AN EVALUATION OF GENTLE TEACHING AND VISUAL SCREENING IN THE REDUCTION OF STEREOTYPY

Gentle teaching and visual screening techniques have been used to control severe behavior problems in persons with mental retardation. An alternating treatments design was used to compare gentle teaching, visual screening, and a task-training condition in the reduction of the high-level stereotypy of 3 persons with mental retardation. Following a baseline phase, a task-training condition using standard behavioral techniques was implemented to establish the effects of training the subjects on the tasks. Results showed a modest decrease in stereotypy. This phase was followed by an alternating treatments phase in which visual screening, gentle teaching, and baseline conditions were compared. Both procedures were superior to the control condition in reducing stereotypic behavior, with visual screening being more effective than gentle teaching. When compared with data from the prior phase, gentle teaching was found to be more effective than task training for 2 subjects but less effective for the 3rd, whose stereotypy increased during gentle teaching. Two succeeding phases in which visual screening was implemented across two and then all three daily conditions reduced stereotypy further to near-zero levels. An additional phase with 1 subject demonstrated that the treatment effects of visual screening were easily replicated across therapists. Mixed and idiosyncratic changes in collateral behaviors occurred. For example, “bonding,” the goal of gentle teaching, occurred at the same low levels under both treatments, contrary to the predictions of gentle teaching's proponents. The results indicate that gentle teaching may not be the universal treatment of choice for stereotypy its proponents suggest, and that it requires further empirical evaluation.     

Themes and schemes: A philosophical approach to interdisciplinary science teaching

An interdisciplinary fusion between the philosophy of science and the teaching of science can help to eradicate the disciplinary rigidity entrenched in both. In this paper I approach the history of sciencethematically, identifying general themes which transcend the boundaries of individual disciplines. Such conceptual themes can be used as a basis for an interdisciplinary introduction to university science, encouraging certain important cognitive skills not exercised during the disciplinary training emphasised in traditional approaches. Courses which teach themes such as conservation, randomness, and holism/reductionism have already proved successful, and these innovations should encourage philosophers and historians to explore the exciting new possibilities which arise from stepping outside the confines of a single discipline.     

Size scaling in two-dimensional pictorial arrays

The study examined effects of instructional sets (objective, phenomenal, projective, and retinal) on the judged sizes of blocks placed at various “distances” in a pictorial array. Magnitude estimations of size were consistent with previous studies of size constancy in three-dimensional arrays. Chronometric analyses indicated that reaction time increased with distal size, but was not affected by perceived distance. The results suggested that size was scaled relative to a perceptual unit. Instructions affected the nature of the scale unit (proximal vs. distal), but not the scaling process itself.     

Paradox and polarity: the Tao of family therapy

Taoism is a Chinese spiritual tradition whose central metaphors concern polarity, paradox, and the natural process of change. Taoist ideas offer a particularly useful framework for understanding paradoxical interventions, the stance of the paradoxical therapist, and the new epistemology emerging in the field. The relevance of three Taoist metaphors for family therapists is discussed: polarity, cyclical change, and Wu Wei (noninterference).