Establishing Equivalence Relations Using a Respondent-Type Training Procedure III

The Psychological Record - In this study, 12 5-year-old normal functioning children were exposed to a respondent-type training procedure and tested for emergent conditional discriminations. During...     

Constructing Relational Sentences: Establishing Arbitrarily AppliCable Comparative Relations with the Relational Completion Procedure

The present study examined the effectiveness of the Relational Completion Procedure (RCP) in establishing arbitrarily applicable comparative relations after training with either linear (Experiment 1) or non-linear (Experiment 2) arbitrary relations. Linear relations were those presented in a sequential order (i.e., A-B, B-C, C-D, etc.), while nonlinear relations were presented in a nonsequential order (i.e., C-D, B-C, A-B, etc.). After nonarbitrary relational training and testing to establish the contextual functions of MORE THAN and LESS THAN, adults underwent constructed-response nonarbitrary relational training and testing with physically dissimilar stimuli in which they were required to “complete” relational sentences in the presence of the cues. Next, during arbitrary relational training with abstract stimuli, participants were randomly assigned to 1 of 3 training groups: All-More (E > D, D > C., C > B, and B > A), All-Less (A < B, B < C., C < D, and D < E), and Less-More (A < B, B < C., D > C., and E > D). Finally, during arbitrary relational testing, probes for mutually entailed relations were followed by probes for 1-and 2-node combinatorially entailed relations. The yield, or percentage of participants passing, was 83% in Experiment 1 and 91.6% in Experiment 2. Our findings demonstrate that the RCP was successful in establishing arbitrarily applicable comparative relations with adults regardless of the order in which the arbitrary relational training trials were presented.

     

Establishing Arbitrarily Applicable Relations of Same and Opposite with the Relational Completion Procedure: Selection-Based Feedback

The Psychological Record - Research suggests that the relational completion procedure (RCP) is effective for studying derived relations of same and opposite. Previously, procedural parameters, such...     

Stimulus Equivalence Using a Respondent Matching-to-Sample Procedure with Verification Trials

The Psychological Record - Despite systematic demonstrations of the effectiveness of the respondent-type procedure in producing relational responding, matching-to-sample continues to be the...     

Attempting to Analyze Perspective-Taking with a False Belief Vignette Using the Implicit Relational Assessment Procedure

The Psychological Record - Cognitive perspective-taking research has primarily been conducted under the rubric of theory of mind (ToM), with the core skill believed to involve the correct...     

Methodological improvements to a Procedure for Rapidly Establishing Steady-State Behavior

We performed three experiments to improve the quality and retention of data obtained from a Procedure for Rapidly Establishing Steady-State Behavior (PRESS-B; Klapes et al., 2020). In Experiment 1, 120 participants worked on nine concurrent random-interval random-interval (conc RI RI) schedules and were assigned to four conditions of varying changeover delay (COD) length. The 0.5-s COD condition group exhibited the fewest instances of exclusive reinforcer acquisition. Importantly, this group did not differ in generalized matching law (GML) fit quality from the other groups. In Experiment 2, 60 participants worked on nine conc RI RI schedules with a wider range of scheduled reinforcement rate ratios than was used in Experiment 1. Participants showed dramatic reductions in exclusive reinforcer acquisition. Experiment 3 entailed a replication of Experiment 2 wherein blackout periods were implemented between the schedule presentations and each schedule remained in operation until at least one reinforcer was acquired on each alternative. GML fit quality was slightly more consistent in Experiment 3 than in the previous experiments. Thus, these results suggest that future PRESS-B studies should implement a shorter COD, a wider and richer scheduled reinforcement rate ratio range, and brief blackouts between schedule presentations for optimal data quality and retention.     

Testing and Training Analogical Responding in Young Children Using A Relational Evaluation Procedure

The Psychological Record - Analogical responding, or relating relations, as operationally defined by relational frame theory (RFT), is ubiquitous in everyday language and cognition, and is a key...     

Generating Relations Elicits a Relational Mindset in Children

Relational reasoning is a hallmark of human higher cognition and creativity, yet it is notoriously difficult to encourage in abstract tasks, even in adults. Generally, young children initially focus more on objects, but with age become more focused on relations. While prerequisite knowledge and cognitive resource maturation partially explains this pattern, here we propose a new facet important for children's relational reasoning development: a general orientation to relational information, or a relational mindset. We demonstrate that a relational mindset can be elicited, even in 4‐year‐old children, yielding greater than expected spontaneous attention to relations. Children either generated or listened to an experimenter state the relationships between objects in a set of formal analogy problems, and then in a second task, selected object or relational matches according to their preference. Children tended to make object mappings, but those who generated relations on the first task selected relational matches more often on the second task, signaling that relational attention is malleable even in young children.     

The Role of Relational Contextual Cues versus Relational Coherence Indicators as Response Options on the Implicit Relational Assessment Procedure

The Psychological Record - Recent research has indicated that the results of the implicit relational assessment procedure (IRAP) may be affected by certain facets of the measure. The current...     

Developing the Implicit Relational Assessment Procedure (IRAP) as a Measure of Self-Forgiveness Related to Failing and Succeeding Behaviors

The Psychological Record - This study aimed to develop the Implicit Relational Assessment Procedure (IRAP) as a measure of response biases related to emotional reactions and expected outcomes in...     

The Implicit Relational Assessment Procedure as a Measure of Implicit Depression and the Role of Psychological Flexibility

A broad implicit measure of depressive emotional reactions was created by mapping the content of the depression scale from the Depression Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS) on to the Implicit Relational Assessment Procedure (IRAP). Participants were asked to relate pairings of antecedents and emotional reactions that followed the formula “When X happens . . . I feel Y.” Groups of participants representing the low and high extremes of normative levels of depressive symptoms completed an IRAP before and after a sad mood–induction procedure. At baseline both groups produced a positive emotional response bias on the IRAP. After the sad mood induction, the “normal” group showed no change, whereas the “mild/moderate” depression group showed a significant decrease in the positivity of their emotional responses. A similar pattern of differential change was found when groups were created using scores on the AAQ-II. The findings are related to the broader literature on cognitive reactivity and implications for future research are considered.     

Establishing Measurement Equivalence and Invariance in Longitudinal Data With Item Response Theory

If measurement invariance does not hold over 2 or more measurement occasions, differences in observed scores are not directly interpretable. Golembiewski, Billingsley, and Yeager (1976) identified 2 types of psychometric differences over time as beta change and gamma change. Gamma change is a fundamental change in thinking about the nature of a construct over time. Beta change can be described as respondents' change in calibration of the response scale over time. Recently, researchers have had considerable success establishing measurement invariance using confirmatory factor analytic (CFA) techniques. However, the use of item response theory (IRT) techniques for assessing item parameter drift can provide additional useful information regarding the psychometric equivalence of a measure over time that is not attainable with traditional CFA techniques. This article marries the terminology commonly used in CFA and IRT techniques and illustrates real advantages for identifying beta change over time with IRT methods rather than typical CFA methods, utilizing a longitudinal assessment of job satisfaction as an example.     

The Implicit Relational Assessment Procedure (IRAP ) and the Malleability of Ageist Attitudes

The Psychological Record - The current study examined the malleability of implicit attitudes using the Implicit Relational Assessment Procedure (IRAP). In Experiment 1, “similar” and...     

Evaluation of a Video Prompting and Fading Procedure for Teaching Dish Washing Skills to Adults with Developmental Disabilities

We evaluated a video prompting and fading procedure for teaching three adults with developmental disabilities to wash dishes. Video prompting involved showing video clips depicting each step of the task. All three adults reached 90–100% correct when video prompting was implemented. Following acquisition, video prompting was withdrawn, but performance deteriorated. Subsequently, a 3-step fading procedure was implemented in which the separate video clips were merged to form larger, multi-step segments of video. Performance reached 80–100% correct as the video prompts were re-applied and then faded. Performance decreased at the 3-month follow-up when prompting was removed, but stabilized at 80–90% correct when the third step in the fading sequence was reinstated. These data suggest a promising approach for fading video prompts.     

Forms of Relational Meaning: Issues in the Relations Between the Implicit and Reflective-Verbal Domains

During these last decades, the notion of primary intersubjectivity has gained acceptance among developmentalists and clinicians. But a new challenge is put out to our models by recent findings on the triangular competence of the very young infant, or her capacity to simultaneously communicate with two partners at a time. This discovery raises the question of a collective form of intersubjectivity. Findings on the triangular competence of the 3- to 4-month-old interactions with father and mother in different contexts of the Lausanne trilogue play situation are reviewed and illustrated, with a view to examine whether it is based on a dyadic or triangular program and whether conditions for a threesome form of primary intersubjectivity are fulfilled. The discussion focuses on the revisions of the theory of intersubjectivity, of developmental theory, and of clinical practice these findings call for, pointing toward a three -person psychology too.     

Go/No-Go Procedure with Compound Stimuli: Effects of Training Structure on the Emergence of Equivalence Classes

The Psychological Record - When the matching-to-sample (MTS) procedure is used, different training structures imply differences in the successive discriminations required in training and test...     

Establishing the Measurement Equivalence of Online Selection Assessments Delivered on Mobile versus Nonmobile Devices

Recent usage data suggest job applicants are completing online selection assessments using mobile devices (e.g., smartphones) in greater numbers. To determine the appropriateness of this new technology, this study examined the measurement equivalence of selection assessments delivered on mobile and nonmobile devices (e.g., personal computers). Measurement invariance tests conducted with multigroup confirmatory factor analysis suggest mobile versions of a cognitive ability‐type assessment, two biodata assessments, a multimedia work simulation, and a text‐based situational judgment test appear to be equivalent to nonmobile versions. However, mobile device user latent means were half a standard deviation lower than their nonmobile counterparts for the situational judgment test. Implications for mobile device usage within selection and assessment are discussed.     

Increasing the Generativity of Identity-Based Procedures for Establishing Arbitrary Conditional Relations

The Psychological Record - Previous studies have shown that conditional discrimination training procedures involving identity matching to complex samples can produce emergent arbitrary relations....