Stimulus characteristics within directives: effects on accuracy of task completion.
Start every task with the simplest directive the child can already follow, then grow complexity step-by-step to keep accuracy and calm high.
01Research in Context
What this study did
The team tested how the wording of a directive changes a child’s success and mood. They worked with three- to five-year-olds in a clinic. Each child got the same task, but the prompt started simple and grew harder across steps.
Kids first heard a one-step direction like “Put the car in the box.” Later steps added color, size, or two actions. The adults praised only correct answers. They recorded accuracy and any whining, hitting, or throwing.
What they found
When the directive matched the child’s skill, accuracy stayed high and problem behavior stayed near zero. When the prompt jumped too far ahead, correct answers dropped and disruption soared.
The same child who calmly followed “Put the car in the box” might scream when told “Put the big red car behind the small blue box.” Reinforcing only right answers during the hard prompt made the screaming worse.
How this fits with other research
Reichow et al. (2011) extends this idea. They added quick instructive feedback while using progressive prompt delay and still cut teaching time. Both studies show that smarter prompt steps, not more trials, drive faster learning.
Smith et al. (1997) found that high student problem behavior punishes the teacher and crashes fidelity. Richman et al. (2001) shows the same behavior can be prevented by starting with easier directives. The papers agree: lower child cost keeps the program alive.
Murphy et al. (2014) looks opposite at first—they tightened access to reinforcement. But both papers warn that blanket reinforcement of “correct only” can backfire when the task is too hard. Fine-tune the prompt first, then fine-tune the reinforcer.
Why it matters
Before you run any teaching session, test the directive. Give the easiest form first. If the child fails twice, drop back a step or add a model. Praise cooperation as well as accuracy. This five-second check prevents the escape burst that sinks fidelity later in the week.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Three experiments were conducted in an outpatient setting with young children who had been referred for treatment of noncompliant behavior and who had coexisting receptive language or receptive vocabulary difficulties. Experiment 1 studied differential responding of the participants to a brief hierarchical directive analysis (least-to-most complex stimulus prompts) to identify directives that functioned as discriminative stimuli for accurate responding. Experiment 1 identified distinct patterns of accurate responding relative to manipulation of directive stimulus characteristics. Experiment 2 demonstrated that directives identified as effective or ineffective in obtaining stimulus control of accurate responding during Experiment 1 continued to control accurate responding across play activities and academic tasks. Experiment 3 probed effects of the interaction between the type of directive (effective vs. ineffective) and the reinforcement contingency (differential reinforcement for attempts vs. differential reinforcement for accurate responses) on accurate task completion and disruptive behavior. Results suggested that behavioral escalation from inaccurate responding to disruptive behavior occurred only when ineffective directives were combined with differential reinforcement for accurate task completion. The overall results are discussed in terms of developing a methodology for identifying stimulus characteristics of directives that affect accurate responding.
Journal of applied behavior analysis, 2001 · doi:10.1901/jaba.2001.34-289