. Prior to the intervention, books did not function as reinforcers for any of the participants. The observational intervention consisted of a situation in which the participant observed a confederate being presented with access to books contingent on correct responses and the participant received nothing for correct responses. After several sessions of this treatment, the previously neutral books acquired reinforcing properties for maintenance and acquisition responses for all three participants.

The Emergence of Autoclitic Frames in Atypically and Typically Developing Children as a Function of Multiple Exemplar Instruction

In two experiments, we tested the effect of multiple exemplar instruction (MEI) for training sets on the emergence of autoclitic frames for spatial relations for novel tacts and mands. In Experiment 1, we used a replicated pre- and post-intervention probe design with four students with significant learning disabilities to test for acquisition of four autoclitic frames with novel tacts and mands before and after MEI. The untaught topographies emerged for all participants. In Experiment 2, we used a multiple probe design to test the effects of the MEI procedures on the same responses in four typically developing, bilingual students. The novel usage emerged for all participants. In the latter experiment, the children demonstrated untaught usage of mand or tact frames regardless of whether they were taught to respond in either listener or speaker functions alone or across listener and speaker functions. The findings are discussed in terms of the role of MEI in the formation of abstractions.

Peer presence and the emergence of conditioned reinforcement from observation

We examined the effects of peer presence on the conditioning of new reinforcers via observation. At the outset, strings and toothpicks did not reinforce maintenance or acquisition responses for 3 preschoolers with and without developmental delays. In the first intervention, the stimuli were placed in a cup in front of an empty chair next to the participant, and the participant was denied access to those stimuli. The second intervention was identical to the first, except that a peer was present. Postintervention tests revealed that only the peer intervention was successful in conditioning neutral stimuli as reinforcers for both maintenance and acquisition responses for all 3 participants. The presence of a peer appears to facilitate the conditioning of reinforcers by observation.

The Effects of the Establishment of Adult Faces and/or Voices as Conditioned Reinforcers for Children with ASD and Related Disorders

Abstract We tested the effects of the establishment of conditioned reinforcement for observing human faces and/or voices on the rate of learning, observing responses, and verbal operant emissions for four children, ages 4-5 years, with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and related disorders. We used a non-concurrent, delayed probe design across participants with pre and post-intervention measures. The intervention included a conjugate stimulus-stimulus pairing procedure. Results demonstrated that as a function of the intervention, faces were conditioned for three out of three participants and voices were conditioned for two out of two participants for whom either was lacking respectively prior to the intervention (both faces and voices were conditioned for one participant). Post-intervention probes demonstrated increases in rate of learning, observing responses, and verbal operants for all four participants.

Experiences that establish preschoolers’ interest in speaking and listening to others.

We conducted 2 experiments on the effects of establishing conditioned reinforcement for adult attention on the initiation and continuation of vocal verbal operants with adults by 3- and 4-year-olds. Designs for both experiments consisted of pre- and postintervention functional analyses of attention as a reinforcer for learning (multiple baseline) and maintenance (reversal), as well as the target participants’ initiations of verbal behavior. In the first experiment we tested whether intensive tact instruction established adult attention as a reinforcer for the tasks and whether it affected the initiation of verbal operants. Experiment 2 procedures were the same as Experiment 1 with 3 similar children, but the intervention was an observational procedure that established attention as a reinforcer. In both experiments, the children’s initiation and continuation of social verbal episodes increased following the interventions because each intervention established adult social attention as a reinforcer. The findings suggest that the establishment of adult social attention as a reinforcer under social learning conditions is key to increases in children’s interest (i.e., reinforcement value) in speaking to and listening to others.

Establishing the transformation of motivating operations across mands and tacts for preschoolers with developmental delays.

In 2 studies, we tested the effects of multiple exemplar instruction (MEI), using rapidly rotating mand and tact opportunities under relevant motivating conditions, on the transformation of motivating operations (MOs) across mands and tacts for sets of adjective-object pairs. The design for both studies was a delayed multiple probe across participants, using pre- and postintervention tests of untaught mand or tact functions. Two 3-year-old children with developmental disabilities participated in Experiment 1, and 5 4-year-old males with developmental delays participated in Experiment 2. At the outset of the study, none of the participants demonstrated both mand and tact responses for untaught functions. After MEI, untaught adjective-object functions for mands or tacts emerged for all children in both experiments, suggesting that the transformation of MOs is a verbal behavior developmental cusp. Our findings support Skinner’s notion that mand and tact functions are acquired separately, but later join as a function of experience.