Premack Principle for

Increasing Motivation
Luis Cruz
 Introduction
• The purpose of this project was to use the Premack
principle to increase Jose’s participation in class.

• The class is taught on Zoom which means that

students are at home and become easily distracted.
The students are not required to have cameras on so
it is difficult to see when students are not engaged or
having trouble.
 Literature
• By using the Premack principle, participants can earn more preferred,
highly reinforcing, or valued activities contingent upon
completing less preferred or desired behaviors (Premack,
1959)

• . The Premack Principle is effective because you use

activities that participants value or desire as incentives
(Lavay et al., 2016).
 Meet Jose
• 15 Years Old
• 10th Grade
• Autism Spectrum Disorder
• Failing physical education class
• Rarely participates or responds when called on
 Setting
• Santa Ana High School
• 3rd Period (80 minutes)
• Monday, Wednesday (40 minutes), Friday
• The Class is conducted on Zoom
• 48 Students, 8 with IEP’s
• Teacher – Mr. Cruz
 Target Behavior
• Participation measured by:
• Responding in the Zoom-chat when the teacher asks a question

• Examples of questions asked during class:

• A question pertaining to the Unit we are learning:
• How many points is a free worth in basketball?
• Random checks to see which students are paying attention
• Put a 1 in the chat if you can hear me and are paying
attention…
 Baseline of Target Behavior
• Baseline data was collected for five classes on how many
times Jose responded in the chat.
• The teacher asked the class 10-12 questions per class.
• Jose did not respond one time in five consecutive days of
classes.
 Intervention
• The Premack principle was implemented and the teacher reached
out to Jose as soon as he logged in to Zoom each day to get his
attention
• During the Intervention phase, the goal was for Jose to respond at
least 2 times during each class when the teacher asked the class a
question
• If Jose responded at least twice, he would get to pick the topic of
the Kahoot t the end of class.
• Kahoot was one of the things that Jose would participate in
sometimes.
 Results
Days Behavior
1 0Baseline
2 0
3 0
4 0
5 0
6 2Intervention
7 2
8 4
9 4
10 5
11 4Baseline
12 4
13 3
14 2
15 3
 Results Graphed
Effects of the Premack Principle on Increasing Participation in PE Zoom Sessions in a Student with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Baseline Intervention
6 Baseline

5
Figure 1 ABA design in
an 80 minute, 3rd
period Zoom class; 5
days per week, 4
alternating baseline
to show the effects
DV

of getting to pick a
kahootof their choice 3
when they respond to
quesitons at least
twice per class. 2

0
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16

Days
A-B-A Graph on the Effects of the Premack Principle on Increasing Participation in PE Zoom Sessions in a student
with ASD by allowing them to choose a Kahoot Topic of their choice For participating Two or more times per day
 Before and After
• During the baseline Jose did not respond at all during class
• After the intervention was implemented his motivation
increased up to 5 times per day
• When we returned to baseline, his participation decreased
but was still more then the initial baseline
 Conclusion
• The results indicate that use of the Premack principle can be
successful in increasing participation in class when on Zoom
• Connecting with the student as soon as they log on to get them
responding right away before they get distracted and start doing
something else is appears to be beneficial as well.
• Ask how their day is going and if there is anything they need help with
 Next Steps
• Get to know students’ interests so you know what will motivate
them
• Reaching out to the students individually to ask how their day is
going and if they need help is way to show students you care. If
students know the teachers care, they be more motivated to
participate during class