-description: try to find relations, ex. decline of teacher praise

-prediction: able to predict when you see repeated events, events covary so when one exists the other happens ex. increase in drownings with hot weather, there is a pos correlation but we cant determine causation

-control: predict with confidence that treatment can cause change ex. empirical manipulations demonstrate effect of iv on dv and not due to confounding variables

the assumption that the universe is a lawful and orderly place in which phenomena occur as a results of other events

-events do not just occur at will and events are related in systematic ways

the objective observation, description, quantification of the phenomena of interest

-strictly descriptive

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the controlled comparison of some measure of phenomena of interest (the DV) under 2 or more diff conditions in which only one factor at a time (the IV) differs from one condition to another

ex. does the attention given for eye contact compared to not attention increase or decrease eye contact?

repeating of experiment to determine reliability of and usefullness of findings

-includes the repitition of IV conditions w/o experiments

- method for which mistakes are discovered

-the results from a single experiment no matter how impressive are never sufficient to earn an accepted place among scientific knoledge base, must be replicated several times

simple, logical explanations must be ruled out, experimentally or conceptually, before more complex or abstract explanations are considered

KISS - keep it simple stupid

continually questioning the truthfulness and validity of all scientific theory and knowledge

-always have doubt and ask questions

-conclusions derived from scientific manipulations are tenative and they may be modified or discarded when new facts or discoveries come to light

a science devoted to the understanding and improvement of human behavior

-discover env. variables that reliably influence socially sig. beh. and for developing a tech. of beh. change that takes practical advantage of those discoveries

implements basic principles of beh.

-beh's are of sig. to the participants involved

-want to improve peoples lives so pick beh's that matter to them: language, academic, daily living, self-care or affect their sig. others: teachers, parents, peers, employers

-focuses on beh. in its own right as a target for change, not a similar beh

-entails precise measurement of the acutal beh. in need of improvement and documents that it was the subjects beh. that changed

identifies functional relationships between beh. and env. events through scientific study, what happened before beh. occured

-experimental control over occurance/nonoccurance of a beh

procedures are linked to and described in terms of the basic principles of behavior

ex. pos/neg reinforcement, punishment, etc

-beh change interventions are derived from basic principles of beh

-the procedures for changing beh and any interpretatios of how or why those procedures were effective should be described in terms of the relevant principles from which they were derived

produces beh. changes that last over time, appear in other env. or spread to other beh's

-discovered procedures can be applied effectively to many individuals, and in many settings

Francis Bacon

-father of empiricism, established scientific method

-inductive (scientific - objective, control treatment, measure, observe, collect data, analyze) reasoning over deductive reasoning

-wrote the utopian fable the new atlantis - wrote of modern research universities that conducted applied and pure science

-survival of the fittest

-The Origin of Species (1859)

-his theory of evolution by natural selection permitted human beh to become an appropriate subject for science

-Russian physiologist best known for his studies of reflexive beh - kicking legs

-coined the term "psychic secretions" noticed that attendants who had perviously fed dog elicited a salivation response when they simply entered the room

-coing many beh terms like conditioned reflex,

-observable beh. not mental process/states of mind

-he realized that we can't just assume that we know what people are thinking because we really don't and we can only rely on their observable behaviors

-objective study of beh. is relationship between env stimulus (S) and responses (R) became known as the stimulus-response (S-R) method

-made a bold claim that he could take any child and make him a begger, etc

The Behavior of Organisms (1938) divided beh. into 2 ways

1.Respondent Beh's (classical/pavlovian)

-ellicited by stimulus that immediately preceded it

-reflex

-involuntary

2. Operant Beh.

-influenced more by stimulus changes that have followed the beh in the past

-3 term contingency S-R-S

-challenges -> exploratory fiction, variables that take the form of another name for the observed behavior that it claims to explain and contributes nothing to the understanding of variables

ex. saying he walks with caution to avoid slipping not he walks carefully because of his caution

-radical behaviorism -> incorporate private events into overall conceptual system of beh and seek to understand all of human beh.

-systematically and differentially reinforcing successive approximations to a terminal beh.

-differentiated reinforcement is used to produce a series of slightly diff response classes with each class closer to desired beh.

-success measured when topography (improving golf swing with lessons), frequency (increasing the number of math problems they can do in a minute), latency (decreasing time it takes between "clean your room" and child actually does it), duration (increasing lenght of time a student stays on task), or amplitude/magnitude (increasing the height of the high jump bar) of target reaches predetermine criterian level

specific behaviors are reinforced within the response class while other beh's are not reinforced

-produces response differentiation to those beh's similar to terminal beh, and decreases those that are not similar

ex. parent who gives child what they ask for when they use please, thank you, may i, etc, but not when they dont

-response differeniation is when a new class or responses emerges of beh's in a specific class

pros: uses a pos approach to teach new beh, continuous reniforcement with correct beh, terminal beh is in sight, can be used with other established beh changing procedures like chaining

cons: can be time consuming, progress is not always linear, requires the practitioner to consistently monitor the learner (hard in a busy classroom), can be misappplied (child getting louder and louder for attention and the parent eventually gives in so it is rewarded, harmful beh can be shaped (rat fell from edge of ledge, or daredevils on reality tv)

1. select a terminal beh (increase eye contact)

2. describe what the terminal beh look like - rate, magnitude, intensity (ex. will look at the therapist's eyes for 2 seconds)

3. describe current beh.

4. outline the approx. that may be reinforced along the way (ex. looking in the therapist's direction, then looking at face, then looking at eyes for .5 seconds, then 1, and eventually 2)

5. start reinforcing an existing approx. and gradually raise the criteria for success

6. continue observation and reinforce only those responses that meet or exceed current criteria

-using S(D) (disscriminative stimulus) -> cues -> combined with shaping

"Alyssa look over hear, Alyssa good looking at me!"

-physical guidance/prompts -> verbal prompts (say raise your hand), physical prompts (push their arm up)

-imitative prompts/models -> "oh who has a question?" and the teacher raises their hand

-The clicker is a hand held device that produces a click sound when a metal tab is pressed

-reinforcement is paired with the sound of the clicker so that the sound become a conditioned reinforcer

ex. dog in box

-a specific sequence of discrete responses each associated with a particular stimulus condition

-each response in a chain (except first and last response) serves a dual function

1. conditioned reinforcer for the response that produced it

2. discriminative stimulus S(D) for the subsequent response

-they contribute to independence(daily tasks, hygeine)

-can combine beh's already in repertoire into more complex beh's -> they might know how to turn on water and rub hands together, but they don't know how to actually wash their hands

-always deliver a cue first

-series of seq. ordered steps that are smaller, teachable units of the chain

-conducting a task analysis -> observe others, consult experts, perform the task

-# of tasks needed depends on the individual

-assessing mastery -> either single opportunity method or multiple opportunity method (make sure during baseline, teaching is not implemented)

say wash your hands, if they turn water on then reinforce them, and use hand over hand to help with the rest

-successively reward for step one, then step one and two, then step one two and three, etc

- beh's are linked together beginning with the first beh in the seq

variation of forward chaining, use reinforcers after each step, make sure the last step has the strongest reinforcer

-beh's are linked together beginning with the last beh in the seq

-train and reinforce each step

best for teaching new beh's, help them through the whole thing and reward them, then reduce the number of steps you help them with and rewarding until they can do it all by themselves

-all steps are completed by the trainer except the last until the child does it then the trainer gradually reduces the number of steps they do and increases the number of steps the child has to do until child does the whole thing by them selves

putting shirt on ex.

1. completeness of the task analysis

2. lenght or complexity of the chain

3. schedule of reinforcement. 4. stimulus variation 5. response variation

-intervention that relies on the participants skill in perfoming the critical elements of a chain independently but the chain is interupted at a predetermined step so that another beh can be emitted

-initially used to increase speech

-select chain for training that is moderately distressing when interrupted

-ex. directed to start doing something like make toast but when the student goes to press down the lever the therapist steps in between and says what do you want