Effects of direct instruction on the acquisition of prepositions by students with intellectual disabilities

Some students with intellectual disabilities require explicit instruction of language skills, including preposition use; however, little is known about effective ways to teach preposition use to this population. This study examined direct instruction (DI) to teach students to use and respond to prepositions. Results indicated that DI was an effective way to teach prepositions. Limitations and directions for future research are discussed.     

Capturing the psychopathic female: a prototypicality analysis of the comprehensive assessment of psychopathic personality (CAPP) across gender

Psychopathy in women has been subject to little systematic investigation; no coherent conceptualization of the disorder in women exists. Previous research is constrained by the reliance both on a male conceptualization of psychopathy and on assessment instruments developed, and primarily validated, with men. This study utilized a newly developed, broad, personality-based, and gender-sensitive lexical model of psychopathy, the Comprehensive Assessment of Psychopathic Personality (CAPP). Prototypical analysis was used to explore gender differences in the construct and the content validity of the CAPP model across gender. Symptoms were rated by international mental health professionals (N = 132). The findings support the content validity of the CAPP across gender and suggest that – at symptom and domain levels – psychopathic men and women have key similarities, but also that important gender differences exists. This has implications for the assessment of psychopathy in women, and has relevance for the proposed revision of diagnostic criteria for personality disorders. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Effects of Friendship Circles on the Social Interactions of Elementary Age Students with Mild Disabilities

This study assessed the effects of Friendship Circles on the social interactions between students with mild disabilities and their nondisabled peers. A multiple probe design was used to analyze the social interactions during lunch. Data also were collected in the form of sociograms and anecdotal records. In addition, generalization was assessed during recess observations. Results indicated that the Friendship Circle intervention produced increases in appropriate interactions at lunch for all three students and for two there were increases in friendly play at recess. Anecdotal data suggested improved social interactions for two of the students throughout the day and improved social behaviors in the general education classroom such as cooperation during group activities. Implications for future research are discussed.     

Argumentation and Transformation

I consider argumentation from the point of view of context-transcendent cognitive transformation through reference to the critical social theory of Jürgen Habermas. My aim is threefold. First, to make the case for a concept of context-transcendent cognitive transformation. Second, to clarify the transformatory role of argumentation itself by showing that, while argumentation may contribute constructively to context-transcendent cognitive transformation, such transformation presupposes the existence of a reality conceptually independent of argumentation. Third, to cast light on the problem of how to justify argumentatively the poetically formulated, novel and innovative semantic contents that may be required for context-transcendent cognitive transformation. I conclude that the difficulties involved in argumentatively assessing novel and innovative semantic contents should not be misconstrued as evidence of an unbridgeable gap between language and experience but rather suggest the need for a more dynamic normative conception of language and for a more receptive model of autonomous agency.     

Movement related EMGs become more variable during learning of fast accurate movements

Human subjects performed simple flexion and extension movements about the elbow in a visual step-tracking paradigm. Movements were self-terminated. Subjects were instructed to increase movement velocity while maintaining end-point accuracy during practice. The effects of practice on the pattern and variability of EMG activity of the biceps and triceps muscles were studied. Initial movements were performed using reciprocal phasic activation of agonist and antagonist muscles as indicated by surface EMGs. With practice, increases in movement speed were associated with larger agonist and antagonist bursts and an earlier onset of the antagonist burst. Decreased duration of the premovement antagonist silence was also observed during practice. Decreases in variability of movements during practice were not accompanied by equivalent decreases in variability of the associated EMGs. Surprisingly, both agonist and antagonist EMGs were more variable in faster, practiced movements. The combined agonist-antagonist EMG variability depended on both movement speed and trajectory variability. Lower variability in movements in the presence of greater variability in the related EMGs occurred because of linked variations in agonist and antagonist muscle activities. Variations in the first agonist burst were often compensated for by associated variations in the antagonist and late agonist bursts. These linked variations maintained the limb trajectory relatively constant in spite of large variations in the first agonist burst. Modifications to impulse-variability models are therefore needed to explain compensations for variability in accelerative impulses (produced by the first agonist burst) by linked variations in impulses for deceleration (produced by the antagonist and late agonist bursts).     

GENERALIZATION EFFECTS FROM INTRATHERAPY ARTICULATION TRAINING: A CASE STUDY1

This study analyzed generalization effects found associated with a language-training intervention to modify the articulation (/f/ phoneme) of a 3.5-year-old boy. The McLean and Raymore Stimulus Shift Articulation Program was implemented by the subject's mother. This language training program is designed to produce setting generalization effects based on an intratherapy training model (i.e., systematic training is applied in a single setting to promote transfer effects to nontraining environments). The intervention resulted in a significant improvement in the subject's production of the /f/ phoneme within the clinical setting in response to untrained stimuli (stimulus generalization). Additionally, the subject's correct phoneme production was observed to generalize to his home and school settings (setting generalization) under “opportunity loaded” (picture prompts) and “spontaneous” (no prompts) conditions. The results provide case-study evidence that stimulus generalization, both within and across settings, may occur with exclusively intratherapy articulation training.     

Behavioral limits of auditory temporal resolution in the rat: amplitude modulation and duration discrimination

Thresholds for detecting the presence of amplitude modulation in a noise carrier were determined for rats using conditioned avoidance procedures. There was a progressive increase in threshold with modulation rates between 5 Hz and 2 kHz. Further tests were conducted to determine difference thresholds for detecting an increase in modulation rate for standard rates of 10, 50, and 100 Hz. The size of the difference threshold increased progressively as the standard rate increased. In addition, thresholds for detecting an increase in the duration of a noise burst were determined for various standard durations. The difference thresholds were constant for values between 10 and 50 ms but increased progressively, with standard durations between 0.1 and 1.0 s.     

Ratings of speech naturalness of children ages 8-16 years

The focus of this cross-sectional study was the investigation of Speech Naturalness (speech that sounds normal or natural to the listener) of 60 normal speaking children and adolescents between the ages of 8 and 16 years. 26 naive adult listeners rated the naturalness of videotaped and computer-presented speech samples, using a 9-point-Likert rating scale (1: highly natural sounding speech and 9: highly unnatural sounding speech). The children and adolescents who participated as speakers were distributed among 5 age groups (8, 10, 12, 14, and 16 yr.) with 6 boys and 6 girls in each group. Each child demonstrated normal articulation, language, voice, and speech fluency skills. Age and sex comparisons indicated boys' and girls' speech was rated comparably; however, 8-yr.-olds' speech was rated as significantly less natural than those of 12-, 14-, and 16-yr.-olds. Preliminary ratings of Speech Naturalness for normal speaking children were presented. Suggestions for the clinical application of the findings as a target criterion in treatment programs with communicatively impaired children were suggested. Replication with a larger and more representative sample is in order.     

Temporal control of conditioned responding in goldfish

The peak procedure was used to characterize response timing during acquisition and maintenance of conditioned responding in goldfish. Subjects received light-shock pairings with a 5- or 15-s interstimulus interval. On interspersed peak trials, the conditioned stimulus light was presented for 45 s and no shock was delivered. Peaks in the conditioned response, general activity, occurred at about the time of the expected unconditioned stimulus, and variability in the activity distribution was scalar. Modeling of the changes in the activity distributions over sessions revealed that the temporal features of the conditioned response changed very little during acquisition. The data suggest that times are learned early in training, and, contrary to I. P. Pavlov's (1927/1960) concept of "inhibition of delay," that timing is learning when to respond rather than learning when not to respond.