Applied Behavior Analysis

Arshia Saif
 Applied Behavior Analysis
ABA- an evidence based therapy, systematically applies procedures
based on behavioral principles to the instruction and modification of
socially significant behaviors. It is used most extensively in the
treatment of Neurodevelopmental Disorders specifically Autism
Spectrum Disorder (ASD).
 Facts & Figures

• In Pakistan about 400,000 children are suffering from Autism

Spectrum Disorder (Autism Society of Pakistan, 2021).
• Unfortunately most of these children remain undiagnosed due to lack
of awareness.
• In Pakistan services available for autistic individuals and their families
are limited and expensive (Nadeem et al., 2019).
 Success of ABA
• More than 20 studies have established that intensive and long-
term therapy using ABA principles improves outcomes for many but
not all children with autism (Elemy, 2020).
• “Intensive” and “long term” refer to programs that provide 25 to 40
hours a week of therapy for 1 to 3 years. These studies show gains in
intellectual functioning, language development, daily living skills and
social functioning.
 ABA- An Evidence Based Therapy
• ABA is considered an evidence-based best practice treatment by the US
Surgeon General and by the American Psychological Association.
• “Evidence based” means that ABA has passed scientific tests of its usefulness,
quality, and effectiveness.
• ABA therapy includes many different techniques. All of these techniques focus
on antecedents (what happens before a behavior occurs) and on consequences
(what happens after the behavior).
 7 Dimensions of ABA
Dimension Description
Applied In te rve n tio n is d e sig n e d to h av e a m e an in g fu l,
p o sitiv e im p act o n th e life o f th e ch ild .
Behavioral The target behavior can be directly observed and
measured.
Analytical D ata sh o w th at th e in terv en tio n is resp o n sib le fo r the
change in behavior
C o n ce p tu a l In te rve n tio n s are re searc h -b ase d b e h av io ral strategies

Technological T each in g p ro ced u res are w ritten ex p licitly en o u g h

to b e im p lem en ted in th e sam e w ay b y ev ery o n e
Effective In te rve n tio n re sults in sig n ific ant p o sitive c h an g e in
behavior
Generality S k ills learn ed can b e m ain tain ed o v er tim e an d
g en eralized acro ss p eo p le, settin g s, an d co n tex ts
 Assessment

• Detailed Intake Interview

• Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scale – Second Edition (VABS-II)

• The Childhood Autism Rating Scale – Second Edition (CARS-2)

• Autism Diagnostic Observation schedule – Second Edition (ADOS-2)

• ABBLS
 ABA Used for

Skill Behavior
Acquisition Reduction
 Skill Acquisition

Acquisition of skill is a type of learning in which repetition

results in enduring changes in an individual's capability to
perform a specific task. With enough repetition, performance
of the task eventually may become automatic, with little need
for conscious oversight.
 Skill Acquisition Plan
A skill acquisition plan includes
• A description of the target skill being taught
• Materials needed for teaching
• Strategies to be used
• The consequences for correct or incorrect responding
• Reinforcement strategies
• Plan for generalization and maintenance
Consequences: Reinforcement and Punishment
 Reinforcers
A consequence stimulus that increases the target behavior it follows is
referred to as a reinforcer.
• Types of Positive Reinforcers
• Edible Reinforcer – Highly preferred food items.
• Sensory Reinforcer – Anything that effects pleasure to the senses to the
individual (massage, music).
• Tangible Reinforcer – Any tangible item that the person values (token, stickers)
• Activity Reinforcer – The opportunity to have some fun (watching TV, jumping
on a trampoline)
• Social Reinforcer – Any positive or desired attention or interaction with another
person can serve to reinforce.
 Schedules of Reinforcement

• Continuous – Reinforce after every correct response

• Used for acquisition of new skills and difficult
tasks (within 3 seconds)

• Intermittent – Fixed or variable schedule

• Used to maintain a behavior
Intermittent Reinforcement Schedule
 Fading of Reinforcement
• The concept of fading refers to the gradual lessening of something; usually
reinforcement. The trick with fading is doing it systematically; the right time, the
right thing and the right amount.
• The right time is not too soon and not too late. If your child is struggling with
something, it isn't the right time.
• If they are making steady progress of excelling, it may be the right time. For
instance, you give your child a skittle every time he/she has a toileting success,
and they have had consistent successes for 2 weeks, it may be a good time to start
fading out that reinforcement.
• Variable reinforcement schedules may be used to help fade the use of reinforcers.
 Types/ Strategies of ABA

ABA

Natural
Discrete-trial Environment
Training (DTT) Training (NET)
 Discrete-trial Training (DTT)

• Discrete trial teaching involves breaking skills down into smaller

components and teaching those smaller sub-skills individually.
• Repeated practice of skills is conducted.
• Therapist may incorporate prompting procedures as necessary.
• Activities on Table-top.
• Focus on and start with the Prerequisites:
• Eye contact
• Attention Span
• Sitting Span
 Discrete-trial Training (DTT)
A discrete trial is a single cycle of instruction that may be repeated several times
until a skill is mastered.
• A discrete trial consists of 5 main parts:
1. An initial instruction – ex. “Touch your nose.”
2. A prompt or cue given by the teacher to help the child respond correctly – ex.
Teacher points to child’s nose.
3. A response given by the child – ex. Child touches their nose
4. An appropriate consequence, such as correct responses receiving a reward
designed to motivate the child to respond correctly again in the future – ex.
“Nice job touching your nose,” teacher gives child a sticker.
5. A pause between consecutive trials – waiting 1 – 5 seconds before beginning
the next trial.
 Natural Environment Training (NET)

• Natural Environment Teaching is a term that is used for when skills are taught or
generalized within the natural environment.
• For example, you might teach a student to receptively and expressively label
colors of items at the table. Then, during NET the student would get to practice
the skill by labelling colors of crayons that you’re coloring with.
• Therapist should focus on the targeted behaviors.
• Use appropriate reinforcers.
 Prompt
• Prompts are instructions, gestures, demonstrations, touches, or other things
that we arrange or do to increase the likelihood that children will make
correct responses.
• When learning new tasks, a child needs help to understand the connection
between the request and the desired response.
• Prompts increase the success of the child.
 Task Analysis Chaining
Occurs when a larger task is divided into smaller tasks and those get linked together
to complete the one larger task. There are two basic types of chaining.
• Forward chaining: This is when the child learns the first step and is rewarded
when they successfully complete it. Then, they learn the second step in
conjunction with the first and are rewarded. This process continues until the entire
process has been learned completely.
• Backward chaining: This is somewhat the opposite of forward chaining. A
therapist, teacher, or parent helps the person with autism complete each step of the
task until the very last one. Then, the behavior is reinforced, for completing that
step independently.
 Discrimination Training
• The goal of discrimination therapy is to help the client discriminate between
what is said, to help them choose the correct item.
• First stage: there will be only one item on the table: the item that the
therapist has asked for.
• Second stage: there will be two items out. Ideally, the two items will be
very different, to minimize any chance of the client confusing one for the
other.
• Third stage: there will be three items out: the desired object, plus two non-
preferred items.
• Each time the client gives the correct item to the therapist, this is celebrated
with reinforcing behavior.
 Shaping
• Shaping is the use of reinforcement of successive approximations of a desired
behavior. Specifically, when using a shaping technique, each approximate desired
behavior that is demonstrated is reinforced, while behaviors that are not
approximations of the desired behavior are not reinforced.
• Shaping starts with a task analysis in which a desired behavior is broken down
into smaller and more manageable steps that would move the child successively
closer to that desired behavior.
 Shaping (Example)
Jason didn’t sit on his chair, his teacher, targeted sitting in his seat during
lectures as a desired behavior for Jason.

• Reinforcing when Jason sits in his seat for a 3 minutes

• Reinforcing when Jason sits in his seat for a 5 minutes
• Reinforcing when Jason sits in his seat for a 10 minutes
• Reinforcing when Jason sits in his seat for a 15 minutes
• Reinforcing when Jason sits in his seat for 20 minutes (the targeted time)
 Token Economy
• A token economy is a contingency based procedure developed to aid in the
reduction of maladaptive behaviors and increase desired behaviors through the
deliverance of a tangible conditioned reinforcer.
• The premise of a token economy is that a child can earn a certain number of
tokens by exhibiting desired behaviors. For example, a child may be required to
earn 5 tokens which can be exchanged for a larger and more preferred item.
Token Economy Board
 Generalization
Continuing to perform a mastered target behavior in another setting or when the
setting has been altered, with other people, or engaging in untrained responses that
are equivalent to the original target behavior is referred to as generalization.
Strategies to Promote Generalization
• Teach Sufficient Stimulus Examples
• Teach Loosely
• Program Common Stimuli
• Ask People in the Generalization Setting to Reinforce the Behavior
 Maintenance
• Maintenance is verified if a learner continues to perform the target behavior after
a portion of or all of the teaching intervention has been terminated.

• Maintenance typically consists of weekly probe sessions of the mastered skill for
several weeks. In addition, it would be expected that the skill would also be
demonstrated outside of sessions during naturally occurring opportunities.

• If a client does not continue to demonstrate the skill during the maintenance
phase, the skill may need to be taught again.
Behavior Reduction
Behavior Reduction Plan
• According to the BACB: Practice Guidelines (2014), a behavior plan should include:
• Interventions supported by evidence only
• A focus on socially significant behaviors
• Identification of ABA concepts to be used in efforts of reducing maladaptive behaviors
• Objective goals
• Measurement/data collection strategies
• Use of function-based interventions (formulated from a Functional Behavior Assessment)
• Baseline levels of behaviors identified
• Direct assessments with graphs when applicable
• Antecedent strategies
• Consequence strategies
• Crisis plan
Common Functions of Behavior
• There are four functions of behavior:
• Tangible
• Attention
• Escape
• Automatic reinforcement.
Motivating operations
• Implement interventions based on modification of antecedents such as
motivating/establishing operations and discriminative stimuli

Establishing Abolishing
Operations Operations
Differential Reinforcement
Differential reinforcement is reinforcing a target behavior
while withholding reinforcement from an unwanted behavior.
The goal is to replace unwanted behaviors with desirable
behaviors.
• Differential Reinforcement Of Alternative Behavior (DRA)
• Differential Reinforcement Of Incompatible Behavior (DRI)
• Differential Reinforcement Of Other Behavior (DRO)
• Differential Reinforcement Of Low Rates (DRL)
Differential Reinforcement Of Alternative Behavior (DRA)

DRA reinforces a pre-determined target behavior that is

an alternative to the unwanted behavior.
Differential Reinforcement Of Incompatible Behavior (DRI)

DRI reinforces a physically incompatible behavior to replace the

unwanted behavior. This means it’s impossible to perform both
behaviors at the same time.
Differential Reinforcement Of Other Behavior (DRO)

DRO reinforces any behavior other than the unwanted behavior.

Differential Reinforcement Of Low Rates (DRL)

• DRL reinforces at the end of an instructional session if the problem

behavior occurred during the entire session at or below a
predetermined criterion. The goal is usually to decrease the frequency
of recurring behaviors, not to eliminate them entirely.
Extinction
Extinction refers to a procedure used in Applied Behavioral Analysis
(ABA) in which reinforcement that is provided for problem behavior
(often unintentionally) is discontinued in order to decrease or eliminate
occurrences of these types of negative (or problem) behaviors.
• Types of extinction
• Escape maintained Extinction
• Extinction of Positively Reinforced Behaviors
• Sensory Extinction
Things you can expect with an extinction procedure

• Extinction Burst
• Spontaneous Recovery
FBA
 Verbal Behavior
VB language:
•The word for a request is a “Mand”
•Labeling objects is called “Tact”
•Conversation or social language are called “Intraverbals”
•Mimicking language is called “Echoic”
 Crisis emergency process

Proactive Strategies
Proactive strategies are ABA therapy techniques used to shape
and change the social environment, or how your child interacts with the
environment. The strategies aim to reduce the frequency of a challenging
behavior or prevent it from occurring at all.
Reactive Strategies
Positive Behavior Support features approaches designed to respond to
challenging behavior when it occurs. These are called reactive strategies.
W h y d o P ro b lem B eh av io rsO cu r?

• 4 Basic common functions of behavior

• Additional Factors
Medical reasons
Historical Reasons (Sexual/Physical abuse)
Mental Impairments
Environmental Conditions
Techniques
• Know your client (Problem behaviors and triggers)
• Organize therapeutic environment
• Communication with others
• Dress for problematic behavior
• BCBA involvement
• Functional Communication training
• Change of environment and staff
• Change in activity
• Call for help
Measurement
Continuous methods
Frequency
Rate
Duration
Latency
Discontinuous Measurement Methods
Planning Goals
• ABLLS
• AFLS
• B-MAP
• ESDM
• PEAL
Report Writing