UNT Theses and Dissertations - 47 Matching Results

Search Results

Results: 1 - 24 next
open access

The Effects of D.A.N.C.E. Training on Staff Teaching Interactions, Child Goal Responding, and Staff-Child Harmonious Engagement in an Autism Intervention Organization

Description: This study was conducted at a nonprofit organization whose mission is to provide responsive, caring, and effective services to children with autism. The purpose of this study was to analyze the effects of D.A.N.C.E. training on teaching interactions, harmonious engagement, instructional engagement, and progress on child goals for two early and intensive behavioral intervention (EIBI) staff and the children in their care. A multiple baseline design was employed to evaluate the effectiveness of t… more
Date: December 2019
Creator: Tavera, Marlene Lucy
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Evaluating the Effects of the D.A.N.C.E Training System on Staff and Child Responding

Description: The purpose of this study was to evaluate and systematically replicate the effectiveness of the DANCE training for a staff member to be an effective change agent for the children in her care, while maintaining the organization's and family's values. The study was conducted in an organization that values and focuses on building rapport, avoids the use of coercive procedures, and teaches children in a caring and meaningful way. A multiple baseline across indoor and outdoor settings was used to ev… more
Date: December 2019
Creator: Morales, Erendira
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

A Shaping Procedure for Introducing Horses to Clipping

Description: The purpose of the current study is to evaluate a procedure that can be used to introduce horses to clipping. Negative reinforcement was used in a shaping paradigm. Shaping steps were conducted by the handler, starting with touching the horse with the hand, then touching the horse with the clippers while they are off, culminating with touching the horse with the clippers while they are on. When a horse broke contact with either the hand or the clippers, the hand or the clippers were held at tha… more
Date: December 2019
Creator: Hardaway, Alison K
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Teaching Children How to Stay Still Using Movies to Provide Continuous Feedback

Description: External beam radiation therapy is often used as a form of treatment for individuals diagnosed with cancer. However, because staying completely still can often be difficult for children, sedation is often used daily to remedy the need for stillness. In this document, we introduce the development, implementation, and testing of a technology designed to teach healthy children to self-monitor and control their movements. This technology monitored a child's body movement and created a continuous fe… more
Date: December 2019
Creator: Otero, Maria Jose
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Training Behavior Professionals to Use the Interview-Informed Synthesized Contingency Analysis (IISCA): Extension

Description: The current investigation replicated and extended previous research on training of behavior professionals to implement functional assessment and analysis procedures. Specifically, the study extended procedures described by Metras to train board certified behavior analysts (BCBAs) to administer two components of the Interview Informed Synthesized Contingency Analyses (IISCA) by: (1) conducting the study in the context of a large residential/training facility for adults with ID, (2) including a p… more
Date: December 2019
Creator: Markham, Eric Nicholas
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Assessing and Treating Oral Reading Deficits in Children with Developmental Disabilities

Description: A brief reading assessment and preference assessment were conducted with three participants with developmental and learning disabilities (i.e., two participants were diagnosed with Autism, the third participant was diagnosed with intellectual disability) who did not acquire fluent reading in previous individualized instruction. The results of the brief reading assessment were analyzed in an alternating treatment design and a preference assessment was conducted to determine the participants' pre… more
Date: December 2018
Creator: Braun, Emily Catherine
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

A Comparison of Fixed- and Variable-Ratio Token Exchange-Production Schedules with Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Description: The token economy is a widely used and versatile motivational system within applied behavior analysis. Moreover, token reinforcement procedures have been shown to be highly effective in the treatment of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). In the experimental analysis of behavior, token reinforcement contingencies are conceptualized as three interconnected schedule components: (1) the token-production schedule, (2) the exchange-production schedule, and (3) the token-exchange schedule. … more
Date: December 2018
Creator: McNeely, Mitchell P
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Contingency Management of Physical Rehabilitation: The Role of Feedback

Description: Modern advances in technology have allowed for an increase in the precision with which we are able to measure, record, and affect behavior. These developments suggest that the domains in which behavior analysis might contribute are considerably broader than previously appreciated, for instance the area of behavioral medicine. One way the field of behavior analysis can begin to address problems in behavioral medicine is with biosensor technology, like surface electromyography (sEMG). For sEMG te… more
Date: December 2018
Creator: Armshaw, Brennan P
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Development of an Observation System to Measure Narratives of Teaching Interactions

Description: Having a measurable way to analyze how staff members describe teaching interactions is important for staff training and building a community of effective and caring practice. The purpose of this project, part of a larger program, is to develop a measurement system that captures descriptions of connected events (narratives) during teaching interactions. This project involved development of a reliable measurement system that discriminates between experienced and novice narratives of teaching inte… more
Date: December 2018
Creator: Hines, Dalai C
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Direct Assessment of Quality of Care in a Memory-Care Residential Setting: A Systematic Replication

Description: The quality of care of residents in nursing homes receive is an important issue facing our society, and reliable methods to assess and measure important indicators of quality of care are necessary to ensure that nursing homes are providing adequate services. Previous researchers have developed methodologies to evaluate indicators of quality of care, including environmental conditions, resident conditions, resident activities, and staff activities using momentary-time sampling procedures across … more
Date: December 2018
Creator: Free, Corinne
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

The Effects of an Instructional Package on the Emergence of Novel Intraverbals in Children with Autism

Description: We evaluated the effects of an instructional package on the emergence of novel intraverbals in children diagnosed with autism. Participants were two boys with a diagnosis of autism who had tact and listener repertoires for common objects and events, some intraverbal responses, and showed an ability to learn new intraverbal responses through direct instruction prior to participating in the study. Tact training, listener training, sorting training, and mixed training (listener and tact training) … more
Date: December 2018
Creator: Macias, Heather A.
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

The Effects of Modeling and Coaching on Verbal Narratives of Teaching Interactions by Novice Behavior Analysts

Description: Research has shown that well-trained staff within early and intensive behavioral intervention (EIBI) provide more effective treatment. An important part of training is learning the vocabulary and concepts of treatment. This aids in conceptual understanding of the principles and procedures. The process of learning behavioral concepts also develops the necessary verbal repertoire needed to communicate among members of a community of practice; a group of people who have common reinforcers and are … more
Date: December 2018
Creator: Lambert, Lindsey L
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Increasing the Quantity and Quality of Caregivers' Use of Social Reinforcement in a Large Residential Facility

Description: Behavior-specific praise has been shown to increase rate of desired behaviors for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities, though it is rarely used by caregivers in residential facilities for adults with disabilities. Prompting in the form of tactile stimulation has been demonstrated to increase rate of behavior-specific praise delivered by teachers and caregivers. The purpose of the current study was to increase the quantity and quality of behavior-specific praise statemen… more
Date: December 2018
Creator: Brown, Madison McMurray
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Induced Water Drinking during a Discrete Trial Procedure Using a Variable-Ratio Schedule of Reinforcement with a Canine

Description: Falk's pivotal 1961 study showed that rats would drink excessive amounts of water when exposed to a time based schedule of reinforcement. Since then, schedule-induced drinking or polydipsia, has been demonstrated with several species and with a variety of different behaviors. Rats, the most commonly used animal, have been shown to drink excessive amounts of water under a variety of different time based schedules of reinforcement; exclusively during a free operant procedure. The current study sh… more
Date: December 2018
Creator: Frier, Tracy
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Evaluation of a Behavior Skills Package to Teach Caregivers to Manage Disruptive Behavior during Medical and Dental Appointments

Description: Adults with developmental disabilities that live in large residential settings experience complications due to problem behavior when attending routine medical/dental appointments. This may result in sedation for clients for even the most routine medical/dental appointments. The purpose of this project was to develop a comprehensive staff training program that incorporated best practices to teach direct-support professionals behavior management techniques and best practices for transporting clie… more
Date: December 2017
Creator: Kinser, Joshua Andrew
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Musical Priming and Operant Selection

Description: Language is a cultural construct, and the relationship between words is taught. Priming research has long investigated the relationship between related and unrelated words. Similar research has been seen in music relationships, but most of these investigate harmonic relations despite the melodic relationship being the one listeners are mostly likely to describe. Further, these studies typically measure existing relationships and do not attempt to teach a new relationship, nothing that most adu… more
Date: December 2017
Creator: Vail, Kimberly Gail
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Teaching Observational Learning to Children with Autism: An In-vivo and Video-Model Assessment

Description: Observational learning (OL) occurs when an individual contacts reinforcement as a direct result of discriminating the observed consequences of other individuals' responses. Individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) may have deficits in observational learning and previous research has demonstrated that teaching a series of prerequisite skills (i.e., attending, imitation, delayed imitation, and consequence discrimination) can result in observational learning. We sequentially taught these pr… more
Date: December 2017
Creator: Sansing, Elizabeth M
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Using Concurrent Schedules of Reinforcement to Decrease Behavior

Description: We manipulated delay and magnitude of reinforcers in two concurrent schedules of reinforcement to decrease a prevalent behavior while increasing another behavior already in the participant's repertoire. The first experiment manipulated delay, implementing a five second delay between the behavior and delivery of reinforcement for a behavior targeted for decrease while no delay was implemented after the behavior targeted for increase. The second experiment manipulated magnitude, providing one pi… more
Date: December 2017
Creator: Palmer, Ashlyn
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

When to Say It: Establishing a Verbal Cue

Description: Dog trainers sometimes teach verbal cues by saying the cue as the dog is performing the desired behavior. However, there is disagreement about when to say the cue. In this study, a pet dog was trained to go to three different apparatus, the cue for each of which was given at a different time, in a multi-element design. The cue "hoop" was given just as the dog began to move to the hoop apparatus. The cue "carrier" was given as the dog was stepping into the carrier apparatus. The cue "platform" w… more
Date: December 2017
Creator: Rulla, Emily
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Acceptability of Behavioral Interventions for Autism

Description: Caregivers' evaluation of evidence-based behavioral interventions may differ dependent upon the type of language used to describe the intervention. We administered a survey to 24 parents of children with autism to assess social validity measures of behavioral interventions described in one of three communication styles: technical, conversational, and conversational with intended outcome. Participants were presented with a description of two behavior-reduction and two behavior-acquisition interv… more
Date: December 2016
Creator: Fatema, Afshaan
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Can Observing Behavior Predict Performance in Conditional Discriminations?

Description: Prompts are implemented often in training procedures, to include conditional discriminations, and this can lead to prompt dependency. The current study extends a prior study that suggested that the effectiveness of supplementary visual stimuli displaying the sample and comparison was dependent on the timing in relation to the selection task, presented as a prompt or feedback, in a match-to-sample procedure. The current research examines if the differences in that effectiveness were due to diffe… more
Date: December 2016
Creator: Marchini, Kevin Julian
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Creating a Verbal Community for Describing Emotional Responses within a Contingency Lens: The Effects of a Brief Training Workshop

Description: Observing emotional responses is recognized as a valuable clinical skill in a variety of professions, including applied behavior analysis. Emotional responses can flag possible contingencies thereby guiding a behavior analyst to better select valid measures, goals, and procedures. Additionally, emotional responses can be goals in and of themselves. The purpose of the present study was to evaluate the effects of a workshop on the observation and description of emotional responses by behavior ana… more
Date: December 2016
Creator: Garden, Regan E.
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Evaluation of Agreement among Respondents to Anecdotal Assessments and Correspondence between Anecdotal and Experimental Analysis Outcomes

Description: Study 1 evaluated agreement among five respondents using the Functional Analysis Screening Tool (FAST), the Motivation Assessment Scale (MAS) and Questions About Behavioral Function (QABF). Respondents provided ratings for 20 target behaviors exhibited by 10 individuals. At least 4/5 raters agreed on the primary maintaining variable in 80% of cases with the FAST, 70% of cases with the MAS, and 55% of cases with the QABF. Study 2 evaluated correspondence between results of anecdotal assessments … more
Date: December 2016
Creator: Frusha, Caroline J.
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

An Evaluation of Correspondence between Preference and Performance under a Progressive Ration Schedule with College Students

Description: Preference assessments are used in clinical settings to identify stimuli with reinforcing potential. The progressive-ratio schedule has shown to be useful in clinical assessments in identifying stimuli with stronger reinforcer efficacy that corresponds to formalized assessments.The current study utilized a progressive-ratio schedule to compare videos of high and low preference assessed by verbal reports of preference with college students. Results indicated breakpoints were higher for high pref… more
Date: December 2016
Creator: Johnson, Jamarious
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
Partner: UNT Libraries
Back to Top of Screen