A comparison of two flash-card methods for improving sight-word reading

Flash cards have been shown to be useful for teaching sight-word reading. To date, the most effective flash-card instruction method is incremental rehearsal (IR). This method involves the instructor interspersing unknown stimulus items into the presentation of known stimulus items. In this study, we compared IR to a modified IR procedure-strategic incremental rehearsal (SIR)-to determine whether the effects of IR might be improved by incorporating variables likely to increase word acquisition. These included increased opportunities to respond to unknown stimuli, using learner responding as a basis for changing instructional items, and systematic prompting methods. An A-B-A-B design was used to compare the effects of IR and SIR for increasing sight-word reading with 4 elementary school students. Results indicated that students read more words correctly with SIR than with IR. In addition, similar patterns of responding were seen at a 2-week follow-up.     

Temporal discounting predicts student responsiveness to exchange delays in a classroom token system

Typical assessments of temporal discounting involve presenting choices between hypothetical monetary outcomes. Participants choose between smaller immediate rewards and larger delayed rewards to determine how the passage of time affects the subjective value of reinforcement. Few studies, however, have compared such discounting to actual manipulations of reward delay. The present study examined the predictive validity of a temporal discounting procedure developed for use with children. Forty-six sixth-grade students completed a brief discounting assessment and were then exposed to a classwide intervention that involved both immediate and delayed reinforcement in a multiple baseline design across classrooms. The parameters derived from two hyperbolic models of discounting correlated significantly with actual on-task behavior under conditions of immediate and delayed exchange. Implications of temporal discounting assessments for behavioral assessment and treatment are discussed.     

Reversing the Signaled Magnitude Effect in Delayed Matching to Sample: Delay-specific Remembering

Pigeons performed a delayed matching‐to‐sample task in which large or small reinforcers for correct remembering were signaled during the retention interval. Accuracy was low when small reinforcers were signaled, and high when large reinforcers were signaled (the signaled magnitude effect). When the reinforcer‐size cue was switched from small to large partway through the retention interval, accuracy accordingly changed from low to high. The opposite happened when the cue was switched from large to small. This dissociation of forgetting from the passage of time raises the possibility that remembering is delay‐specific. The reversal of the signaled magnitude effect during the retention interval is consistent with an attentional account in which the stimulus control of remembering is influenced by extraneous events.     

TEACHING SELF‐CONTROL WITH QUALITATIVELY DIFFERENT REINFORCERS

This study examined the effectiveness of using qualitatively different reinforcers to teach self‐control to an adolescent boy who had been diagnosed with an intellectual disability. First, he was instructed to engage in an activity without programmed reinforcement. Next, he was instructed to engage in the activity under a two‐choice fixed‐duration schedule of reinforcement. Finally, he was exposed to self‐control training, during which the delay to a more preferred reinforcer was initially short and then increased incrementally relative to the delay to a less preferred reinforcer. Self‐control training effectively increased time on task to earn the delayed reinforcer.     

Effects of pre-trial response requirements on self-control choices by rats and pigeons

Parallel experiments with rats and pigeons examined whether the size of a pre-trial ratio requirement would affect choices in a self-control situation. In different conditions, either 1 response or 40 responses were required before each trial. In the first half of each experiment, an adjusting-ratio schedule was used, in which subjects could choose a fixed-ratio schedule leading to a small reinforcer, or an adjusting-ratio schedule leading to a larger reinforcer. The size of the adjusting ratio requirement was increased and decreased over trials based on the subject's responses, in order to estimate an indifference point-a ratio at which the two alternatives were chosen about equally often. The second half of each experiment used an adjusting-delay procedure-fixed and adjusting delays to the small and large reinforcers were used instead of ratio requirements. In some conditions, particularly with the reinforcer delays, the rats had consistently longer adjusting delays with the larger pre-trial ratios, reflecting a greater tendency to choose the larger, delayed reinforcer when more responding was required to reach the choice point. No consistent effects of the pre-trial ratio were found for the pigeons in any of the conditions. These results may indicate that rats are more sensitive to the long-term reinforcement rates of the two alternatives, or they may result from a shallower temporal discounting rate for rats than for pigeons, a difference that has been observed in previous studies.     

Incentive theory: IV. Magnitude of reward

Incentive theory is successfully applied to data from experiments in which the amount of food reward is varied. This is accomplished by assuming that incentive value is a negatively accelerated function of reward duration. The interaction of the magnitude of a reward with its delay is confirmed, and the causes and implications of this interaction are discussed.     

Homogeneous chains, heterogeneous chains, and delay of reinforcement

Three pigeons responded on two-component chain schedules in which the required response topography in the initial and terminal links was similar (a homogeneous chain) or dissimilar (a heterogeneous chain). Key-peck responding in the initial link under a variable-interval 60-second (VI 60) schedule produced a terminal link in which, in different conditions, either key pecking or foot treadling was reinforced according to a VI 60 schedule. Multiple VI 60 VI 60 schedules, in which the responses required in the chain schedules were maintained by primary reinforcement in the two components, preceded and followed each type of chain. These multiple schedules were used to ensure that both responses occurred reliably prior to introducing the chain schedule. Key-peck response rates in the initial link of the chain consistently were higher during the homogeneous chain than during the heterogeneous chain. These results illustrate that intervening events during a period separating an operant response from primary reinforcement influence that operant, independently of the delay between the response and reinforcement.     

Choice between single and multiple delayed reinforcers.

Pigeons chose between alternatives that differed in the number of reinforcers and in the delay to each reinforcer. A peck on a red key produced the same consequences on every trial within a condition, but between conditions the number of reinforcers varied from one to three and the reinforcer delays varied between 5 s and 30 s. A peck on a green key produced a delay of adjustable duration and then a single reinforcer. The green-key delay was increased or decreased many times per session, depending on a subject's previous choices, which permitted estimation of an indifference point, or a delay at which a subject chose each alternative about equally often. The indifference points decreased systematically with more red-key reinforcers and with shorter red-key delays. The results did not support the suggestion of Moore (1979) that multiple delayed reinforcers have no effect on preference unless they are closely grouped. The results were well described in quantitative detail by a simple model stating that each of a series of reinforcers increases preference, but that a reinforcer's effect is inversely related to its delay. The success of this model, which considers only delay of reinforcement, suggested that the overall rate of reinforcement for each alternative had no effect on choice between those alternatives.     

INCREASING SPONTANEOUS LANGUAGE IN THREE AUTISTIC CHILDREN

A time delay procedure was used to increase spontaneous verbalizations of 3 autistic children. Multiple baseline across behaviors designs were used with target responses, selected via a social validation procedure, of two spontaneous responses (“please” and “thank you”) and one verbally prompted response (“you're welcome”). The results indicate gains across target behaviors for all children, with occurrence across other stimuli and settings. These gains were validated socially with 10 adults. Furthermore, increases in appropriate language had no effect on levels of inappropriate speech.     

Observing behavior in a computer game.

Contingencies studied in lever-pressing procedures were incorporated into a popular computer game, "Star Trek," played by college students. One putative reinforcer, the opportunity to destroy Klingon invaders, was scheduled independently of responding according to a variable-time schedule that alternated unpredictably with equal periods of Klingon unavailability (mixed variable time, extinction schedule of reinforcement). Two commands ("observing responses") each produced stimuli that were either correlated or uncorrelated with the two components. In several variations of the basic game, an S-, or bad news, was not as reinforcing as an S+, or good news. In addition, in other conditions for the same subjects observing responses were not maintained better by bad news than by an uninformative stimulus. In both choices, more observing tended to be maintained by an S- for response-independent Klingons when its information could be (and was) used to advantage with respect to other types of reinforcement in the situation (Parts 1 and 2) than when the information could not be so used (Part 3). The findings favor the conditioned reinforcement hypothesis of observing behavior over the uncertainty-reduction hypothesis. This extends research to a more natural setting and to multialternative concurrent schedules of events of seemingly intrinsic value.