Tutorial: Understanding Concepts: Implications for Behavior Analysts and Educators
Teach concepts in tight intradimensional-to-interdimensional steps and the child will use the idea in places you never drilled.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Layng (2019) wrote a how-to guide for teachers and BCBAs.
It shows the order you should teach concepts so kids grasp them fast.
Start with one feature at a time, then mix features across examples.
The paper uses no kids or data; it is a map, not a test.
What they found
The map says: go from intradimensional to interdimensional tasks.
That path builds conceptual hierarchies without extra drills.
Kids who follow this climb can apply the idea to new cases sooner.
How this fits with other research
LaFrance et al. (2020) extend the map into spoken words.
They say once you run enough examples, kids start saying things you never taught.
The two papers share the same engine—rich example sets—but LaFrance targets verbal novelty.
McGee et al. (2024) add a turbo button: tell the learner to "picture it."
With that single cue, emergent matching scores doubled in adults.
Layng’s sequence plus McGee’s imagery gives you both route and rocket.
Fetterman et al. (1989) supply the early lab proof.
They showed transitive relations pop out when reinforcement links the items.
Their data echo Layng’s claim that well-built classes keep growing on their own.
Why it matters
Use Layng’s ladder next week.
Pick a concept your student struggles with.
Teach one feature across many examples, then blend features.
Add LaFrance’s tip: keep examples coming until novel talk appears.
If the learner is older, drop in McGee’s cue: "Picture the image."
You may watch the concept travel to untaught tests with fewer extra trials.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
How we make sense of the world is founded on our understanding of simple and complex concepts, which form the basis for our vocabulary (Layng, 2016a). We often gain this understanding through life experience, but conceptual learning can be explicitly taught. This tutorial provides a brief introduction to concept learning and teaching that has its roots in behavior analysis and related disciplines (Bruner, Goodnow, & Austin, 1956; Englemann & Carnine, 1982; Markle & Tiemann, 1969; Mechner, 1962; Tiemann & Markle, 1990). Presented here are examples drawn from a sequence designed to teach physical science to elementary school learners to illustrate how concept teaching can be used to improve instruction. These examples include both intradimensional concept teaching, where features of a physical stimulus guide behavior, and interdimensional concept teaching, where relations among different stimuli guide behavior (Bruner, Goodnow, & Austin, 1956; Layng, 2014; Tiemann & Markle, 1990). Efficiencies in teaching using conceptual inheritance designs is briefly described, as well as the implications of what are referred to as conceptual hierarchies, where instances of one concept may share features inherited from a superordinate concepts. The purpose here is not to perform a literature review, but to provide an overview of how concept analysis and teaching may improve instruction.
Perspectives on Behavior Science, 2019 · doi:10.1007/s40614-018-00188-6