Effects of differential reinforcement on the behavior and self-esteem of children with emotional and behavioral disorders

Students in a residential special school for children with emotional and behavioral disorders participated in a study designed to reduce their levels of inappropriate behavior. The residential care staff rated the students' behavioral problems and their class teachers rated their overt self-esteem pre and post intervention. In addition, the students completed self-ratings of their self-esteem. The students were divided into two groups, experimental and control. A multiple baseline across behaviors design was used to assess behavioral changes in the experimental group. Both groups received tangible rewards to the same level but only the experimental group received them contingent upon behaving appropriately. Results showed that the experimental group students made substantial reductions in their levels of inappropriate behavior, which were maintained at a three-month followup. Also, ratings of their behavioral problems by residential child care staff suggested that this improvement in behavior had generalized beyond the classroom to the residential setting. However, no significant differences were found between the pre- and post-intervention ratings of their self-esteem or teacher ratings of their overt self-esteem.     

Factor structure of the basic personality inventory with incarcerated offenders

The item and scale factor structure of the Basic Personality Inventory (BPI) was examined in a sample of 486 offenders incarcerated for violent and sexual crimes. Separate principal-component analyses of the items for each of the 11 clinical scales, critical item scale, and social desirability scale indicated a one-dimensional factor solution for all scales except Depression and Persecutory Ideation. The Depression scale's two factors were Hopelessness and Depressive Affect and the Persecutory Ideation scale's two factors were General Paranoia and Perception of External Control. Although the factors for these two scales may assist in interpretation, the correlations between the factors and the total score of their respective scale were high. Confirmatory factor analysis of the 220 items from the 11 clinical scales supported the factorial logic of the scoring key. Analysis of the 11 clinical scales resulted in two factors: General Psychopathology/Adjustment and Antisocial Orientation. The results suggest that all but two scales can be viewed as unidimensional thereby allowing for a straightforward clinical interpretation. These analyses support the internal structure of the BPI and lend credence to external validity work with forensic populations.     

THE EFFECTS OF CONTINGENT AND NONCONTINGENT ATTENTION ON SELF-INJURY AND SELF-RESTRAINT

Self-restraint and self-injurious behavior (SIB) are two responses that can sometimes be members of the same functional response class (i.e., maintained by the same contingency). In such cases, a single treatment should be effective for both responses. In this investigation, we examined the effects of providing attention (the presumed reinforcer) both noncontingently and contingent upon either SIB or self-restraint. Results were consistent with our hypothesis that both responses were maintained by attention and suggested that noncontingent reinforcement was a potentially effective treatment.     

COMPARISON OF PROTOTYPE AND ROTE INSTRUCTION OF ENGLISH NAMES FOR CHINESE VISUAL CHARACTERS

This study compared prototype and rote instruction of English names for Chinese visual characters. In the prototype condition, participants were taught the meaning of the prototype that served as the distinctive feature of multicomponent characters. In the rote condition, participants traced the character and wrote its translation. Participants learned more rapidly and maintained more words in the prototype condition.     

The Natural Selection of Prediction Heuristics: Anchoring and Adjustment versus Representativeness

There are several heuristics which people use in making numerical predictions and these heuristics compete for the determination of prediction output. Some of them (e.g. representativeness) lead to excessively extreme predictions while others (e.g. anchoring and adjustment) lead to regressive (and even over-regressive) predictions. In this paper we study the competition between these two heuristics by varying the representation of predictor and outcome. The results indicate that factors which facilitate reliance on representativeness (e.g. compatibility between predictor and outcome) indeed lead to an increase in extremity, while factors that facilitate reliance on anchoring and adjustment (e.g. increased salience of a potential anchor) lead to a decrease in extremity.     

军队初级指挥官PM领导行为类型的研究——与中、日企业领导行为的比较

本研究采用日本三隅二不二教授的PM领导行为理论 ,用中国修订版的PM量表对 2 64名初级军官的领导行为类型进行了评定 ,并与对中、日企业界的有关研究结果进行了比较 ,目的是研究初级军官所特有的领导行为特征以及与其相对应的情境因素。研究结果显示 :①在军事组织中 ,PM型是较理想的领导类型 ,其次为P型。这与中、日企业的结果有所不同。②方差分析结果表示 ,在与领导行为类型相关的八项情境因素中 ,初级军官在工作激励、连队满意度、团队精神和会议成效等因子上高于中、日企业界 ;但在心理卫生、对待遇满意度、信息沟通和绩效规范等因子上均低于中国企业界。③ χ2 分析结果显示 ,三种组织与四种PM行为类型之间在六项情境因素上的差异显著 ,提示三种组织在领导行为和情境因素上各有其特点 ;另外 ,与军事指挥官领导行为类型关系最为密切的是工作激励因素和团队精神 ,这是军事集团突出的特征之一。④中、日企业界在会议成效和信息沟通两因素上的差异较大 ,反映了两国在企业管理方面不同的特点。     

Superstitious behavior in humans

Twenty undergraduate students were exposed to single response-independent schedules of reinforcer presentation, fixed-time or variable-time, each with values of 30 and 60 s. The reinforcer was a point on a counter accompanied by a red lamp and a brief buzzer. Three color signals were presented, without consistent relation to reinforcer or to the subjects' behavior. Three large levers were available, but the subjects were not asked to perform any particular behavior. Three of the 20 subjects developed persistent superstitious behavior. One engaged in a pattern of lever-pulling responses that consisted of long pulls after a few short pulls; the second touched many things in the experimental booth; the third showed biased responding called sensory superstition. However, most subjects did not show consistent superstitious behavior. Reinforcers can operate effectively on human behavior even in the absence of a response-reinforcer contingency and can, in some cases, shape stable superstitious patterns. However, superstitious behavior is not a consistent outcome of exposure of human subjects to response-independent reinforcer deliveries.     

SOCIAL INFLUENCES ON “SELF-STIMULATORY” BEHAVIOR: ANALYSIS AND TREATMENT APPLICATION

We tested the hypothesis that the “self-stimulatory” behaviors exhibited by some individuals may be socially mediated. Four developmentally disabled children who exhibited hand flapping and body rocking participated in a series of three experiments conducted to assess the influence of social variables on stereotyped behavior and to develop a treatment based on the assessment. Experiment 1 used an assessment procedure to determine the relative influences of social attention and task demands on stereotyped behavior. For all four children, hand flapping and body rocking increased when difficult academic tasks were introduced. Experiment 2 involved the use of a procedural time-out and demonstrated that removing task demands contingent on stereotyped behavior resulted in increased rates of hand flapping and body rocking. In Experiment 3, these results were used to develop a communication treatment that consisted of teaching the children to request assistance on the difficult tasks. This treatment resulted in significant reductions in self-stimulatory behavior. These results are consistent with the hypothesis that some forms of repetitive stereotyped behavior may come to serve social functions (e.g., escape from aversive situations). Teaching a functionally equivalent communicative alternative to escape-motivated stereotyped behavior can be an effective form of intervention for this problem.     

SERIOUS DELINQUENT BEHAVIOR AS PART OF A SIGNIFICANTLY HANDICAPPING CONDITION: CURES AND SUPPORTIVE ENVIRONMENTS

The past 20 years have been productive ones for the field of applied behavior analysis. A brief review of our own efforts during this period reveals that we have accomplished several but not all of our goals for the Teaching-Family approach. In this context, we note that the setting of realistic and appropriate goals is important for the field and for society. Moreover, we suggest that the realistic goal for some persons with serious delinquent behavior may be extended supportive and socializing treatment rather than permanent cure from conventional short-term treatment programs. We base this suggestion on the accumulating evidence that serious delinquent behavior may often be part of a significantly disabling and durable condition that consists of multiple antisocial and dysfunctional behaviors, often runs in families, and robustly eludes effective short-term treatment. Like other significant disabilities such as retardation, autism, and blindness, the effects of this condition may be a function of an interaction of environmental and constitutional variables. We argue that our field has the wherewithal to construct effective and humane long-term supportive environments for seriously delinquent youths. In this regard, we explore the dimensions, rationales, logistics, and beginnings of a new treatment direction that involves long-term supportive family treatment. We contend that such supportive families may be able to provide long, perhaps even lifetime, socializing influences through models, values, and contingencies that seem essential for developing and maintaining prosocial behavior in these high-risk youths.