Component 2: Chaney et al (Developmental) Flashcards
What is operant conditioning?
A form of associative learning where associations and connections are formed between stimuli and responses that didn’t occur previously. It involves learning through consequences or behavioural responses. Any response that led to desirable consequences were more likely to be repeated whereas when there were undesirable consequences behaviour was less likely to be repeated. This became known as the law effect.
What is the background to Chaney et al.s study?
Good and bad behaviours develop over a lifespan. Many are due to the influence of external early influences such as parents, teachers etc.
Behaviour therapy and behaviour modification are major approaches used by both clinical psychologists and health practitioners to improve adherence to medical to prescribed medical regimes. Poor adherence has remained a problem for paediatric asthmatics on inhaler medication. In children this was between 50-70%
What was the aim of Chaney et al.s study?
Aimed to show that the use of a novel asthma spacer device, ‘the fun haler’ can provide positive reinforcement leads to improved adherence in young people (by taking the correct dosage as regularly as they should.)
What was the research method for Chaney et al.s study?
Field experiment - it was conducted in the participants home setting in Australia
What was the experimental design in Chaney et al.s study?
Repeated measures design
What were the IVs and DVs in Chaney et al.s study?
IVs: whether the child used a standard/small volume spacer device (the breath-a-tech)or whether they used the funhaler.
DVs: amount of adherence to prescribed medical regime
Describe the sample in Chaney et al.s study.
32 children (22 male and 10 female) aged between 1.5-6 years with a mean age of 3.2 years.
The parents of the children gave consent and also participated in the study by completing questionnaires and taking part in a phone interview. They also helped (when necessary) in the use of the inhalers.
Describe the procedure in Chaney et al.s study.
- First a comparison was made between the aerosol output of the standard/small volume spacer device (235ml breath-a-tech) and the 225ml funhaler. There was no significant difference, meaning that using the funhaler does not compromise drug delivery.
- Participants were initially approached at home, before the funhaler was mentioned and interviewed with a questionnaire on their existing inhaler.
- They were then given the funhaler for two weeks and reported over the phone on an ad hoc basis (whenever necessary)
- After sequential use of both inhalers, they were again visited by the researchers and parents were interviewed and completed matched pairs questionnaires.
- The data collected related to how easy each device was to use, compliance of parents and children and treatment attitudes. During the course of the study, each parent was called at random to find out if they had attempted to medicate their child the day before.
- The funhaler incorporates several features to distract attention of the child away from the event of the drug delivery itself and provide self-reinforcement.
What are the features of the funhaler that made it appealing to children?
The funhaler was made appealing to children in the following ways (I) it isolates incentive toys (e.g. spinner or whistle) in a separate branch to the standard inhalation circuit, placing them outside the expiratory valve of the spacer to avoid the problems with contamination or interference with drug delivery. (II) The design of the toy ensures sufficient inspiratory resistance to minimise entrapment of inspired air through the toy circuit. (III) The design attempts to link optimal functions of the toys to deep breathing pattern conductive to effective medication. (IV) The design anticipates the potential for boredom of children with particular incentive toys in its modular arrangement which would allow the replacement of the incentive toy module with a range of different toys.
What were the results of Chaney et al.s study?
1.The funhaler was associated with improved parental and child compliance When surveyed at random 81% (22/27) children using the funhaler were compliant/medicated compared to 59% of children (16/27) when using the existing spacer device.
2. When using the standard spacer only 3/30 parents reported successfully medicating their child every time compared to 22/30 when using the funhaler.
What were the conclusions of Chaney et al.s study?
- Improved adherence, combined with satisfactory delivery characteristics, suggests the funhaler may be useful for young asthmatics.
- The use of the functional incentive devices such as the funhaler may improve health of children.
- More research is recommended in long-term efficiency of this treatment.
How does Chaney et al.s study relate to the developmental area?
Chaney relates to the developmental area because it is illustrating another way in which children’s behaviour can be influenced by external factors - in this case presence of positive and negative reinforcers.
How does Chaney et al relate to the behaviourist perspective?
It can also be considered to relate to the behaviourist perspective because of the way it provides empirical support for operant conditioning (both positive and negative reinforcement) Results found increased adherence due to positive reinforcement provided by the funhaler.
