1. BRSS Honor Thesis Eleanor Giles

2. The Team Eleanor Giles- Undergraduate student
Brittain Coleman- Master’s student
Brighid Fronapfel-Sonderegger- Doctural student

3. Brighid’s Project Stimulus-stimulus pairing procedure
Increase vocal behavior/mands in children with autism
Prerequisite: <33% on echoic section of Vocal Language Assessment

4. Brighid’s Project
Stimulus named 3-5 times followed by immediate delivery of that stimulus
If child emitted echoic response stimulus was delivered
Mastered: once child emitted echoic response 80% during pairing over 2 consecutive sessions

5. Brighid’s Project
Mand training: stimulus presented, delivered if phoneme emitted within 3 seconds
Mastered: phoneme emitted independently within 3 seconds 80%, 2 consecutive sessions
Once mastered: stimulus present throughout the school day and delivery remained contingent upon the vocal response of the child

6. Eleanor and Brittain’s Project
Analysis of the successful aspects of Brighid’s project.
Data taken in several areas:
Vocal behavior of the children
Reinforcement delivery by the tutor
Assessment of the data to see frequency of pairings made

7. Participants 1 child aged 4
diagnosed with autism
30 hours a week of intensive behavior therapy
The practicum students working with this child

8. My tasks Collect data from videos of therapy sessions
Research articles relating to stimulus-stimulus pairing and treatment integrity
Review Brittain’s paper
Write my own thesis

9. Data Tables- Tally Data Sheet
Video # and length of video:
 #1 18:30
Functional Vocalizations
IIIIIIIIIIIII
Trained Response?
IIIIIIIIIIII
Reinforced?
Tangible?
Edible?
Social?
Non-Sense Vocalizations
IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
Vocal Stereotypy?
IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
Hand Stim?

10. Comprehensive Data Sheet
1] Video #
2] Length of Video
3] # of Functional Vocalizations
4] # of Reinforced Functional Vocalizations
5) # of reinforcers that were social
6) # of reinforcers that were tangible or edible
7] # of Non-Sense Vocalizations
8] #of Reinforced Non-Sense Vocalizations 1
18:30 13 12 28
9] Ratio of % of total # Reinforcers %tangible- edible/ % social
10] Ratio of: # of emissions of trained vocalizations/# of vocalizations reinforced by specific tangible/ edible
11] # of vocalizations that are vocal stereotypy
12] # of [7] and simultaneous physical stim (hand stim)
13] Total # of vocalizations (combine [3] and [7])
100% edible, 100% social
92% 20 13 41

11. Analysis of data How often social praise was delivered
How often tangible/edible reinforcement was delivered
Calculated the percentage of reinforcement that paired social praise with the stimulus
No pairing was required during Brighid’s procedure

12. Analysis of data 67.5% of functional vocalizations were reinforced
64.5% of functional vocalizations were reinforced by social praise
63% of functional vocalizations were reinforced by tangible/edible
97.5% had a pairing of social reinforcement and reinforcement through delivery of tangible/edible

13. Conclusions
Consistent pairing of the 2 stimuli is important when attempting to increase vocal behavior
Social praise enough when delay was required
Tangible/edible delivered after completed task

14. Conclusions
Hoped/ prediction that non-sense vocalizations would decrease as functional increased
Data showed no decrease in vocal stereotypy
Further research- find ways of decreasing vocal stereotypy

15. Overall Experience Very positive! Enjoyed getting research experience
Chance to analyze what is being done in treatment
Experience with writing
Chance to work with grad students
Brittain is the best!

16. Thank you!
Questions?