Systematic application of positive reinforcement principles can be a powerful tool for teachers in the classroom setting. (NH)

Recognizing that punishment for aggression often is noneffective or inadvertently reinforces the aggressive act, the authors discuss an alternative approach and provide an explanation of the exchange theory of aggression. Three classroom experiments, operated with children chosen as the most severe behavior problems in a local school system, are…

A description of the Social Exchange Laboratory's work with autistic children is presented. The laboratory's philosophy of the exchange theory of autism, seen as a set of habitual response patterns maintained and intensified by exchanges which are inadvertantly structured by others in the child's environment, is set forth with characteristics,…

Discussed the effects of a relatively simple token economy that used group contingency in a regular fifth-grade class setting. Results were favorable. (HMV)

Based upon the author's doctoral dissertation (University of Minnesota, 1967).

Negative reinforcement plus edibles and praise produced about 90 percent correct responding for four severely retarded/autistic children (six to eight years old), while edibles and praise alone were much less effective. Use of negative reinforcement with noncompliant or difficult- to-motivate behaviorally disordered children appeared to be an…

This study describes how a graduate student in counseling and guidance worked with a team of teachers in implementing a group-contingent reinforcement system with first graders. The group contingencies proved highly effective in increasing the percentage of work completed and reducing disruptive responses. (Author)

Adaptations of token reinforcement and time out from reinforcement were used for reducing the highly disruptive classroom behavior of a first grade boy. High and low rates of disruptive behavior were paralleled by changes in tardiness from recess behavior thus indicating generalization of conditioning. (Author/CG)

An 11 year old Blind, Retarded male, was treated for self abusive behavior by creating a feeding response incompatible with it. When head beating had been eliminated at feeding time, additional techniques, involving rewards, were used to extend its elimination beyond the eating situation. (Author)

Ten schizophrenic and autistic children who exhibited self destructive, tantrum, echolalic, and self stimulatory behaviors were treated by reinforcement therapy. Reinforcement withdrawal, in the form of interpersonal isolation contingent upon self-destruction, and electrical shocks served to extinguish these behaviors in some children.…

Nicotine replacement products are commonly used to promote smoking cessation, but alternative and complementary methods may increase cessation rates. The current experiment compared the short-term effects of a transdermal nicotine patch to voucher-based reinforcement of smoking abstinence on cigarette smoking. Fourteen heavy smokers (7 men and 7…

Play is, by definition, internally motivated, flexible, spontaneous and voluntary. Yet some researchers claim to have taught children with autism to play using behavioural interventions that are heavily structured, repetitive and make use of external reinforcements. In the current systematic review, we examine the extent to which these claims are…