Introduction on Applied Behavior Analysis

Workshop 2Eunice Park

Workshop 2 agenda:

• Shaping activity• What can we do to

decrease behavior, without the use of punishment?

• Quick! Think fast!• Promoting behavior

change• Ethics for ABA• Functions of

behavior

* Today’s workshop will focus on identifying the principles we talked about yesterday in Workshop 1.

Decreasing behavior without punishment

• Since these 3 workshops are an introduction to Applied Behavior Analysis, I will list each strategy, so that you are aware of what is available. I highly encourage you to attend my future workshops on Applied Behavior Analysis, where these strategies will be the main focus.

Types of strategies to decrease behavior without punishment

• Extinction• Differential

reinforcement• Non-contingent

reinforcer (NCR)• Fixed time escape (FTE)• Behavioral momentum• Functional

communication training (FCT)

• High probability request (high-p)Cooper, J. O., Heron, T. E., & Heward, W. L. (2007). Applied behavior

analysis. (2nd ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Merrill Prentice Hall.

Quick! Think fast!

• Which of these is NOT a strategy to reduce behavior without punishment?

i. Discriminative stimulusii. Fixed time escapeiii. Extinctioniv. Motivating operationv. Only i & iv

Promoting behavior change• What can we do to make sure that the behaviors

taught are maintained and intact?• When teaching a new skill (acquisition), the child has

to reach a mastery criterion with the therapist, then we take that skill and apply it to different people, settings and to different materials. This is called generalization.

• Once the child has reached mastery in generalization, the skill is said to be learned, and therefore that particular program is terminated. Once a program is terminated, then that skill is put in maintenance. Maintenance is important, because we want the child to maintain the skill, so that they are able retain and recall.

Cooper, J. O., Heron, T. E., & Heward, W. L. (2007). Applied behavior analysis. (2nd ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Merrill Prentice Hall.

Ethics in ABA

• As mentioned before, since these 3 workshops are an introduction to Applied Behavior Analysis, ethics will be loosely covered here. I encourage you to attend my future workshop dedicated to ethics in ABA.

• What is ethics? Ethics refers to behaviors, practices, and decisions that address three basic questions:

1. What is the right thing to do?2. What is worth doing?3. What does it mean to be a good behavior

analyst?Cooper, J. O., Heron, T. E., & Heward, W. L. (2007). Applied behavior analysis. (2nd ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Merrill Prentice Hall.

Functions of behavior

• S.E.A.T (I have included a handout)

S ENSORYE SCAPE/ELOPEA TTENTIONT ANGIBLE

Practicing the principles from Workshop 1

• Example 1:Mom and kid Joe went

to the market. At the checkout line, Joe started to cry and yell, “I want that candy!!” Mom told Joe, not right now. Joe kept yelling and crying. Mom gave in and bought the candy.

• In this example, was Joes’ behavior:

a) Positively reinforcedb) Negatively reinforced• In this example, was

Mom’s behavior:a) Negatively reinforcedb) Positively reinforced

Practicing the principles

• Using the same example, write the example down in A-B-C format:

A:B:C:

• Example 2:The teen decided to

go out with his buddies. He was having so much fun he came home past curfew. His parents were not happy and took his cell phone away for 1 week.

Practicing the principles

• In example 2, the teen’s behavior was:

a) Positively punishedb) Negatively punished• Using example 2,

write the example in A-B-C format:

A:B:C:

• Example 3:Kim was bbq’ing, and

the smoke was hurting her eyes, so she decided to close the bbq hood.

• In this example, the behavior of closing the hood is:

a) Positively punishingb) Negatively

reinforcing

Practicing the principles

• Example 4:In the middle of the

night, Bob was going down the hall to get some water. He didn’t turn on the light, and ended up stubbing his toe, and he yelled in pain, “OWW!”

• In this example, what was the antecedent?

• In this example, the behavior is Bob yelling “OWW!”

a) Trueb) False• Was Bob:a) Positively punishedb) Positively reinforced

Tomorrow’s workshop is the last one! Now that you have had an opportunity to practice identifying the principles, in tomorrow’s workshop, I want you to model each the principles we practiced

today.