Title: Decreasing Behavior with Nonpunishment Procedures
1Decreasing Behavior with Nonpunishment Procedures
2What Does Nonpunishment Mean?
- Punishment
- Occurs when a stimulus change immediately follows
a response and - Decreases the future frequency of that type of
behavior in similar conditions - Nonpunishment procedures that decrease behavior
- Extinction
- Differential reinforcement arrangements
- Antecedent arrangements
3Differential Reinforcement Arrangements Used to
Decrease Behavior
- Differential Reinforcement reinforcing one
response class and withholding reinforcement for
another response class - As a behavior reduction procedure, DR is
- Providing reinforcement contingent upon the
occurrence of behavior other than the problem
behavior - Or contingent upon a reduced rate of the problem
behavior - Withholding reinforcement as much as possible for
the problem behavior
4Differential Reinforcement of
- Incompatible Behavior (DRI)
- Alternative Behavior (DRA)
- Other Behavior (DRO)
- Low Rates of Responding (DRL)
- High Rates of Responding (DRH)
5DRA
- Reinforcement of an appropriate alternative to
the problem behavior - Withholding of reinforcement following instances
of problem behavior (extinction) - Sometimes the new behavior is a communication
response that results in the same reinforcer as
the target behavior Functional Communication
Training (FCT) - Sometimes the new behavior and the problem
behavior cant be done at the same time this is
called DRI whats the benefit of this?
6Durand (1999)
(DRA)
of Intervals
7Implementing DRA and DRI
- Select incompatible and alternative behaviors
that are - Require equal or less effort than the problem
behavior - If possible, already in the learners repertoire
- Likely to be reinforced in the learners natural
environment - Select reinforcers that are
- Powerful try to use same reinforcer that
maintains problem behavior if you can! - Can be delivered consistently and immediately
(than switch from CRF to Intermittent schedule) - Withhold reinforcement for the problem behavior
(Extinction) - Combine with other procedures if the behavior is
destructive or dangerous
8Should the Replacement Behavior Be Saying Im
angry?
- It may be true that a student is feeling angry,
sad, or frustrated - Will teaching the student to say, Im angry be
an appropriate replacement behavior? - What reinforcer will be delivered contingent upon
Im angry? - How will another person know what to do in
response to that statement? - Learning to describe emotions is an important
skill - But it may be beneficial to teach a student to
specify the reinforcer or engage in a functional
skill instead
9DRO
- Reinforcer is delivered contingent on
the absence of a - problem behavior whats the
problem with the term DRO? - Arranging a DRO schedule
- Identify the target behaviors reinforcer
- Identify the mean interresponse time (IRT) during
baseline - Total of all baseline sessions/total number of
responses - Set the initial DRO value slightly less than the
mean baseline IRT - Deliver the reinforcer only at the end of
intervals in which no target behaviors have
occurred (Interval DRO) - or at a specific moment when no target behaviors
are occurring (Momentary DRO) - Hint think of momentary time sampling and
partial interval recording - If the target behavior occurs, reset the interval
10Types of DRO
Interval Momentary
Fixed FI-DRO FM-DRO
Variable VI-DRO VM-DRO
11(No Transcript)
12DRO Video
13Guidelines for Using DRO
Step Start at 15 s incr
1 30 s 100
2 45 s 50
3 60 s 33
4 90 s 50
5 120 s 33
6 160 s 33
7 230 s 44
8 330 s 43
9 450 s 37
10 600 s 33
- Interval DRO may be more effective than Momentary
DRO - But VM-DRO may be more practical
- Increase the DRO interval gradually as behavior
improves (recall LeBlanc, Hagopian, Maglieri,
Poling, 2002) - Watch for
- Other problem behaviors occurring during the
interval - Problem behavior occurring at the time of
reinforcement - Combine DRO with other procedures
14Antecedent Interventions Used to Decrease Behavior
- Antecedent Intervention Behavior change
strategy in which motivating operations are
manipulated - 3 established antecedent interventions
- Noncontingent reinforcement (NCR)
- High-probability (Hi-p) request sequence
- Functional communication training (FCT)
15NCR
- Reinforcer that maintains a problem behavior is
delivered on a fixed-time (FT) or variable-time
(VT) schedule (also continuous) - Independent of the learners behavior
- How is noncontingent reinforcement a misnomer?
Vollmer et al. (1998)
16How Does NCR manipulate Motivating Operations?
- Abolishing Operation Motivating operation that
decreases the reinforcing effectiveness of a
consequence - e.g., food consumption decreases the reinforcing
effectiveness of food - In the case of NCR
- Noncontingent access to attention decreases the
reinforcing effectiveness of attention (social
SR) - Noncontingent access to escape decreases the
reinforcing effectiveness of escape (social SR-) - Noncontingent access to sensory stimulation
decreases the reinforcing effectiveness of
sensory stimulation (automatic SR)
17Guidelines for Using NCR
- First conduct Functional Assessment
- Use with extinction or DRO
- Initial time interval should be dense and then
thinned - Total duration of all baseline sessions/total
number of occurrences of the problem behavior - Set the initial interval slightly below this
18Advantages and Disadvantages of NCR
- Advantages
- Easy to use
- Creates positive learning environment
- If used with extinction, can reduce extinction
burst - Chance pairing of productive behavior and NCR
could strengthen the productive behavior
- Disadvantages
- Free access to NCR stimuli may reducte motivation
to engage in adaptive behavior - Chance pairing of non-productive behavior and NCR
could strengthen the non-productive behavior
19High-P Request Sequence
- Teacher presents 2-5 easy-to-follow requests for
which the learner has a history of compliance
(hi-p) - When the learner complies, the teacher
immediately gives the target request for which
the learner has a history of noncompliance
(low-p) - Sometimes called behavioral momentum
20How Does the High-P Request Sequence Manipulate
MOs?
- Reinforcement during the high-p requests reduces
the value of escape from the low-p request - Makes the situation less aversive
21Selecting the Hi-p Requests
- Selecting the hi-p requests
- Create a list of requests
- Present each one in 5 separate sessions
- Hi-p requests are those that the student complies
with 100 of the time
22Functional Communication Training
- Conduct a functional assessment
- Use the reinforcer maintaining problem behavior
to teach a communication response - Can be vocalization, sign, written word, picture,
voice output system, gesture - How do you do this???
- Best if combined with extinction
- Rather than changing the MO, FCT develops an
alternative behavior that is sensitive to the MO
that evokes the target problem behavior
23Advantages Disadvantages of FCT
- Advantages
- Generalization Maintenance of the communicative
response - High social validity
- When using FRI, may be effective without using
extinction
- Disadvantages
- Usually includes extinction and side effects of
extinction - Extinction is very difficult to use consistently
- Inappropriate high rates of new response
- These may occur at impossible times
24Extinction
- Procedure Discontinuation of the
response-reinforcer relationship - Process decline in response rate caused by
withholding reinforcement - Extinction is procedurally different depending on
what the maintaining reinforcer of the behavior
ishow? - What are possible categories of maintaining
reinforcers? - How do you know what reinforcer maintains a
behavior?
25Iwata, Pace, Cowdery, and Miltenberger (1994)
EXT (Sensory)
EXT (Escape)
EXT (Attention)
Irrelevant
Contra-indicated
Treatment
Social SR (Attention)
Irrelevant
Treatment
Contra-indicated
Social SR- (Escape)
Treatment
Irrelevant
Irrelevant
Automatic SR (Sensory)
What Makes Extinction Work An Analysis of
Procedural Form and Function
26Misuse of the term Extinction
- Extinction is NOT just any decrease in behavior
- Extinction is NOT the same as forgetting
- Whats forgetting?
- Extinction is NOT the same as response blocking
- Extinction is not necessarily ignoring
27Characteristics of Extinction
- Extinction alone has not been well-studied in
humans in applied settings! - In ABA, we always combine extinction with other
procedures (treatment package) - Although these characteristics have been clearly
documented in basic research, apply them
cautiously to your learners - Initial increase in response frequency and
magnitude - Extinction burst immediate increase in the
frequency of a response after the discontinuation
of reinforcement - Gradual decrease in frequency and magnitude
- Emotional responses (e.g., aggression, crying)
- Extinction-induced variability
- Spontaneous recovery
28The Extinction Burst (Iwata et al., 1994)
29Resistance to Extinction
- Initial continued responding during an extinction
procedure - Variables Affecting RTE
- Schedule of reinforcement
- Intermittent schedules produce
- Variable schedules produce
- Thinner schedules of SR produce
- Motivating Operations
- RTE is greater when carried out with a strong EO
in effect - Number, magnitude, and quality of reinforcement
- Effects are unclear!
- Response effort
- A low effort response is more resistant to
extinction - Number of previous extinction trials
- The 2nd extinction is
30Higbee, Carr, and Patel (2002)
31Guidelines for Effective Use of Extinction
- Withhold all reinforcers maintaining the problem
behavior - Withhold reinforcement consistently
- Combine extinction with other behaviors
- Use instructions
- Plan for extinction-produced aggression
- Increase the number of extinction trials
- Include significant others in extinction
- Guard against unintentional extinction
- Maintain extinction-decreased behavior