Part 1 - Intro/Basic Concepts

Question 0

What are the three key parts of science?

Answer 0

Description, prediction, and control

Question 1

What is ABA?

Answer 1

ABA is a 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 these discoveries.

Question 2

What is a functional relation?

Answer 2

A functional relation is when a specific change in one event can reliably be produced by specific manipulations of another event and that the change in the dependent variable was unlikely to be the result of other extraneous factors.

Question 3

What is determinism?

Answer 3

Determinism is the assumption that universe is a lawful and orderly place in which all phenomena occur as the result of other events. Events are related systematically to other factors. Scientists first assume lawfulness then proceed to look for lawful relations.

Question 4

What is empiricism?

Answer 4

Empiricism is the practice of objective observation of the phenomena of interest.

Question 5

What is an experiment?

Answer 5

An experiment is a carefully conducted comparison of some measure of the phenomena of interest under two or more different conditions in which only one factor at a time differs from one condition to another.

Question 6

What is replication?

Answer 6

Replication is the repeating of experiments.

Question 7

What is parsimony?

Answer 7

Parsimony is the requirement that all simple, logical explanations for the phenomenon under investigation be ruled out, experimentally or conceptually, before more complex or abstract explanations are considered

Question 8

What is philosophic doubt?

Answer 8

Philosophic doubt requires scientists to continually question the truthfulness of what’s regarded as fact.

Question 9

What are the three branches of behavior analysis?

Answer 9

Behaviorism (philosophy of the science of behavior)
Experimental analysis of behavior (basic research)
Applied behavior analysis (developing technology for improving behavior)

Question 10

What was Watson’s deal?

Answer 10

Behavior should be the subject matter of psychology. Stimulus-response (S-R) psychology.

Question 11

What was Skinner’s deal?

Answer 11

Respondent versus operant behaviors.

Question 12

What is a reflex?

Answer 12

A reflex is a functional unit of antecedent stimulus and response elicited.

Question 13

What are hypothetical constructs?

Answer 13

Hypothetical constructs are presumed but unobserved entities that can’t be manipulated in an experiment.

Question 14

What is the three-term contingency?

Answer 14

Stimulus – response – stimulus

Question 15

What is the experimental analysis of behavior?

Answer 15

Investigation of operant behavior

Question 16

What is behaviorism?

Answer 16

Behaviorism is the philosophy of the science of human behavior.

Question 17

What is mentalism?

Answer 17

Mentalism is an approach to the study of behavior which assumes a mental or “inner” dimension exists that differs from a behavioral dimension.

Question 18

What is an explanatory fiction?

Answer 18

An explanatory fiction is a fictitious variable that often is simply another name for the observed behavior that contributes nothing to an understanding of the variables responsible for developing or maintaining the behavior.

Question 19

What is methodological behaviorism?

Answer 19

Only public events are considered.

Question 20

What is radical behaviorism?

Answer 20

Radical behaviorism includes all private and public human behavior.

Question 21

What happened in 1968?

Answer 21

JABA began publication and “Some Current Dimensions of ABA” was published.

Question 22

What are the defining characteristics of ABA?

Answer 22

ABATCEG - applied, behavioral, analytic, technological, conceptually systematic, effective, generality

Question 23

What are the meanings of the defining characteristics of ABA?

Answer 23

applied - commitment to affecting improvements in behavior that enhance and improve people’s lives
behavioral - specific behavior of importance must be selected, it must be measurable, we must know whose behavior changes
analytic - demonstration of functional relation between the manipulated events and a reliable change in some measurable dimension of the targeted behavior
technological - operative procedures sufficiently identified and described
conceptually systematic - procedures based on principles
effective - behavior improved to a practical degree
generality - lasts over time, appears in new environments, and/or spreads to non-treated behaviors

Question 24

What are the other ABA characteristics?

Answer 24

Accountable, public, doable, empowering, optimistic

Question 25

What is a response?

Answer 25

An action of an organism’s effector

Question 26

What is a response class?

Answer 26

A group of responses with the same function

Question 27

What is a stimulus?

Answer 27

An energy change affecting an organism through receptor cells

Question 28

What is a stimulus class?

Answer 28

Stimuli sharing sets of common elements on one or more dimensions

Question 29

What is respondent behavior?

Answer 29

Behavior elicited by antecedent stimuli

Question 30

What is higher-order conditioning?

Answer 30

Pairing neutral stimuli with conditioned stimuli

Question 31

What does ontogeny refer to?

Answer 31

The lifetime of an individual

Question 32

What does phylogeny refer to?

Answer 32

The evolutionary history of a species

Question 33

What is automaticity of reinforcement?

Answer 33

Behavior is modified by consequences regardless of intent or awareness

Question 34

What are the principles of behavior?

Answer 34

Basic behavior-environment relations demonstrated repeatedly. For example, reinforcement, punishment, extinction

Question 35

What is a behavior change tactic?

Answer 35

Research-based, technologically consistent method for changing behavior based on one or more principles of behavior. For example, backward chaining, DRO, shaping, response cost, time out

Question 36

What is a discriminated operant?

Answer 36

Behavior that occurs more frequently in some antecedent conditions. Behavior under antecedent control.

Question 37

What are three sources for the complexity of behavior?

Answer 37

Complexity of the human repertoire, complexity of controlling variables, and individual differences

Question 38

What is contingency adduction?

Answer 38

Behavior that was initially selected and shaped under one set of conditions is recruited by a different set of contingencies and takes on a new function in a person’s repertoire

Question 39

What is joint control?

Answer 39

Two discriminative stimuli combine to evoke a common response class