Review of Current Procedural Variations of the High‐Probability Instructional Sequence
Keep the reinforcer the same across high-p and low-p trials, then add a tiny bonus only for the hard request.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Flores et al. (2025) read every HPIS paper from the past 12 years. They pulled out how each study set up the high-p and low-p trials. They looked for what made the sequence work best.
What they found
Big effects happen when the same fun reinforcer stays in place for both high-p and low-p requests. Adding an extra touch, sound, or token only for the low-p response boosts compliance even more.
How this fits with other research
Perez et al. (2015) showed that noncontingent reinforcement can slash problem behavior by using the same functional reinforcer throughout. Flores et al. echo this: keep the reinforcer type steady in HPIS too.
Fisher et al. (2016) found that mixing reinforcers during assessment muddied the results. Flores et al. agree: switching reinforcer types between high-p and low-p trials weakens HPIS.
Greer et al. (2020) questioned whether extra interview steps add value. Likewise, Flores et al. show that a simple add-on stimulus for low-p trials works without extra paperwork.
Why it matters
You can lift compliance tomorrow. Keep the same edible, toy, or praise for both easy and hard tasks. Then save an extra sparkle—like a light-up token—only for the hard one. No new forms, no new data. Just a quick tweak that the review calls large.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
ABSTRACTThe high‐probability instructional sequence (HPIS) is a widely used behavior analytical intervention comprising multiple components and procedural variations; therefore, identifying the key elements contributing to its efficacy is crucial. Twenty articles published between 2010 and 2022 met our inclusion criteria. We quantified the association between HPIS procedural variations and the intervention's efficacy. Across the studies included in this review, HPIS was associated with a moderately large effect or a large effect and deemed as effective for at least 60% of the data sets when (a) during the compliance assessment, compliance was exposed to appetitive consequences, (b) during the HPIS evaluation, the same combination of stimuli (e.g., edible and praise; tactile stimulus and praise) was delivered contingent on compliance with the high‐p and low‐p, and (c) during the HPIS evaluation different consequences were provided for compliance with the low‐p and high‐p and combined stimuli were presented as a reinforcer following compliance to low‐p (i.e., praise for compliance with the high‐p and praise and tactile stimulus for compliance with the low‐p). The associations identified in this review can guide the design and implementation of HPIS in applied settings. Additionally, the results highlight the need for additional empirical evaluations of isolated and combined components of HPIS to determine their relative contribution to the intervention efficacy and to determine the generality of the results of previous studies.
Behavioral Interventions, 2025 · doi:10.1002/bin.70021