A comparison of continuous, dense, and lean schedules of noncontingent access to matched competing stimuli to reduce stereotypy
Keep the matched toy in the child’s hands all session to slash automatically maintained stereotypy.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Two boys with autism, ages 6 and 8, kept flapping and rocking during free play.
The team gave each child his favorite toy cars and puzzles.
They tested three ways to hand out the toys: keep them in the child's hands all the time, give a new toy every 30 seconds, or give a new toy every 60 seconds.
Each schedule ran for 10 minutes and they switched back and forth to see which cut the flapping fastest.
What they found
When the toys stayed in the children's hands nonstop, stereotypy dropped the most and the fastest.
The 30-second schedule helped a little.
The 60-second schedule barely helped at all.
Parents liked the continuous access best because it felt natural and easy.
How this fits with other research
Phillips et al. (2017) warned that automatic-reinforcement cases often need extra tricks. This study shows you may not need extra tricks if you just keep the matched stimuli in the child's hands.
Esposito et al. (2021) used red/green cards to teach when stereotypy was okay. That works too, but it needs teaching steps. Continuous NCR skips the teaching and still wins.
Wilder et al. (2023) compared two DRO schedules for automatic behavior. Both papers used the same tight alternating-treatments design, but this one swaps DRO for NCR and finds a clear winner in continuous access.
Why it matters
If a child’s stereotypy is automatic, try giving nonstop access to a matched toy first. It is simple, fast, and parents like it. If that is not practical, shorten the FT schedule as much as you can.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
AbstractNoncontingent or response‐independent access to matched, competing stimuli has been shown to be effective to decrease automatically maintained challenging behavior. Despite research on its effectiveness, various schedules of noncontingent access to matched competing stimuli have not been directly compared. The purpose of the current study was to compare the effectiveness of and preference for continuous, dense (fixed‐time 30 s), and lean (fixed‐time 60 s) schedules of noncontingent access to matched competing stimuli to decrease automatically maintained stereotypy exhibited by two children with autism. We also conducted a within session analysis of the lean condition to examine possible mechanisms responsible for the effects of the procedure. The results showed that the continuous schedule was most effective and most preferred to reduce stereotypy for both participants. A social validity measure indicated that the participant's caregivers approved of and preferred the continuous schedule.
Behavioral Interventions, 2022 · doi:10.1002/bin.1867