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Biomedical subjects

N H Azrin

Publications and source records attributed to N H Azrin.

At least 55 records · Page 3Linked to original sources
PubMed1973

The elimination of autistic self-stimulatory behavior by overcorrection.

No method is in general usage and of demonstrated effectiveness in eliminating the self-stimulatory behaviors of retardates and autistics. An Overcorrection rationale was used to develop such a method. The Overcorrection procedures consisted of a period of practice in the correct mode of the behavior contingent upon self-stimulatory behavior. The procedures were applied in a behavioral day-care program to three retarded children and one autistic child who exhibited object-mouthing, hand-mouthing, head-weaving and hand-clapping. For some behaviors, comparisons were made between the Overcorrection procedure and several alternative procedures, such as physical punishment by a slap, reinforcement for nonself-stimulatory behavior, a distasteful solution painted on the hand of a hand-mouther, and free reinforcement. The Overcorrection procedures eliminated the self-stimulatory behaviors of all four children in tutorial sessions and during the entire school day and were more effective than the alternative procedures in eliminating self-stimulation. The Overcorrection procedures appear to be rapid, enduring, and effective methods of eliminating self-stimulatory behavior.

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PubMed1973

An experimental application of a social reinforcement approach to the problem of job-finding.

The current conception of the employment process is that positions become available, are publicized, and are filled by the most qualified job seekers. An alternative conception is proposed that social factors play a major role in the process and that job finding can be analyzed as an exchange of social reinforcers in which the first behavioral step is to locate job openings. A questionnaire survey of 120 jobs found that two-thirds of the job leads came from friends or relatives who: (1) usually knew of a specific opening (63%); (2) were themselves employed by the hiring firm (71%); and (3) actively influenced the hiring process (53%). An experimental evaluation was made of an "Information-Reward" advertisement procedure for motivating community residents to report unpublicized openings. It was found that the Information-Reward procedure produced 10 times as many job leads and eight times as many placements as a noreward control advertisement. These findings represent a first step toward a much needed technology of job finding that is based on experimental evidence and support the notion that the employment process depends on factors unrelated to work skills.

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PubMed1972

Training profoundly retarded children to stop crawling.

Many profoundly retarded children continue to crawl even though they can walk. Crawling and walking were viewed as two alternative response modes, both reinforced by movement. Children choose the one mode that is easier and faster for them. A training program was designed to increase the ease and speed of walking relative to that of crawling, and consisted of restraint-for-crawling and priming-of-walking. With the program, four retarded children reduced crawling and began to walk instead. When training was discontinued, two children with moderate walking impairment continued to walk rather than crawl. Two children with severe impairment of walking, however, required the occasional use of the restraint procedure to maintain walking as the dominant mode of locomotion. The program was easily administered, required little time, and was effective for all four children.

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PubMed1972

Developing proper mealtime behaviors of the institutionalized retarded.

The institutionalized mentally retarded display a variety of unsanitary, disruptive, and improper table manners. A program was developed that included (1) acquisition-training of a high standard of proper table manners and (2) maintenance procedures to provide continued motivation to maintain proper mealtime behaviors and decrease improper skills. Twelve retardates received acquisition training, individually, by a combination of verbal instruction, imitation, and manual guidance. The students then ate in their group dining arrangement where the staff supervisor provided continuing approval for proper manners and verbal correction and timeout for improper manners. The results were: (1) the trained retardates showed significant improvement, whereas those untrained did not; (2) the trained retardates ate as well in the institution as non-retarded customers did in a public restaurant; (3) proper eating was maintained in the group dining setting; (4) timeout was rarely needed; (5) the program was easily administered by regular staff in a regular dining setting. The rapidity, feasibility, and effectiveness of the program suggests the program as a solution to improper mealtime behaviors by the institutionalized mentally retarded.

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PubMed1972

Training and maintaining a retarded child's proper eating.

The present study was designed to explore whether motivational procedures are needed to maintain a retardate's continued use of previously trained eating skills. A profoundly retarded child who ate food with her hands was trained by a manual guidance procedure to eat properly with a spoon, but the child still did not use the spoon after having learned to do so. When a motivational-maintenance procedure was applied, the child did begin to eat properly. When maintenance was discontinued, the child returned to eating with her hands. Proper eating returned when maintenance was applied again; when discontinued, the child returned to eating with her hands. These results demonstrate that continued motivational procedures are needed after training to maintain the retardate's continued use of proper eating skills.

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PubMed1971

Behavioral engineering: two apparatuses for toilet training retarded children.

Daytime incontinence is a major problem for retarded children. A training procedure for eliminating this problem should be facilitated by an apparatus that provided the trainer with an immediate signal when the child voided so that the trainer could react immediately. Two apparatuses were developed for this purpose: a toilet-chair apparatus to signal proper toileting and a portable pants-alarm apparatus to signal wetting of the pants. A reprimand was given when pants wetting occurred whereas positive reinforcement was given for proper toileting. Results with four profoundly retarded children indicated the reliability of the apparatuses in practice and the effectiveness of a toilet training program that used the two apparatuses.

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PubMed1971

A rapid method of toilet training the institutionalized retarded.

Incontinence is a major unsolved problem in the institutional care of the profoundly retarded. A reinforcement and social analysis of incontinence was used to develop a procedure that would rapidly toilet train retardates and motivate them to remain continent during the day in their ward setting. Nine profoundly retarded adults were given intensive training (median of four days per patient), the distinctive features of which were artificially increasing the frequency of urinations, positive reinforcement of correct toileting but a delay for "accidents", use of new automatic apparatus for signalling elimination, shaping of independent toileting, cleanliness training, and staff reinforcement procedures. Incontinence was reduced immediately by about 90% and eventually decreased to near-zero. These results indicate the present procedure is an effective, rapid, enduring, and administratively feasible solution to the problem of incontinence of the institutionalized retarded.

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PubMed1970

Behavioral engineering: control of posture by informational feedback.

The effects of informational feedback on a socially undesirable behavior were studied. The feedback was a mild vibrotactile stimulus and the response was slouching. When subjects slouched, a behavioral engineering apparatus provided vibrotactile stimulation to the shoulder. All subjects slouched less when stimulation was provided. A procedural control revealed that slouching will decrease because of the informational aspect of the stimulus consequence and not because of its aversive properties. When the subjects were instructed to slouch, the effects of feedback were reversed: feedback increased, rather than decreased, slouching. These results indicate that the effect of feedback for a response depends on the subject's motivation to perform that response. It is suggested that informational feedback could be used more widely as a therapeutic procedure to modify human behaviors, but only those behaviors that a patient is strongly motivated to change.

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PubMed1970

Punishment of elicited aggression.

Aversive shocks are known to produce aggression when the shocks are not dependent on behavior and to suppress behavior when the shocks are arranged as a dependent punisher. These two processes were studied by presenting non-dependent shock to monkeys at regular intervals, thereby producing biting attacks on a pneumatic tube. Immediate shock punishment was stimultaneously delivered for each biting attack. The attacks were found to decrease as a function of increasing punishment intensity. These results show that aggression is eliminated by direct punishment of the aggression even when the stimulus that is used as a punisher otherwise causes the aggression.

Aggression↗
PubMed1969

Behavioral engineering: stuttering as a function of stimulus duration during speech synchronization.

Past studies have shown that stuttering is eliminated when speech is synchronized with a metronomic beat, but the speech sounds artificial. The present study investigated the effect of increasing the duration of these individual stimulus beats with the stimulus-off period constant at 1 sec. When subjects were instructed to speak during the stimulus-on period, stuttering was an inverse function of stimulus duration, indicating that the known metronome effect on stuttering is one point on a continuum of effective rhythm procedures. The "naturalness" of speech increased as the stimulus duration increased up to durations of about 2 sec, and then decreased. At optimal values, stuttering was greatly reduced and naturalness and rapidity of speech were retained. These optimal values effectively controlled stuttering in a field test that used two types of specially designed portable instruments, one of which produced a tactual stimulus and the other an auditory stimulus.

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PubMed1969

Increased communications of chronic mental patients by reinforcement and by response priming.

An attempt was made to increase the frequency with which chronic schizophrenic patients suggested feasible improvements in their treatment. A response priming procedure was devised that was comparable to a previously developed reinforcer exposure procedure. The patients were required to attend a structured meeting during which they were prompted to make suggestions. This priming procedure was compared with the more usual procedure of "welcoming" attendance and suggestions. It was found that more suggestions were made when attendance was required, rather than optional. This increase occurred during a group as well as a private meeting. An attempt was then made to analyze the probable reinforcer for the suggestions by experimentally varying the percentage of suggestions followed. Different staff members served as the discriminative stimuli within a multiple schedule. It was found that the number of suggestions was a direct function of the percentage followed. These results demonstrate the effectiveness of the priming procedure as an adjunct to reinforcement procedures for increasing desired behaviors of mental patients. Few suggestions were made when reinforcement or priming were used alone.

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PubMed1969

Behavioral engineering: the use of response priming to improve prescribed self-medication.

A major problem in outpatient treatment has been the extreme irregularity with which patients use medication prescribed for them. As a new approach to resolving this problem, a portable operant apparatus was developed based on response priming and escape reinforcement. The apparatus sounded a tone at the time that a pill was to be taken. When the user turned a knob to terminate the tone, the apparatus delivered the pill into the user's hand. The apparatus was evaluated with six normal adults using a medically inert pill. A greater proportion of the pills were taken by each subject when using the special apparatus as compared with the use of a portable alarm timer or the usual wristwatch. These results demonstrate a new approach for increasing the regularity of self-administration of medicines.

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