Overselective stimulus control in residential school students with intellectual disabilities.
Most residential students with ID/DD show overselectivity regardless of mental age, so screen with matching-to-sample before teaching complex discriminations.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Staff at a residential school gave three matching-to-sample tasks to 29 students with intellectual or developmental disabilities.
They wanted to know how many kids showed overselectivity, that is, picking only one part of a complex picture instead of noticing all the parts.
What they found
Eighteen of the 29 students showed overselectivity on at least one task.
The narrow focus happened across mental ages from toddler to third-grade level, and higher ADOS scores went with more overselectivity.
How this fits with other research
Cox et al. (2015) later saw only 19% overselectivity in children with ASD, far below the 62% here. The drop hints that newer teaching methods may already be widening kids’ attention.
Vassos et al. (2016) found no difference between autism, Down syndrome, and typical groups once mental age was matched. Together these papers say overselectivity is tied more to cognitive level than to any one diagnosis.
McGeown et al. (2013) muddies the picture further: typical toddlers under three also look overselective on the same kind of tasks. The pattern may be part of typical development, not just a disability marker.
Why it matters
Before you run conditional-discrimination programs, give a quick matching-to-sample probe. If the learner locks onto only one cue, simplify the materials or add differential observing prompts first. This five-minute check can save weeks of slow progress.
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Join Free →Start your next session with a three-trial matching-to-sample probe; if the learner picks only one feature, break the stimulus into simpler parts or add an identity-matching prompt.
02At a glance
03Original abstract
Overselective stimulus control was assessed in 29 students at residential schools for individuals with developmental disabilities. Overselectivity testing included three different delayed identity matching-to-sample tasks. Sample stimuli for the Form/Color Test were nine possible combinations of three colors and three forms. On each trial, the S+ stimulus was identical to the sample, one S- was the same color as the sample but a different form, and the other S- was the same form but a different color. Sample stimuli for the Two-Sample Test were two alphanumeric characters. The S+ stimulus was identical to one of the sample stimuli, and two S- stimuli were characters different from both samples. Sample stimuli for the Faces Test were six digital images of adult faces. On each trial, the S+ stimulus was identical to the sample, one S- stimulus was a non-matching face to which one sample feature had been added (e.g., an identical hat or scarf), and the other S- stimulus was an unaltered non-matching face. All participants were also tested with the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test III (PPVT) and the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS). Results indicated overselective stimulus control on at least one test for 18 of the 29 participants. Overselectivity (a) was distributed across a range of PPVT mental age equivalent scores from <1.75 to 8.83; (b) was more likely in individuals with higher ADOS scores; (c) was most likely on the Two-Sample Test; and (d) was found in five individuals on more than one of the tests. Thus, overselective stimulus control may occur across a range of characteristics typical for students who attend residential special-education programs.
Research in developmental disabilities, 2006 · doi:10.1016/j.ridd.2005.07.004