Search PubMed⌕ Search

Biomedical subjects

D M Baer

Publications and source records attributed to D M Baer.

At least 91 records · Page 5Linked to original sources
PubMed1979

Facilitating generalization of on-task behavior through self-monitoring of academic tasks.

This study (1) examined whether a self-monitoring procedure taught in a laboratory setting would increase independent on-task behavior there and would generalize without further teaching to a classroom setting, and (2) analyzed the durability of the training effects over the course of 5 months for one subject and 10 months for two other subjects. Two multiple-baseline designs, one across three normal and the other across three deviant children, showed that self-monitoring of academic task-completions facilitated on-task responding for all subjects in the generalization (classroom) setting. A subsequent reversal design showed that these effects were durable, in two of the three subjects still available, at least as much as 1 year after commencement of training. This latter design also suggested that one subject who was not maintained by self-monitoring could be supported in on-task behavior by a peer who was maintained by self-monitoring.

Behavior Therapy↗
PubMed1978

Multiple-probe technique: a variation on the multiple baseline.

Multiple-baseline and probe procedures are combined into a "multiple-probe" technique. The technique is designed to provide a thorough analysis of the relationship between an independent variable and the acquisition of a successive-approximation or chain sequence. It provides answers to the following questions: (1) What is the initial level of performance on each step in the training sequence? (2) What happens if sequential opportunities to perform each next step in the sequence are provided before training on that step? (3) What happens when training is applied? (4) What happens to the performance of remaining steps in the sequence as criterion is reached in the course of training each prior step? The technique features: (1) one initial probe of each step in the training sequence, (2) an additional probe of every step after criterion is reached on any training step, and (3) a series of "true" baseline sessions conducted just before the introduction of the independent variable to each training step. Intermittent probes also provide an alternative to continuous baseline measurement, when such measurement during extended multiple baselines (1) may prove reactive, (2) is impractical, and/or (3) a strong a priori assumption of stability can be made.

Journal Article↗
PubMed1978

Training preschool children to recruit natural communities of reinforcement.

Four normal and four deviant children aged four-to-six years were taught to judge the quality of their academic work in a preschool classroom, and to prompt or cue their teachers to comment about the quality of that work. When these skills did not generalize spontaneously to other teachers in concurrent natural situations, generalized responding was taught by the experimenter, in multiple-baseline design across subjects. This generalization programming enabled the children to contact a sometimes dormant, but readily available natural community of teacher praise and reinforcement, i.e., to recruit an increase in cued praise and schedules of praise for their good work. These behaviors may be important to young children who find themselves bereft of attention in classrooms.

Child↗
PubMed1978

Training generalized improvisation of tools by preschool children.

The development of new, "creative" behaviors was examined in a problem-solving context. One form of problem solving, improvisation, was defined as finding a substitute to replace the specifically designated, but currently unavailable, tool ordinarily used to solve the problem. The study examined whether preschool children spontaneously displayed generalized improvisation skills, and if not, whether they could be trained to do so within different classes of tools. Generalization across different tool classes was monitored but not specifically trained. Five preschool children participated in individual sessions that first probed their skill at improvising tools, and later trained and probed generalized improvisation in one or more of three tool classes (Hammers, Containers, and Shoelaces), using a multiple-baseline design. All five children were trained with Hammers, two were trained in two classes, and two were trained in all three tool classes. Four of the five children improvised little in Baseline. During Training, all five showed increased generalized improvisation within the trained class, but none across classes. Tools fabricated by item combinations were rare in Baseline, but common in Training. Followup probes showed that the training effects were durable.

Journal Article↗
PubMed1978

Finders, keepers?: an analysis and validation of a free-found-ad policy.

A SURVEY OF LOST AND FOUND CLASSIFIED SECTIONS IN METROPOLITAN AND SMALLER NEWSPAPERS REVEALED DISPARATE RATES BETWEEN LOST ADS AND FOUND ADS: Lost ads greatly outnumbered Found ads, probably because newspapers usually require the finders of lost personal property to pay for Found advertisements. The effect of a Free-Found-Ad policy on the rate of Found advertisements placed in the Lost and Found sections of three community newspapers was investigated using a multiple-baseline design. The results suggested that the Free-Found-Ad policy was effective in increasing the rates of Found ads in all three newspapers. To determine whether increases in Found ads resulted in increases in recovered property, a sample of individuals who placed Found ads were surveyed in both baseline and treatment conditions and asked if the found items had been claimed by their owners. The Free-Found-Ad policy appeared to be effective in increasing the amount of personal property returned. The study concluded that community newspapers can provide incentives to increase such help-giving or altruistic behaviors. The implications of this study for a general policy-research strategy are discussed.

Journal Article↗
PubMed1978

An experimental analysis of some procedures to teach priming and reinforcement skills to preschool teachers.

This Monograph reports the results of teaching preschool teachers to be successful at increasing desired behaviors of their children, thus becoming successful teachers. Five teacher-training techniques were examined experimentally under single-subject designs: written assignments, feedback from viewing graphs, on-the-spot feedback from a wireless radio (Bug-in-the-Ear), feedback from an observer, and self-counting. Those teaching procedures that included prompt and frequent information to the teacher about the behavior under study were the most effective techniques. Self-counting, in which the teacher tallied the number of times she emitted the behavior of either priming or reinforcing social or verbal behavior of a child (or children), and observer feedback, in which the observer reported to the teacher periodically during the hour the frequency of her behavior, were the most reliable teaching techniques. The other procedures, while less reliable than self-counting and observer feedback, were effective with some teachers. Maintenance of teacher behavior across settings was examined with a group of Head Start teachers, and maintenance of teacher behaviors across different child behaviors and different children was examined with three student teachers. The results indicated that teaching was more likely to maintain if it occurred in the teacher's home setting rather than at another site. In all cases, when generalization occurred across settings, time, or children, the frequency of the teacher's behavior was not as high as when the relevant behavior had been trained directly. Results supported the proposal that it is possible to define effective teacher behavior, not just characterize it, as it occurs in the classroom, and that effectiveness can be measured by defining and observing the child behaviors to which teacher behaviors are directed.

Adult↗
PubMed1977

"Perhaps it would be better not to know everything.".

The advent of statistical methods for evaluating the data of individual-subject designs invites a comparison of the usual research tactics of the group-design paradigm and the individual-subject-design paradigm. That comparison can hinge on the concept of assigning probabilities of Type 1 and Type 2 errors. Individual-subject designs are usually interpreted with implicit, very low probabilities of Type 1 errors, and correspondingly high probabilities of Type 1 errors, and correspondingly high probabilities of Type 2 errors. Group designs are usually interpreted with explicit, moderately low probabilities of Type 1 errors, and therefore with not such high probabilities of Type 2 errors as in the other paradigm. This difference may seem to be a minor one, considered in terms of centiles on a probability scale. However, when it is interpreted in terms of the substantive kinds of results likely to be produced by each paradigm, it appears that the individual-subject-design paradigm is more likely to contribute to the development of a technology of behavior, and it is suggested that this orientation should not be abandoned.

Journal Article↗
PubMed1977

An implicit technology of generalization.

Traditionally, discrimination has been understood as an active process, and a technology of its procedures has been developed and practiced extensively. Generalization, by contrast, has been considered the natural result of failing to practice a discrimination technology adequately, and thus has remained a passive concept almost devoid of a technology. But, generalization is equally deserving of an active conceptualization and technology. This review summarizes the structure of the generalization literature and its implicit embryonic technology, categorizing studies designed to assess or program generalization according to nine general headings: Train and Hope; Sequential Modification; Introduce to Natural Maintaining Contingencies; Train Sufficient Exemplars; Train Loosely; Use Indiscriminable Contingencies; Program Common Stimuli; Mediate Generalization; and Train "To Generalize".

Journal Article↗
PubMed1977

Implications of the stereotyping and modification of sex role.

This article discusses and questions a study by Rekers and Lovaas (1974), which sought to "normalize" a young boy's sex-role behavior. The reasons given for treatment and the treatment itself are questioned. The ethical implications of the treatment and its outcome are then discussed, and alternative treatment procedures are suggested. Finally, the experimenters' description of the feminine sex-role is criticized.

Behavior Therapy↗
PubMed1977

Functional considerations in the use of procedural timeout and in effective alternative.

Two single-subject experiments were conducted with students in special preschool classes. In Experiment I, the subject's disruptive, appropriate, and inappropriate play behaviors were measured as a function of three independent variables: reinforcement, a typical timeout procedure, and regularly paced teacher instructions. In an ABA reversal within a multiple baseline across two teachers, all three independent variables comprised the A conditions and procedural timeout was omitted in B. Experiment II examined a second subject's appropriate and inappropriate eating as a function of the same three variables. Two teachers conducted baseline and paced instruction-plus-reinforcement conditions in multiple baseline across teachers. Subsequently, one teacher performed a series of reversals and replications with various combinations of a typical timeout procedure and reinforcement mixed with paced instructions. The results of both experiments suggest that timeout did not produce response decrement in a punishment paradigm, but rather produced response increment in a negative reinforcement paradigm. These results prevailed, even though a reinforcer was operating in the environment before introducing timeout. Paced instructions (delivering instructions to the child at a set pace regardless of the child's behavior) appears to be an alternative when timeout is not effective and, in conjunction with reinforcement, was demonstrated to reduce inappropriate behavior to near zero.

Autistic Disorder↗
PubMed1976

Color-matching technique to train children in the correct use of stairs.

Color cues were used to train four severely retarded children and two learning disabled children to move in a left foot-right foot alteration pattern when using stairs. The occurrence of left-right alterations and marking time behavior was recorded throughout baseline and training conditions. The color-cue procedure effectively produced a consistent pattern of alteration of four of the children and eliminated marking time in three of the children. Physical prompts were used to train alteration in two children for whom color-cue training was not sufficient. At the termination of training, observations of the children's performances in new settings and to new adults were conducted. Results indicated that the children continued to alternate correctly. In addition, follow-up investigations conducted between two weeks to 16 months after training indicated that the children were maintaining the stair alteration pattern. Future research should determine whether a visual-cue procedure could be used in training other forms of locomotion or motor behavior.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1976

Correspondence between saying and doing: teaching children to share and praise.

Five small groups of preschool children were taught to share and praise by the modelling of these behaviors and reinforcement of their reports of sharing and praising. Experiment I demonstrated that modelling and reinforcement of any (true or untrue) reports of sharing, and then of praising, promptly increased reports of the corresponding behaviors. Modelling and reinforcement for true reports of each behavior increased both reporting and actual behavior. Experiment II showed that both reported and actual sharing and praising may be increased by modelling and reinforcement for true reports of the target behavior, without previous reinforcement for any (true or untrue) reports of those behaviors. Sharing, but not praising, generalized to a second setting. Experiment III replicated the results of Experiment II for sharing and praising, and demonstrated similar success in increasing a third behavior, specific praising. In general, these experiments show that developing correspondence between children's reports of behavior and actual behavior may be an efficient means of increasing prosocial responses.

Journal Article↗
PubMed1976

Interactions between teacher guidance and contingent access to play in developing preacademic skills of deviant preschool children.

Token-mediated access to play and snacks was made contingent on completion of academic tasks in the Baseline Experiment. This contingency produced stable completion rates that were subsequently doubled, and then tripled, for four deviant children in a special preschool. A reversal design demonstrated that the contingency was functional in maintaining the children's rates of task completion. The Guidance Experiment examined the role of a social event, teacher guidance, in the acquisition of task-completion skills, in a multiple-baseline-across-tasks design (with reversals). The analysis demonstrated that teacher guidance was an important supplement to the token-mediated contingency in establishing significant increases in task completions for a second group of three deviant children in the special class. The importance of teacher guidance was related to the difficulty level of the children's tasks.

Attention↗