In two instrumental conditioning experiments with rats, we examined the impacts of acquisition and extinction cues on ABC renewal of instrumental behavior. Animals were reinforced with food for lever pressing in one context, followed by extinction of the response in a second one. Presentations of a brief tone accompanied extinction in Experiment 1…

Social skills--including the ability to participate appropriately in social activities--are predictive of later social and academic success and critical for children to successfully engage in typical early childhood contexts. For children with disabilities, deficits in social skills are not uncommon. To address the relation between social skills…

Rates of inclusion for children with disabilities continue to increase. Schools are also experiencing an increase in culturally and linguistically diverse students. As such, the diversity of children in classrooms across the country continues to dramatically shift and teachers are challenged to implement culturally responsive and relevant…

Nudge theory describes how indirect suggestions and positive reinforcement can influence decision-making. We used nudge theory to implement a traffic-light labeling and choice architecture (modifying product placement) intervention at Harvard University cafeterias, but found no significant change in sales. Survey and focus group data showed that…

Many teachers struggle with implementing self-help eating goals for children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). No group programs exist to target this important problem. We used findings from applied behavior analysis research and adapted single-subject interventions into a group-based eating program. In describing the program using two…

Food selectivity is the most commonly reported feeding problem in children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD.) Schreck et al. (2004) surveyed 472 caregivers of children between 5 and 12 years of age. They found that 72% of those children diagnosed with ASD had feeding difficulties, significantly higher than same-age peers without ASD.…

A brief training package consisting of pre-teaching of appropriate grocery item--gathering skills and reinforcement for appropriate behavior was used to teach a child diagnosed with autism to remain in a store and participate in shopping without exhibiting tantrums. The training package began with teaching the necessary component skills and…

Five individuals with autism or other developmental disabilities participated in paired-stimulus preference assessments during repeated baseline probes. All subjects initially showed a pronounced bias by typically selecting the stimulus placed in either the left or right position. Biased responding for 3 subjects was eliminated when training…

The delivery of food contingent on 10 s of consecutive toy engagement resulted in a decrease in engagement and a corresponding increase in other responses that had been previously reinforced with food. Similar effects were not observed when tokens exchangeable for the same food were delivered, suggesting that engagement was disrupted by the…

Radical behaviorism considers private events to be a part of ongoing observable behavior and to share the properties of public events. Although private events cannot be measured directly, their roles in overt action can be inferred from mathematical models that relate private responses to external stimuli and reinforcers according to the same…

In this article, the author describes the one 50-minute lunch period for all students, teachers, and staff members at James Hubert Blake High School in Silver Spring, Maryland. The one lunch period, which began in 2000, allows students to eat in certain areas of the school, including classrooms, hallways, and resource areas. Teachers use the lunch…

The origins of many of the basic concepts used in the experimental analysis of behavior can be traced to Pavlov's (1927/1960) discussion of unconditional and conditional reflexes in the dog, but often with substantial changes in meaning (e.g., stimulus, response, and reinforcement). Other terms were added by Skinner (1938/1991) to describe his…

The "PEZ" candy dispenser has been used effectively to deliver reinforcers to moderately handicapped preschool students who display desirable behaviors. Contingency management procedures are described for using the candy dispenser to deliver reinforcers and subsequently to fade out the edible reinforcer and have the colorful dispenser itself…