Ch. 1 - Definition & Characteristics Of ABA

Question 1

Applied behavior analysis (ABA)

Answer 1

Scientific approach for discovering environmental variables that reliably influence socially significant behavior and for developing a technology of behavior change that takes practical advantage of those discoveries

Question 2

Control

Answer 2

Arranging conditions in such a way that you can not only predict, but control / “Cause” an event to occur to assume characteristics

Question 3

Functional relation

Answer 3

When a well-controlled experiment demonstrates that a specific change in one event (DV) is reliably produced by specific manipulations of another event (IV) and that the change in the DV was unlikely to be the result of other extraneous factors

Question 4

Determinism

Answer 4

Scientists presume that the universe is a lawful and orderly place in which all phenomena occur as the result of other events

Question 5

Empiricism

Answer 5

Practice of objective observation and measurement of phenomena of interest

Question 6

Parsimony

Answer 6

All simple, logical explanations for the phenomenon under investigation be ruled out, experimentally or conceptually before more complex or abstract explanations are considered

Question 7

Respondent Behavior

Answer 7

Reflexive behavior - respondents are brought out by stimuli that immediately precede them (e.g., Pavlov)

Question 8

Hypothetical constructs

Answer 8

Presumed but unobserved entities that could not be manipulated in an experiment

Question 9

Operant behavior

Answer 9

Not elicited by preceding stimuli but influenced by stimulus changes that have followed the behavior in the past

Question 10

Explanatory fiction

Answer 10

Fictitious variable that is another name for an observed behavior that contributes nothing to an understanding of variables responsible for developing or maintaining the behavior

Question 11

Pragmatism

Answer 11

Truth value of a statement is a function of how well the statement promotes effective action

Question 12

Private events

Answer 12

Events taking place “inside the skin” — Skinner

Question 13

Characteristics of ABA

Answer 13

Applied, behavioral, analytic, technological, conceptually systematic, effective, and capable of generalized outcomes

Question 14

Applied

Answer 14

Commitment to effecting improvements that enhance and improve other peoples lives (behaviors are socially significant and improve day-to-day life experience)

Question 15

Behavioral

Answer 15

Behavior selected must be behavior in need of improvement, measurable, and when changes are observed answer whose behavior has changed

Question 16

Analytic

Answer 16

When experimenter has demonstrated a functional relation between the manipulated events and a reliable change in some other measurable dimension of the targeted behavior

Question 17

Technological

Answer 17

When all of a study’s operative procedures are identified and described with sufficient detail and clarity (able to be replicated with the same results)

Question 18

Conceptually systematic

Answer 18

Procedures for changing behavior and any interpretations of how/why those procedures were effective should be described in terms of the relevant principals from which they were derived

Question 19

Effective

Answer 19

Producing positive behavior change that is socially/clinically significant

Question 20

Generality

Answer 20

Behavior change lasts over time, appears in environments other than implementation, and/or spreads to other behaviors not directly treated by intervention

Question 21

Generality

Answer 21

Behavior change lasts over time, appears in environments other than implementation, and/or spreads to other behaviors not directly treated by intervention