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Brieana Wise

BIP

Method

The target behavior identified was increasing communication. The operational definition

of communication can be defined as engaging in a conversation for over 1% of the time that the

participant is in the apartment. There was a Functional Behavior Assessment that was

completed (Please see attached) to evaluate the function of the target behavior that the

participant engaged in. The FBA determined that the participant may be engaging in the target

behavior because of escape/avoidance.

Strictly Positive Reinforcement was implemented to increase the target behavior of

communication. There were no replacement behaviors. The target behavior was reinforced

every time the participant communicated. If the participant did not communicate, no behavior

was reinforced or punished.

The intervention was applied whenever the participant was at the apartment. The

intervention took the amount of hours that the participant was there and divided that by the

amount of time that the participant communicated, that number was then multiplied by sixty.

The math was calculated daily to determine the percentage of the time he communicated.

During the intervention, if the participant engaged in a conversation the target behavior was

reinforced with specific praise. The reinforcement was given at a Fixed Ratio of one (FR1) until

October 22, 2016 the reinforcement schedule was then changed to a fixed ratio of two (FR2).

The reinforcement schedule was chosen based on what the baseline data suggested. During
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the Baseline, the participant communicated 0%-.78% of his time spent in the apartment. On

average, the participant communicated for .47%. Therefore, the high intensity of his non-

communicative behavior required a Fixed Ratio of 1 to 1 of the target behavior and the

reinforcement.

Results

The data that were collected from September 9, 2016 through September 22, 2016 was

considered the Baseline. The Baseline data were collected until the participant communicated

for over .45% of the time, six times in a row. The intervention then occurred from September

23, 2016 to November 18, 2016. The table and graphs that are attached, report the percentage

of how long the participant communicated each day.

Discussion

The data were collected throughout the intervention suggest that the

intervention that was implemented was successful. This is exhibited by observing the data, the

percentages increased overtime. The percentages represent the amount of the time that the

participant communicated while he was in the apartment. There are some inconstancies within

the data that should be addressed. There were a few days where the participant communicated

very little or he did not communicate at all.

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On November 8th and 14th, the participant did not communicate at all, this was during

the Baseline data so one possible reason for his lack of communication is that there was no

intervention being implemented. On October 2nd and the 19th, the participant did not

communicate the entire time he was at the house. One of the possible reasons for this lack of

communication is that he was fighting with his girlfriend the entire night. Also on November 3rd

and 11th, there was very little communication. The participant was very sick on those days so

that could possibly be one of the reasons for his lack of communication. The days where the

participant did not communicate, the behavior was not reinforced.

One effective component of the intervention was the use of Positive Reinforcement.

The behaviors of the participant that did not include communication, were ignored. However,

when the participant communicated, the target behavior was reinforced by specific praise.

Another effective component of the intervention was the amount of time that the person who

implemented the intervention could be around the participant. The person who implemented

the intervention lived at the house where the participant was always at, which means that the

target behavior could be reinforced every time the target behavior was exhibited.

Even though there were many effective components of the intervention, there was also

a few ineffective components. Most people may find giving specific praise every time the

individual communicates very impractical and get tired of that type of reinforcement. However,

the data suggested that using specific praise every time the participant communicated to be

very effective.
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An additional possible limitation of the intervention was that the participant and the

person who implemented the intervention, were not always together. They were in the same

house for most of the time but there were times when they were not at the house together, for

example the participant was at the house while the person who implemented the intervention

was not there. There also may have been other factors involved that increased the amount of

communication or caused a lack of communication. Everyone that was involved was human so

there also may have been human error.

Another limitation of the intervention was that the reinforcement schedule was not

thinned out. During the intervention, the reinforcement schedule was Phase changed to a Fixed

Ratio of two. Now that the intervention is complete, the participant may still be dependent

upon the reinforcement. Future interventions that are similar to this should thin out the

reinforces by going from a FR2 to a FR3 to a FR4 and so on until the person who is

implementing the intervention feels like the participant can handle moving to a variable ratio

schedule. This intervention also did not do anything to promote generalization. Generalization

is needed so that the participant will do the desired behavior across all settings and with

different types of people. Any future interventions may want to implement the interventions in

different areas and other people could implement the interventions.

The Functional Behavior Assessment that was performed proposed that the target

behavior happened for escape/avoidance. The target behavior did not demonstrate any signs of

being harmful to the participant or anyone around the participant. Therefore, any increase of

the target behavior was tolerable. During the intervention, the participant received specific

praise from only the intervention conductor. However, future attempts of the intervention may
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was to consider involving other people in the persons life give reinforcement (specific praise)

when the participant engages in the appropriate behavior of communication. That would also

allow for the target behavior to be generalized and eventually become independent.