Essential Dynamics of Reinforcement for Practice becomes clinically important the moment a team has to turn good intentions into reliable action inside case conceptualization, intervention design, staff training, and literature-informed problem solving. In Essential Dynamics of Reinforcement for Practice, for this course, the practical stakes show up in stronger conceptual consistency and better translational decision making, not in abstract discussion alone.
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Join Free →The principle of reinforcement has been extensively studied by basic researchers resulting in an expansive bank of knowledge from the lab regarding the dynamics of the principle. Practitioners in turn apply the fundamental features of reinforcement to address practical problems, with the principle of reinforcement being the foundation of Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA). Research in ABA has shown that even simple manipulations of reinforcement, such as using tangible items in conjunction with praise, can have a huge impact on rates of skill acquisition (Weinsztok et al., 2023). However, it is easy for practitioners in applied settings to neglect important features of reinforcement that may be essential to a learner's progress. For example, practitioners may assume that preferred stimuli will function as reinforcement without verification through assessment (Morris et al., 2023) or they may neglect to embed reinforcing stimuli into teaching strategies to condition the teaching context as reinforcing (Sunberg, 2008). While practitioners often carefully determine a schedule of reinforcement, they may not consider how pace of instruction impacts that schedule (Neil et al., 2020). This symposium will first explore the conceptual underpinnings of important dynamics of reinforcement followed by three pragmatic examples. The first speaker will explore the utility and feasibility of incorporating reinforcement assessments into regular practice. The next speaker will describe the value of embedding reinforcement into teaching arrangements to teach early learner skills. The third will review how increasing pace of instruction can aid in skill acquisition. These examples use clinical data collected through a scientist-practitioner model of service delivery and demonstrate the feasibility and importance of considering dynamics of reinforcement beyond the basics. Finally, a discussant will review implications of the three studies.
| Certification Body | Credits | Type |
|---|---|---|
| BACB® | 1.5 | General |
| COA | 1.5 | — |
Dr. Allie Rader is a Board Certified and Massachusetts licensed Behavior Analyst. Allie currently works for the May Institute as the Executive Director for the May Center School in Wilmington. She received her PhD in Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) from Endicott College and teaches as adjunct faculty at Endicott, Elms College and Simmon’s University. Allie has more than ten years of clinical experience in the field of ABA with special expertise in severe challenging behavior, behavioral treatment of medically complex individuals with rare diagnoses, as well as school consultation. She has been implementing and training others in crisis management of individuals with severe behavior challenges for over seven years. Allie’s research interests include data analytics in single subject design and a scientist-practitioner model of service delivery. She has published work in Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior and European Journal of Behavior Analysis and a book chapter on functional analysis.
Dig into the research behind this topic — plain-English summaries written for BCBAs.
279 research articles with practitioner takeaways
258 research articles with practitioner takeaways
239 research articles with practitioner takeaways
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All behavior-analytic intervention is individualized. The information on this page is for educational purposes and does not constitute clinical advice. Treatment decisions should be informed by the best available published research, individualized assessment, and obtained with the informed consent of the client or their legal guardian. Behavior analysts are responsible for practicing within the boundaries of their competence and adhering to the BACB Ethics Code for Behavior Analysts.