A replication of preference displacement research in children with autism spectrum disorder
About one in six kids with autism will switch their favorite item once food shows up, so keep both edibles and leisure in every tray.
01Research in Context
What this study did
The team ran an MSWO preference test with 25 children with autism. They placed edible and leisure items side-by-side on a tray.
Each child picked once per trial. The order of trays never changed the results.
The goal was to see if one type of item would push out, or displace, the other.
What they found
Edibles knocked out leisure choices for 4 kids. Leisure knocked out edibles for 2 kids.
In plain numbers, about 1 in 6 children showed a clear swap in what they liked best.
The rest kept the same top picks no matter which tray came first.
How this fits with other research
Conine et al. (2019) saw the same edible-first pattern, but kids picked leisure items more often than in older data.
Slanzi et al. (2020) flipped the script in Italy: leisure beat edibles for 44 % of children. The clash looks real, yet both used MSWO with autism; culture and toy type likely explain the gap.
Lucock et al. (2020) stretched the idea to adults with dementia and still found leisure on top, showing the displacement idea travels across ages and diagnoses.
Why it matters
Expect one-sixth of your learners to change their mind once edibles appear. Rotate both edible and leisure items within the same session to keep motivation high. If you see a sudden drop in leisure picks, do not toss the toys—re-test next week. Quick swaps save session time and keep kids engaged.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
The purpose of this paper was to replicate previous research on preference displacement with edible and leisure stimuli. In the present study, the experimenters evaluated preference displacement in 25 children with autism spectrum disorder using combined multiple stimulus without replacement preference assessments that consisted of highly preferred edible and leisure stimuli. In addition, the experimenters used a block randomization procedure to evaluate if assessment order influenced displacement outcomes. The experimenters observed patterns of complete displacement by edible stimuli for four participants and complete displacement by leisure stimuli for two participants; assessment order did not influence outcomes. The results and implications are discussed.
Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 2021 · doi:10.1002/jaba.775