Further evaluation of response-independent delivery of preferred stimuli and child compliance

The effect of a fixed-time (FT) schedule involving the delivery of preferred stimuli prior to the issuance of a low-probability instruction was evaluated with 2 young children with autism. The FT schedule was introduced according to a reversal design with 3 target instructions, 1 for the first child and 2 for the second child. Compliance increased for 2 of the 3 cases. A high-probability instruction sequence and guided compliance were implemented for the second instruction targeted for 1 child, with compliance increasing with guided compliance.     

Christian Mysticism and Science: The Psychological Dimension

Abstract

In this third of three papers, I identify three fundamental psychological themes that have informed Christian mystical theology and then explore how these themes might be given further understanding via natural science. The first theme, desire, represents an ever greater love for God: an insatiability related to the limitations of human language. Such focused desire for God is likely associated with brain activity in the caudate nucleus (CN); associated permanent changes in the neuroplastic brain further enhance this desire. The second theme, discernment, is about listening to God, being open to God's graces, and waiting for the right time to make godly decisions. Such decisions reflect both cognitive and emotive skills, as verified by their overlapping neural circuits within the brain. Psychotherapy indicates that the mind can control the brain, consciously improving and directing chosen events, thus leading to enhanced discernment. The third theme is charity, which represents the universal link between love of God and love of neighbor. Neuroscience demonstrates how cognition gives rise to such features as willfulness, surrender, fragmentation and wholeness—all of which play significant roles in mystical experiences, including the evolution to charity. Love of neighbor can be taken as shared attention building on intersubjective perception; such shared attention represents a deep interaction of lovers in voluntary self-disclosure—surely the ultimate basis for charity.     

Language Development in Children with Simple-Partial Left-Hemisphere Epilepsy

The nature of cerebral involvement in the acquisition of language was addressed in this longitudinal study of children with an early diagnosis of epilepsy with simple-partial seizures (SPE) and with epileptogenic foci localized in the left frontal (LF) lobe. Yearly evaluations of six SPE-LF children on tests of linguistic comprehension (pointing, understanding of narrative, and understanding of prepositions) and production (repetition, lexical diversity, and grammatical production) were carried out between the ages of 3 and 8 years and compared to those of large samples of control children on the same tasks and at each age level. Linguistic production of all children were transcribed, coded, and analyzed using the Child Language Data Exchange System (MacWhinney & Snow, 1991). Individual evolution trajectories revealed that SPE-LF children showed a clear dissociation in linguistic performance between comprehension and production. Linguistic comprehension gradually improved to reach normal performance levels by age 7 while linguistic production, even at later stages, remained quite poor. This dissociation in the development of linguistic performance in SPE-LF children suggests a complex interplay between brain maturation dynamics and dysfunction modulating the succession of stages in language development. The observed persistent deficits in specific aspects of linguistic performance argue for an early involvement of the anterior areas of the left cerebral hemisphere in the production of language.     

An evaluation of preemployment drug testing

As part of a blind longitudinal study, 5,465 job applicants were tested for use of illicit drugs, and the relationships between these drug-test results and absenteeism, turnover, injuries, and accidents on the job were evaluated. After an average 1.3 years of employment, employees who had tested positive for illicit drugs had an absenteeism rate 59.3% higher than employees who had tested negative (6.63% vs. 4.16% of scheduled work hours, respectively). Employees who had tested positive also had a 47% higher rate of involuntary turnover than employees who had tested negative (15.41% vs. 10.51%, respectively). No significant associations were detected between drug-test results and measures of injury and accident occurrence. The practical implications of these results, in terms of economic utility and prediction errors, are discussed.     

SIMSTAT: Bootstrap computer simulation and statistical program for IBM personal computers

SIMSTAT is a computer program that provides bootstrap confidence intervals and estimates distribution parameters for 27 univariate and bivariate statistics. Because it permits variation of the bootstrap sample size, it is a convenient tool for research planning, allowing comparison of power estimates and estimator precision for various estimators and/or sample sizes. SIMSTAT also is a useful tool for studying the robustness of various statistics on real-world data and may be helpful in teaching statistical principles.     

Behavior analytic contributions to public health and telehealth

The Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis is launching a special series on the topics of public health and telehealth. The special series begins with the articles in this issue and will continue for the next 2 to 3 issues with an open submission window until September 1, 2020. Behavior analysis has much to offer with respect to public health and much to gain from continued and expanded use of telehealth. This paper outlines the importance of these topics in the current crisis and in our ongoing evolution as a field. The historical literature in behavior analysis is reviewed for each topic along with suggestions for future research. The articles from the special series will be combined with historical contributions from JABA into a virtual issue. We encourage continued submissions on these topics even after the special series is completed as future papers will also be incorporated into the special issue.     

An evaluation of the high-probability instruction sequence with and without programmed reinforcement for compliance with high-probability instructions

We assessed the effects of reinforcement and no reinforcement for compliance to high-probability (high-p) instructions on compliance to low-probability (low-p) instructions using a reversal design. For both participants, compliance with the low-p instruction increased only when compliance with high-p instructions was followed by reinforcement. These results suggest that providing reinforcement for high-p instructions may result in increased compliance to low-p instructions.     

Promoting healthier food choices in college students using individualized dietary feedback

A healthy diet is a key ingredient to good health and can help prevent a number of adverse health conditions. Although many people can describe a healthy diet, they often cannot accurately report the nutritional content of their own diets. In this study, daily dietary feedback consisting of recommended daily nutrient values accompanied by estimated calorie and fat data of daily food purchases was provided to four college undergraduates. The estimated calorie and percentage of calories from fat data were based on records of participant purchases at university dining establishments. The introduction of daily dietary feedback resulted in the students purchasing fewer calories and fewer calories from fat per day. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The adaptation to sensory information in the production of bimanual movement patterns

Bimanual in-phase and anti-phase patterns were performed in the transverse plane under optimal and degraded proprioceptive conditions, i.e., without and with tendon vibration. Moreover, proprioceptive information was changed midway into each trial to examine on-line reorganization. In addition to the proprioceptive perturbation, the availability of visual information was manipulated to study to which degree sensory information from different modalities interact. Movement patterns performed under identical sensory conditions were compared, i.e., the first 15 s (control) and the 15 s following a change in afferent input (transfer). In the control and transfer conditions, movements with vibrations were less accurate than those without vibrations indicating the influence of optimal proprioceptive information in the calibration and recalibration of intrinsic bimanual movement patterns. Furthermore, pattern stability was affected by the nature of the transfer condition. This indicated that the degree of fluctuations in a sensory transfer situation depended upon the quality of the proprioceptive information experienced in the initial conditions. The influence of visual information was not without importance, although the nature of the coordination mode must be taken into account. In the control conditions, in-phase movements were less stable when vision was absent, whereas anti-phase movements were more stable when vision was not present. This observation was made independent of the available proprioceptive information revealing differences in visual guidance between both coordination modes. In the transfer conditions, pattern stability was similar during the vision and no-vision conditions suggesting a limited influence of visual information in the recalibration process.