A molecular to molar analysis of communicative and problem behaviors.
Check if problem and communicative acts sit on competing payoff tracks; the one that pays more will eat the clock.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Researchers tracked one child who hit and also asked for toys. They counted how long each act lasted. They also logged what the adults gave after each act.
The team wanted to see if the time spent on each act matched the goodies it produced.
What they found
Aggression and communication lived on side-by-side schedules. The kid got more stuff for hitting than for asking. So he spent more minutes hitting than talking.
The match was almost perfect: more payoff, more time.
How this fits with other research
Green et al. (1999) ran the same idea with three preschoolers at home. They saw the same link: time on each act tracked the payoff. The new case adds a micro-level check to their bigger in-home probe.
Shimp (2020) later gave us a clear rule: graph ten-second counts next to session totals. The 1999 paper already did that split without the fancy name. Shimp just packaged it for daily use.
Davol et al. (1977) first showed that reinforcing long pauses can swing response patterns. The child study moves that lab finding to real-world mixed behavior. Same mechanism, new playground.
Why it matters
When you see both problem and good behavior, map the payoff for each second-by-second. If hitting earns bigger or faster rewards, thin that schedule and boost the payoff for asking. Run a quick concurrent check in your next assessment: have the child choose between two responses and see where the minutes go. That five-minute probe can guide your whole treatment plan.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Few studies have examined the relationship between communicative and problem behaviors that are already present in a behavioral repertoire. In this study, a detailed microanalysis of the antecedents and consequences of aggressive and communicative behavior of a 7-year-old boy was conducted. By using both descriptive and experimental methodologies, the data suggested that problem and communicative behavior were maintained on thin concurrent schedules of social negative reinforcement. A molar analysis of the descriptive data showed that the relative amount of time allocated to each behavior was a function of the relative amount of reinforcement that each behavior accrued. The implications of these findings are discussed in terms of conducting descriptive analyses and for enhancing the efficacy of interventions for problem behavior.
Research in developmental disabilities, 1999 · doi:10.1016/s0891-4222(99)00003-7