Notes on ABA in Plain English from March 6

[Guest guest]

www.elija.org

March 2004

Topic: " ABA IN PLAIN ENGLISH "

Presenter: Dr.Bobby Newman, PhD BCBA

*with special guests McAuliffe and Anne Beirne*

Ok, here we go, once again a TON of vital info especially for new parents and

family members....(actually for our service providers too!) Get ready for a

really long but good one (but not NEARLY as good as when you get the opportunity

to see Dr. Newman Present).......

Applied Behavior Analysis is a scientific discipline. ABA in not a bag of

tricks, a table and chair, specific teaching procedures, specific curriculum, or

a related service. It cannot be " modified " or " eclectic " . It is a 24 hour way of

life based on principles of behavior and learning. Some make a distinction ABA

vs. VB vs. PBS...important to realize it's all ABA. Behavior Analytic thinking

process is important-once you get the thinking process down, it all falls into

place, here is some basic vocabulary and principles to understand. Learn how to

figure out behavior ( " why does he do that? " ) and understand the significance of

behavior-> consequence relationship. (tip: to learn more about these terms and

more commonly used terms in ABA, Dr. Newman and collegues have a new book called

Behaviorspeak that can be bought at www.difflearn.com or amazon)

ABC's of ABA:

Antecedent: What happens before a behavior (also know as the Sd - discriminative

stimulus)

Behavior: something that moves through space; a response; somthing you do;

actually have to see it happening. Behaivor goals must pass the " Dead Man's

Test " Anything a dead man (person) can do is not a behavior. Go over your

child's IEP and see if behavior goals pass this test. Awesome tip: Bobby pointed

out how this is a problem with potty training. People reinforce " having dry

pants " (dead people can have dry pants) instead of only reinforcing when the

child eliminates in the toilet (dead people can't elilminate in the toilet) When

you reinforce " dry pants " you are only teaching the child how to hold it in.

Consequence: What follows a behavior, either making the behaivor more or less

likely to occur.

A: Mom says " Touch your Nose "

B: Child touches his nose

C: Mom says " great job! " which her child loves social praise so " great job " acts

as a positive reinforcer (positive because it was given, not because she said it

nicely :0)

Reinforcer: A type of consequence. Anything that will make a behavior more

likely to occur (increase). Reinforcers are individual. What is reinforcing for

one child may be punishing to the next. Reinforcer assessments are important to

conduct on a continuous basis. Reinforcers have to be discovered.

Punisher: A type of consequence. Anything that will make a behavior less likely

to occur (decrease)

Positive: Adding to;

Negative: Removing; taking away

Positive Reinforcement adding/giving something to increase a behavior

Negative Reinforcement: removing something to increase a behavior ex.=ny

hits himself to get out of a task: when you ask him to touch his nose, you stop

the session. Antecedent: touch your nose Behavior: ny hits himself

Consequence: you remove demands. Removal of demands (negative) increased

(reinforced) ny's hitting himself to get out of a task.

Positive Punishment: adding something to decrease a behavior

Negative Punishment: removing something to decrease a behavior

Time Out: A form of negative punishment. Reinforcer is lost temporarily. Often

misused. This doesn't mean you have to remove the child and put them in another

room or special chair. This means a " Time Out " from a reinforcing item or

activity contingent upon the inapporpriate behavior being displayed. Ex.= If

your child gets to close to the TV, time out the show until they step back, then

put the show back on.

Establishing Operation (EO): This is the setting event, the thing that happens

before the A->B->C. This can refer to the state of deprivation and satiation

which will influence how effective your reinforcers will be and can help to

capture and contrive salient teaching opportunities. A setting event can also be

the child's state of being, if they didn't sleep well, or is sick, this setting

event may effect their responding. Bobby explained how even though EO's have

always been a part of ABA, it is not until recent years attention has really

focused on the importance of paying attention to EO's. Another ex. is when those

who work with our children pair themselves with reinforcement, they also become

a setting event. When the child sees them, they know things get better,

influencing the ABC relationship.

Extinction: When you no longer reinforce a behavior that has been previosly

reinforced for the function of which it was serving. When you do an extinction

procedure, the effect will get worse before it gets better; aka extinction

burst; the behavior will burst in frequency, magnitude, and variability. You

must think about how bad a behavior can get before you do an extinction

procedure. The key is to either do it the whole way or don't do it at all

because if you reinforce any of the more intense behaviors during the extinction

burst you will wind up with a worse behavior then what you started with. Ignore

the behavior not the child.

Continuous Reinforcement: When a behavior gets reinforced everytime it happens.

Ex. Soda Machine. Your behavior of putting money in a soda machine is maintained

by continuous reinforcement of always getting a soda (and if the soda doesn't

come out what do you do? Extinction Burst: kick the machine, hit it, rock it etc

until you give up)

What's stronger then Continuous Reinforcement?...

Intermittent Reinforcement: What machine do people continuously put money in

even though they may or may not get something out of it? Slot Machine.

Reinforecement doesn't happen all the time. This is the best way to make a

behavior strong but can also be the worst form of reinforcement to use during a

behavior plan. Crucial to be a soda machine during a behavior plan not a slot

machine.

" the only thing I might look at is that intermittent reinforcement is GREAT when

you WANT to keep seeing a behavior. it's during those reduction procedures that

it can get ugly "

Bobby talked about generalization and how it has to be programmed for. Failing

to generalize skills is one of the characteristics of Autism and family members

play a critical role in generalization. Vary Sd's, vary stimuli, vary settings.

This is why teaching children all behaviors in distraction free 'cubbies' rarely

generalizes. You need to teach the behavior under the function you want to see.

ABA is a data based discipline. The second A in ABA stands for Analysis. We need

enough data to know the teaching technique is working or our behavior plan is

working. (my own comment: there is no one right way to take data. For my son it

depends on the program or target, or how much trouble he may be having acquiring

a skill. It is also important because data often catches the variable that is

effecting his acquiring a new skill which is usually for us an inconsistancy or

misunderstanding among teachers. if someone says " it can only be done with this

data sheet or " it's only done like this in ABA " , be wary) Data does not have to

be collected in blocks of 10. People usually do that for easier calculation.

(for more on data and DTT see my past notes on Taking the Trial out of Discrete

Trial Teaching)

Bobby also went into specific steps and examples about shaping behaviors: The

creation of a new behavior by reinforcing approximations to a desired behavior.

And how important it is for everyone to be on the same step. He talked about

chaining: combining several smaller behaviors to make a long complex behavior

(like brushing your teeth or dressing)

You can do this in a forward (first to last step) or backward (last to first

step) process. Either way, you must do a task analysis (list of exact steps it

takes to complete a behavior) as a starting point. A task analysis for one

learner may consist of 7 steps, while a task analysis for that same task for

another may take 107 steps.

And how and ways to prompt the learner using most to least or least to most

prompting. Prompts are for fading, prompts are not meant to be life long. (my

comment: again, there is NO one right way to prompt, depends on the learner, the

program, the target, the moment. When someone says " we ONLY use no,no prompting

or we ONLY use errorless " be wary) It is important to know what prompt level the

learner is at.

*Now that we had all these principles and definitions understood, we learned

ideas on how to apply them to effectively teach play when McAuliffe

presented on " The Art of Teaching Play " . She explained how play is important to:

increase constuctive use of free time, increase independence, and to encourage

language and test ideas. She talked about the developmental progression of play

1. senorimotor 2. constructive play 3. dramatic play 4. role playing 5. games

w/rules and how to use this guideline combined with assessing your childs

current level and preferences to figure out where to start. Strategies include:

DTT, task analysis, chaining, play centers (replicated at home), social stories

and play coaching. Just a few references gave to learn (most can be found

at www.difflearn.com) more included: Pathways to Play, A Work in Progress,

Teaching Playskills to Children with Autistic Spectrum Disorder, and Activity

Schedules for Children with Autism (Great job !)

Bobby then talked about the function of behavior, central question: " Why is he

DOING that? " Not why did he start. What are the variables maintaining the

behavior now?. Often what starts a behavior isn't what ends up maintaining it.

Define the behaviors in such a way that everyone can agree when it has happened

and when it has not. Make up a clear definition.

ex: Agression includes: ...... Agression does not include:......

Effective Behavior Management requires two things:

First: You must pick the correct variables maintaining the behavior.

If you dont have the right function, you can make the behavior worse.

Second: You must then carry out the treatment plan porperly and consistantly.

INCONSISTANCY IS WORSE THEN DOING NOTHING!

(for more on Functional Analysis look up Functional Analysis in Behaviorspeak)

*After this introduction on how to figure out what is maintaining behavior, Anne

Beirne presented on Functional Communication Training. To extinguish

aggressive/inappropriate behaviors alone is not enough, the learner needs a way

to communicate needs effectively and appropriately. Assumptions of Functional

Communication Training: behavior serves a function. Instead of eliminating the

behavior based on topography, deal with the function (and teach an appropriate

replacement behavior) Behavior is the symptom, not the problem.

Anne went into detail about Functions of behavior maintained by socially

mediated and automatic reinforcement:

1. what we gain from others-like praise, attention (socially mediated positive

reinforcement)

2. what we gain through others-tangible items (socially mediated positive

reinforcement)

3. avoidance of others (socially mediated negative reinforcement)

4. avoidance of what is given through others (socially mediated negative

reinforcement)

Automatic reinforcement (behavior themselves have reinfocing effect)

1. Reinforcing effect is given (automatic positive reinforcement)

2. aversive effect is avoided or lessened (automatic negative reinforcement)

You need to conduct Functional Analysis through descriptive analysis (ABC data)

and Systematic Manipulation of different variables to figure out the function

and test your hypothesis (*for more on FBA's see past notes on Dr. Iwata)

Once you know the behaviors function, choose a mode of communication familiar to

the speaker.

Application examples:

for socially mediated positive reinforcement teach mands (requests) for

attention.

for socially mediated positive reinforcement tangible teach mands (requests) for

specific items

for socially mediated negative reinforcement teach manding for breaks

for socially mediated negative reinforcement tangible teach saying " no "

for automatic postive reinforcement teach manding for breaks, time alone, or

specific items

for automatic negative reinforcement teach " it hurts " etc

(way to go Anne!)

Thanks guys for yesterday's packed packed conference and thank you ELIJA

scholarship recipients McAuliffe and Anne Beirne who presented for

attendees (parents, friends, uncles, aunts, and grandparents) great

introductions and resources to get families started. What an honor to be there

for your first presentation! I had to leave a little early but I understand you

all stayed an extra hour or so during question and answer time with families

discussing least restrictive treatments, feeding programs and other challenges

we face day to day. awesome, thank you, sorry I missed it!

take care,

Jennica