Skinner's Verbal Behavior Theory and Language Interventions for Children with Autism

(1)

See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/309182210

Contributions of Skinner's theory of verbal behaviour to language interventions for children with autism spectrum disorders

Article in Early Child Development and Care · October 2016

DOI: 10.1080/03004430.2016.1236255

CITATIONS

15

READS

2,216 3 authors:

Gaige Johnson

6PUBLICATIONS 30CITATIONS SEE PROFILE

Kelly T. Kohler

4PUBLICATIONS 42CITATIONS SEE PROFILE

Denise Ross

Western Michigan University 21PUBLICATIONS 540CITATIONS

SEE PROFILE

All content following this page was uploaded by Kelly T. Kohler on 15 February 2022.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

(2)

Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at

http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=gecd20

Download by: [104.159.250.224] Date: 15 October 2016, At: 06:14

Early Child Development and Care

ISSN: 0300-4430 (Print) 1476-8275 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/gecd20

Contributions of Skinner's theory of verbal

behaviour to language interventions for children with autism spectrum disorders

Gaige Johnson, Kelly Kohler & Denise Ross

To cite this article: Gaige Johnson, Kelly Kohler & Denise Ross (2016): Contributions of Skinner's theory of verbal behaviour to language interventions for children with autism spectrum disorders, Early Child Development and Care, DOI: 10.1080/03004430.2016.1236255 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03004430.2016.1236255

Published online: 15 Oct 2016.

Submit your article to this journal

View related articles

View Crossmark data

(3)

Contributions of Skinner ’ s theory of verbal behaviour to language interventions for children with autism spectrum disorders

Gaige Johnson, Kelly Kohler and Denise Ross

Department of Psychology, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI, USA

ABSTRACT

The purpose of the current paper is to describe the impact of applied behaviour analysis on language treatment for children with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) diagnoses. Specifically, this paper will describe Skinner’s theory of verbal behaviour and its contributions to evidence-based treatments for communication deficits among individuals with ASD. Skinner’s bookVerbal behaviorwas written in 1957 but saw increased growth in research publications after its application to individuals with autism in the 1990s. Today, verbal behaviour is an accepted evidence-based practice in behaviour analysis, and mastery of Skinner’s theory of verbal behaviour is required for practising behaviour analysts who teach individuals with autism. This paper describes the history of the theory of verbal behaviour, defines the key features of the theory, and presents research supporting its application to the communication development of children with autism.

ARTICLE HISTORY Received 31 May 2016 Accepted 10 September 2016

KEYWORDS

Autism; communication;

applied behaviour analysis;

verbal behaviour

Introduction

The current prevalence rate for autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) diagnoses is significantly greater than in previous years. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (U.S.) (2007), 1 in 68 individuals in the United States is currently diagnosed with an ASD–a rate that is two times greater than the prevalence rate reported in 2002 (Christensen et al., 2016; Zablotsky, Black, Maenner, Schieve, & Blumberg,2015). Without intervention, children with autism are more likely to continue to experience the atypical communication and social development that define the disorder (American Psychiatric Association, 2013; Fernell, Eriksson, & Gillberg, 2013; Pickett, Pullara, O’Grady, & Gordon, 2009). Identifying evidence-based interventions is important because the language development of children with autism is often not simply delayed but also atypical when compared to typically developing children (Luyster, Lopez, & Lord,2007). For instance, some children with autism do not gain speech and are likely to remain nonverbal without intervention (Rice, Warren,

& Betz,2005). Other children may have atypical language patterns such as delayed echolalia (repeat- ing phrases heard previously) or lack social communication with others (Rice et al.,2005). Still other children may have severely delayed listening comprehension (Luyster et al.,2007). These and other communication deficits associated with ASDs challenge researchers and teachers to develop evidence-based interventions that can improve the communication outcomes of young children with autism during early childhood.

The purpose of the current paper is to describe the impact of applied behaviour analysis on language treatment for children with ASDs diagnoses. Specifically, this paper will describe Skinner’s theory of verbal behaviour and its contributions to evidence-based treatments for communication

(4)

deficits among individuals with ASD. Skinner’s bookVerbal behaviorwas written in 1957 but only saw increased growth in research publications after its application to individuals with autism in the 1990’s (Sautter & LeBlanc,2006). Today, verbal behaviour is an accepted evidence-based practice for individuals with autism, and mastery of Skinner’s theory of verbal behaviour is required by the credentialing body that certifies behaviour analysts (Behavior Analyst Certification Board,2012). This paper will describe the history of the theory of verbal behaviour, define the primary components of the theory, and present research supporting its application to the communication development of children with autism.

History of verbal behaviour Behaviour analysis

According to the Association for Behavior Analysis International, behaviour analysis is:

a natural science that seeks to understand the behavior of individuals…Behavior analysts study how biological, pharmacological, and experiential factors influence the behavior of humans and nonhuman animals…[with]

special emphasis on studying factors that reliably influence the behavior of individuals, an emphasis that works well when the goal is to acquire adaptive behavior or ameliorate problem behavior. The science of behavior analysis has made discoveries that have proven useful in addressing socially important behavior such as drug taking, healthy eating, workplace safety, education, and the treatment of pervasive developmental disabilities (e.g. autism). (Society for the Advancement of Behavior Analysis,2016)

Behaviour analysis has two major branches: (1) experimental behaviour analysis, which is the branch that conducts basic research with humans and nonhumans and (2) applied behaviour analysis, the branch that conducts research with people to improve their lives to a socially signiﬁcant degree (Baer, Wolf, & Risley, 1968). Both branches of behaviour analysis are derived from behaviourism, the science of behaviour that is the basis of principles of behaviours and their related concepts.

Since verbal behaviour is a subﬁeld of behaviour analysis, a description of Skinner’s theory of verbal behaviour necessarily includes a description of the history of behaviourism and applied behaviour analysis.

Behaviourism

Behaviourism, or the science of behaviour, began as an outgrowth of psychology in the late 1800s (Baum,2004). Psychology was designed to study the mind or spirit (‘psyche’) in a manner that was analogous to natural sciences such as astronomy or physics (Baum,2004). As a study of the mind, the subject matter for psychology was largely the introspection of a subject’s feelings and mental processes, which could only be reported by subjects experiencing the feelings or by inference from an observer (Baum, 2004). In any case, the role of the psychologist was to interpret the mental process or feelings of a subject (Baum,2004). In this way, psychologists were tasked with con- structing meaning based on the reports or behaviours of those they were studying (Baum,2004).

By the late 1800s, however, some researchers in the field of psychology began to question the usefulness of introspection as a subject matter because it was subjective and necessarily reflected the opinions of individual psychologists (Baum,2004). Introspection was also rejected because it could also not be measured objectively, unlike measures in natural sciences such as astronomy. In response to a growing resistance to measuring internal constructs instead of observable behaviours, psychologist John B. Watson wrote‘Psychology as the behaviorist views it’(Watson,1913). Watson (1913) asserted that ‘Psychology as the behaviorist views it is a purely objective experimental branch of natural science. Its theoretical goal is the prediction and control of behavior. Introspection forms no essential part of its methods’(p. 158). He argued that in order for psychology to be a natural science, its subject matter needed to be more objective than feelings, introspection, or an individual’s consciousness:‘I believe we can write a psychology… and never go back upon our definition: never use the terms consciousness, mental states, mind, content… ’(Watson,1913, p. 250).

(5)

Skinner’s radical behaviourism

While many variations of behaviourism emerged after Watson introduced the concept of behaviourism in 1913 (Schneider & Morris, 1987), Skinner’s radical behaviourism – described in his 1945 publication ‘The operational analysis of psychological terms’ – was perhaps the most influential.

In his work, Skinner emphasised the role of the consequence in strengthening or weakening a behaviour–a concept that differed from Watson’s stimulus–response formulation (Moxley,2004).

Skinner called behaviour that was learned because of the consequences associated with itoperant behaviour and differentiated it from respondentor reflexive behaviour, which was unlearned and only occurred in response to an antecedent (Skinner, 1938). Furthermore, Skinner’s stimulus– response–stimulus formulation was termed a three-term contingency (Skinner, 1938), which became the basis for measuring operant or learned behaviour in both applied and experimental behaviour analysis.

Verbal behaviour

Perhaps one of the greatest differences between radical behaviourism and other types of behaviourism, however, was Skinner’s insistence that behaviour analysis provide a mechanism for verbal reports in order to describe unobservable private events such as a subject’s self-report of pain or discomfort (Moxley, 2004; Skinner, 1945). This insistence was prompted from a challenge issued nearly 10 years earlier by philosopher Alfred North Whitehead who, during a 1934 conversation with Skinner, suggested that behaviour analysis could not account for verbal behaviour (Claus, 2007; Skinner, 1957):‘Let me see you’, Whitehead said,‘account for my behavior as I sit here saying“No black scorpion is falling upon this table”’(Skinner,1957, p. 457). Over the next 20 years following Whitehead’s challenge, Skinner developed a theory of verbal behaviour in which he asserted that language was an operant or learned behaviour like other behaviours.

Specifically, Skinner proposed that humans communicated because their communication was strengthened or weakened by the consequences that an audience or listener provided. Consistent with behavioural paradigms, Skinner did not assign special innate properties to language acquisition for humans (Skinner, 1957).

Skinner (1957) published his theory of verbal behaviour in a largely theoretical text titledVerbal behavior. He called the theory verbal behavior because he wanted to introduce a new term that did not have a history such as linguistics or language. In the text, he created several new categories of verbal operants that aligned themselves with his theory. His assertion that language was an operant differed vastly from his contemporaries in other fields and was criticised because it did not include internal processes. For instance, Noam Chomsky characterised it as superficial and sim- plistic because it did not include information about the‘internal structure of the organism, the ways in which it processes input information and organizes its own behavior’(Chomsky,1959, p. 49). Fur- thermore, Skinner’s work moved slowly into research in behaviour analysis because behaviour analysts continued to use behavioural tactics such as shaping to teach language to individuals with disabilities (Michael,1985).

In 1982, nearly 25 years after the publication ofVerbal behavior, research on Skinner’s theory even- tually received a greater level of support from behaviour analysts when researcher Mark Sundberg published The analysis of verbal behavior, an academic journal designed to disseminate research on verbal behaviour. Initially, publications in this journal helped to disseminate more research on verbal behaviour by focusing on conceptual issues from Skinner’s theory. Subsequent empirical work was largely conducted with young, typically developing children as well as individuals who were deaf or had intellectual disabilities and not with children with autism. Skinner’s work also impacted language assessments for children with autism as evidenced by major autism language assessments developed in the 1990s and widely used to assess language for children with autism today (Partington & Sundberg,1998; Sundberg,2008).

EARLY CHILD DEVELOPMENT AND CARE 3

(6)

Lovaas and autism

However, the demand for applied behaviour analysis in the field of autism brought the greatest attention to Skinner’s theory of verbal behaviour (Sundberg & Michael,2001). In 1987, O. Ivar Lovaas published his seminal work‘Behavioral treatment and normal educational and intellectual functioning in young autistic children’in which he described the outcomes of intensive behavioural intervention with a group of 19 children with autism; Lovaas compared their outcomes to a group of 40 children with autism who did not have the same intensive treatment. His study showed that 47% of children in the treatment group had normal intellectual and educational functioning by first grade, while 40%

had mild intellectual disabilities or language delays. In contrast, however, only 2% of children in the control group had normal intellectual and educational functioning while all of the remaining students were identified as having mild or severe intellectual disabilities and/or language delays by first grade (Lovaas,1987).

A 1993 follow-up study of Lovaas’work, conducted six years after the conclusion of the exper- iment, suggested that students in the treatment group retained their gains when compared to students in the control group (Lovaas,1993). While Lovaas did not use Skinner’s verbal behaviour in his work, his research formalised behaviour analysis as a treatment for autism (Sundberg & Michael, 2001). In 1999, U.S. Surgeon General David Satcher formally endorsed the use of applied behaviour analysis with children with autism, increasing the demand for behaviour analysis by parents (United States Office of the Surgeon General,1999). Subsequent research extended applied behaviour analysis procedures to naturalistic teaching environments (see LeBlanc, Esch, Sidener, & Firth,2006for a review). For example, Dawson et al. (2010) report a randomised control study of the Early Start Denver Model, a model of early behavioural intervention during which parents implemented a developmental model of applied behaviour analysis in their homes with toddlers with autism. Results demonstrated that participants made significant gains on measures of autism, adaptive behaviour, and cognition after the intervention (Dawson et al.,2010). In this way, the use of applied behaviour analysis by Lovaas and other researchers demonstrated its effectiveness in addressing deficits that affect children with autism.

Skinner’s theory of verbal behaviour

Skinner (1957) described several verbal operants or verbal functions that are commonly used to build language repertoires for children with autism (Greer & Ross,2008). These operants included behavioural descriptions of requests, labelling, conversations, adjectives and adverbs, and even writing.

Five of the verbal operants from Skinner’s theory of verbal behaviour will be discussed in this

Table 1.Verbal operants or functions from skinner’s theory of verbal behavior.

Operant Description Example

Mand A child requests an item Antecedent: Child is thirsty

Behavior: Child says,‘Water, please’ Consequence: Parent gives child water Echoic A child imitates a vocal model Antecedent: Parent says‘Dog’

Behavior: Child repeats‘Dog’ Consequence: Parent says‘Yes, dog’ Intraverbal A child verbally responds to a question or statement Antecedent:‘What’s your name?’

Behavior:‘Jeff’

Consequence:‘My name is Linda’

Tact A child labels an item Antecedent: Child sees an apple

Behavior: Child says‘Apple’

Consequence: Parent says‘Right! That’s an apple!’ Autoclitic A child uses an adjective or adverb to request or

label an item

Antecedent: Parent says,‘What do you want?’ Behavior: Child says,‘I wantgrapejuice’ Consequence: Child receives grape juice instead

of orange juice

(7)

section of the paper: the echoic, mand, tact, autolitic, and intraverbal.Table 1lists and defines each of the verbal operants.

The first verbal operant that Skinner described that behaviour analysts find useful for children with autism was anechoic. Skinner (1957) defined an echoic as‘verbal behavior is under the control of verbal stimuli [and] the response generates a sound-pattern similar to that of the stimulus’(p. 55).

In simpler terms, an echoic occurs when a person vocally imitates a vocal model. For example, an echoic occurs when a parent says ‘Cookie’and a child repeats the word‘cookie’. The antecedent for an echoic is a vocal model such as a parent saying‘Dog’, the consequence for an echoic is a generalised conditioned reinforcer such as praise or approval. Skinner (1957) noted that echoics are useful for teaching more advanced verbal operants because parents can use them to model desired responses.

The second verbal operant that is useful for children with autism is themand. The term‘mand’is an abbreviation of the words‘command’or ‘demand’. Skinner (1957) defined a mand as ‘a verbal operant in which the response is reinforced by a characteristic consequence and is therefore under the functional control of relevant conditions of deprivation or aversive stimulation’(p. 35).

According to Skinner, the antecedent for a mand is a condition such as hunger or thirst that would evoke a request from a speaker, and the consequence for a mand is receiving the item that the speaker requests such as a glass of water when thirsty (Skinner,1957). For example, when a child is thirsty, they might say,‘May I have something to drink?’and then receive a beverage from their mother. Mands are often the first operant acquired by young children learning to speak, and they are often one of the first major targets of an early intervention programme for a child with language deficits. This verbal operant is also unique in that it is the only operant that directly benefits the speaker (Skinner,1957), unlike the remaining operants that are maintained by generalised conditioned reinforcers such as praise or approval (Sundberg & Michael,2001).

A third verbal operant that is useful for children with autism is thetact. The term ‘tact’is an abbreviation for the word ‘contact’, an abbreviation that Skinner selected to reflect instances when a speaker comes into contact with a stimulus in their environment. Skinner (1957) defined the tact as‘a verbal operant in which a response of given form is evoked (or at least strengthened) by a particular object or event or property of an object or event’(p. 81). For instance, a child may see an airplane and say‘Airplane’. The antecedent for a tact is the presence of a stimulus and the consequence for a tact is approval from another person. For instance, in the prior example, the child who sees the airplane may receive praise from his parent for saying ‘airplane’. It is differentiated from a mand by its antecedent and consequence because the speaker’s response is not reinforced by receiving the item but by social attention from a listener. After acquiring mands, this verbal operant is useful for young children and children with language deficits because it expands their vocabulary and helps them gain social attention as a reinforcer–a problem that is common for children with autism.

A fourth verbal operant that Skinner identified is anintraverbal. Skinner (1957) defined an intraverbal as below:

In echoic behavior and in writing from copy there is a formal correspondence between stimulus and response- product. In textual behavior and in taking dictation there is a point-to-point correspondence between different dimensional systems. But some verbal responses show no point-to-point correspondence with the verbal stimuli which evoke them. Such is the case when the response four is made to the verbal stimulus two plus two, or to the flag to I pledge allegiance, or Paris to the capital of France, or ten sixty-six to William the Conqueror. We may call behavior controlled by such stimuli intraverbal. Since formal correspondences are not at issue, we may consider both vocal and written stimuli and vocal and written responses in all four combinations at the same time. (p. 71)

The antecedent for an intraverbal is a speaker’s vocal antecedent and the consequence for an intraverbal is a generalised conditioned reinforcer such as praise or the presentation of another verbal response. For example, upon hearing someone say,‘Mary had a little–’the speaker says,‘lamb’. Simi- larly, when asked the question, ‘What color is the sky?’ the speaker says, ‘Blue’. Intraverbals are

(8)

especially useful for expanding the verbal repertoires of children with verbal deﬁcits because they can increase their social communication repertoires through conversations (Greer & Ross,2008).

The final verbal operant that will be described in this paper is anautoclitic. Skinner (1957) defined the autoclitic as verbal‘behavior which is based upon or depends upon other verbal behavior’(p. 315) such as an adjective or adverb form. Peterson (1978) suggested that autoclitics could be identified as either autoclitic mands or autoclitic tacts. Autoclitic mands are under the control of a motivating operation and instruct the listener to behave in a particular way. For example, the speaker might say,‘I wantgrapejuice’. This response informs the listener about thetypeof juice that the speaker is requesting. Autoclitic tacts inform the listener of the conditions under which the speaker’s response is emitted (Peterson,1978). For example, the speaker might say,‘I thinkit is raining outside’. The use ofI thinkinforms the listener that the relationship between the relevant stimulus (the weather) and the response (‘it is raining’) is somewhat weak.

Current applications of Skinner’s verbal behaviour to child language development Within the last decade and a half, Skinner’s theory of verbal behaviour (1957) has been used as an alternative approach to facilitate functional language and communication skills to individuals diagnosed with autism and other developmental disabilities (Sundberg & Michael, 2001). Techniques such as errorless learning, prompting, fading, and discrete trial intervention are often used in both intensive teaching sessions and more naturalistic contexts to teach verbal behaviour (Prelock, Paul,

& Allen,2011). A major distinction between Skinner’s approach and traditional approaches to teaching language is its focus on the individual behaviours of speakers and listeners (Sundberg & Michael,2001).

According to Sundberg and Michael (2001), this emphasis is especially important for training children with autism or other developmental disabilities because they may not have the extensive exposure to language similar to a typically developing child. Furthermore, because Skinner’s approach is based on conditions that are observable and that can be manipulated, procedures derived from it can be oper- ationalised for teachers and parents to use with children with autism. The current applications that will be discussed will focus on the echoic, mand, tact, and intraverbal verbal operants.

Echoics

An echoic is when the speaker repeats, or imitates, what someone else has just said. They are useful for teaching additional verbal responses because parents and teachers can use echoics to model desired responses (Skinner, 1957). In applications to children with autism who may have severe language deficits or even be nonverbal, echoics are established by presenting an opportunity to mand or tact while using echoics as prompts (Koegel, O’Dell, & Koegel,1987). However, when nonverbal students do not vocally imitate a model, then alternative procedures are needed to evoke initial echoics. Research has identified several procedures including rapid motor imitation training (Ross & Greer,2003; Tsiouri & Greer, 2007) and pairing procedures (Rader et al.,2014; Sundberg, Michael, Partington, & Sundberg,1996; Ward, Osnes, & Partington,2007).

Rapid motor imitation training procedures may be effective when a nonverbal child is unable to vocally imitate another person (Ross & Greer,2003; Tsiouri & Greer,2007). During this procedure, an instructor rapidly models several motor actions which the child imitates and then immediately presents an opportunity to imitate a vocalisation. If the vocalisation is imitated, the instructor delivers reinforcement. Once the child reliably imitates the vocalisations, the procedure is faded (Ross & Greer,2003).

Tsiouri and Greer (2007) investigated the role of social reinforcement in the effectiveness of a rapid motor imitation procedure to induce first instances of echoic tacts with two preschoolers with severe language delays. Results showed that the number of echoics significantly increased for previously nonverbal children during the rapid motor imitation condition when compared to baseline conditions.

Another procedure, stimulus–stimulus pairing, has also been shown to be effective in establishing an echoic repertoire for nonverbal children with autism (Rader et al.,2014; Sundberg et al.,1996). First

(9)

demonstrated by Sundberg et al. (1996), the stimulus–stimulus pairing procedure involves the instructor saying a specific sound, word, or phrase while concurrently delivering an established reinforcer to the child (Rader et al.,2014). Rader et al. (2014) sought to systematically replicate the stimulus–stimulus pairing procedure used by Esch, Carr, and Grow (2009) to increase vocalisations in three children with autism. The results from their study showed a substantial increase in target vocalisations and non-target vocalisations for nonverbal children with autism. Ward et al. (2007) found similar results for children with autism who had limited speech repertories.

Mands

As previously noted, a mand is a verbal operant in which the response is verbal, preceded by conditions of deprivation, and reinforced by receiving the item requested by the speaker (Skinner, 1957). In other words, it is a request for a preferred stimulus, event, or condition. Many studies have investigated the effectiveness of procedures aimed to teach individuals with developmental disabilities to mand for information, items, activities, and actions using speech (Albert, Carbone, Murray, Hagerty, & Sweeney-Kerwin, 2012; Sweeney-Kerwin, Carbone, O’Brien, Zecchin, & Janecky, 2007), manual sign language (van der Meer et al.,2012), pictures (Tincani, Crozier, & Alazetta,2006), and speech-generating devices (van der Meer et al.,2012).

Mand training procedures can be placed into two categories: antecedent strategies and consequence strategies (Albert et al.,2012). Antecedent strategies contrive conditions such as thirst or hunger to increase the likelihood that the individual will emit the target mand (Albert et al.,2012).

They can also be implemented by using prompts such as vocal models, manual or textual signs, or pictures. Albert et al. (2012) describe an example of establishing a contrived condition or motivating operation to evoke mands for children with autism who had limited language repertoires. Specifically, the authors used an interrupted chain procedure to teach mands for missing items to three children with autism who ranged between five and eight years of age. As part of the interrupted behaviour chain, the authors removed a portion of a multi-step task and prompted participants to mand for the missing item. Following this mand training, all three children‘emitted unprompted mands for the missing items in the context of the trained chains and within the context of novel chains, untrained chains’(Albert et al.,2012, p. 65). The findings also showed that all of the children were able to tact (label) the missing items as a result of mand training.

Similarly, Sweeney-Kerwin et al. (2007) developed a procedure to teach two children with autism to spontaneously mand for multiply controlled items using a modified time delay and prompt fading procedure. During training, if a participant manded for the reinforcer by saying the name, that item was immediately delivered. After the edible was consumed, a two-minute time delay occurred, during which the targeted item remained out of view. If the child manded for the item within this time interval, but at least 15 seconds after the last display of the preferred item, the mand was reinforced by the delivery of that item and the time delay interval was reset. However, if the child did not mand at the end of the two-minute interval, the item was displayed again. Beginning with the second session, the child was given the opportunity to mand for the target item without it being displayed. Results showed that both children began to make spontaneous mands within or after the first experimental session, and responses increased and maintained for all target items.

However, the skill generalised to another adult for only one of the children.

Tacts

A tact is a verbal operant in which a speaker names things and actions that the speaker has direct contact with (Skinner, 1957). Tacts are commonly established with direct training and prompts (Leaf et al.,2013). However, when children do not acquire tacts within a specified time period, alternative procedures are identified to establish the tact repertoires. For instance, Barbera and Kubina (2005) report a procedure for a child who did not tact 10 target items. Using a prompting procedure

(10)

that involved having the child point to the item and vocally imitate its name, the authors successfully taught the child 30 tacts over 60 teaching sessions. Similar results were reported by Leaf et al. (2013) for children with autism who lacked a tact repertoire.

Intraverbals

Intraverbals are commonly identified as conversational language, question answering, and reciprocal language interactions (Goldsmith, LeBlanc, & Sautter,2007). Sautter and LeBlanc (2006) suggested that this operant may provide better insight into complex human behaviour because it includes a

‘diverse group of responding and accounts for reading comprehension, conversation and question answering, and events that are traditionally conceptualized as thought or memory (i.e. covert med- iating responses)’(p. 41). However, target behaviours in intraverbal training are typically limited to conversational turns, categorisation, and fill-in-the-blank tasks, and question answering (Ingvarsson

& Hollobaugh,2010).

Several procedures have been identified to establish intraverbal repertoires when they are missing. Finkel and Williams (2001) found that textual prompts effectively taught intraverbals when they compared intraverbal instruction under two conditions for children with autism: echoic prompts and textual prompts. Two different questions were assigned to one of three sets of personal questions and taught with either an echoic or textual prompt. A backward chaining procedure was conducted for both textual and echoic prompts with sentence prompts faded one word at a time to facilitate transfer of stimulus control from the prompt to the preceding verbal stimulus. Both prompting forms were effective; however, textual prompts were more effective than echoic prompts in overall accuracy and for the number of correct full-sentence responses.

In an attempt to address the issue of generalised intraverbal responding, Grannan and Rehfeldt (2012) evaluated the effectiveness of category tact and match-to-sample instruction in facilitating intraverbal responding in two children with autism. Following the mastery of 36 picture cards (nine picture cards for each of four categories), the children were taught to emit the appropriate category name (e.g. vehicle, furniture, clothing) when shown each of those picture cards. During the match-to-sample condition, the children were taught to match the cards according to category.

Stimuli were presented in arrays of four. The results showed intraverbals to emerge exclusively from tact and match-to-sample instruction; however, the authors did not evaluate the effects of the two procedures separately.

Conclusion

This paper was written to connect Skinner’s theory of verbal behaviour to growing practices in the field of autism. Specifically, we discussed the impact of Skinner’s (1957) theory of verbal behaviour on the development of language repertoires for children with autism who may have communication deficits–a defining characteristic of ASDs. Skinner developed his theory to provide an account of language based on the principles of behaviour used in behaviour analysis. While his theory was not researched for several years after its publication, in recent years, the theory of verbal behaviour has been useful for addressing language deficits associated with ASDs. Literature reviews suggest that research on Skinner’s theory of verbal behaviour has increased significantly since 1991 (Sautter & LeBlanc,2006) following experimental work demonstrating the effectiveness of applied behaviour analysis for children with autism (Lovaas,1987; Sundberg & Michael,2001). This increase is evident when one examines research on verbal behaviour since 1991. In 1991, Sundberg (1991) listed 301 potential applications of Skinner’s verbal behaviour for children with autism, which encour- aged applied research to identify interventions that could address the language deficits of children with autism. Fifteen years later, in 2006, Sautter and LeBlanc (2006) reported that research on Skin- ner’s theory of verbal behaviour had increased almost three times more than research in the early 1990s.

(11)

Relative to children with autism, Sautter and LeBlanc (2006) also reported that verbal behaviour research has demonstrated the following: (1) Verbal operants such as mands and tacts are acquired independently of one another, (2) mands should be one of the first operants established for children with autism, (3) language repertoires for children with autism can expand by using procedures that connect instructional procedures across different verbal operants and by teaching children to emit verbal operants under different antecedent conditions such as physical and vocal antecedents, and (4) antecedent conditions can be contrived to teach mands (motivating operations). Current research in verbal behaviour is examining areas that Skinner did not emphasise such as the impor- tance of establishing fluent listener skills for children with autism before teaching speaker responses and procedures to establish advanced speaker responses via incidental language acquisition (Sautter

& LeBlanc,2006). While researchers in the field of autism continuously work across disciplines to achieve outcomes that will comprehensively address the varied needs of individuals with ASDs, Skin- ner’s theory of verbal behaviour has made a significant contribution to language interventions for children with autism.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Gaige Johnson, M.A., is a doctoral student in the Department of Psychology at Western Michigan University.

Kelly Kohler, Ph.D., is a faculty specialist in the Department of Psychology at Western Michigan University and Director of the Kalamazoo Autism Center in Kalamazoo, Michigan.

Denise E. Ross, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor of Psychology in the Department of Psychology at Western Michigan University.

References

Albert, K. M., Carbone, V., Murray, D. D., Hagerty, M., & Sweeney-Kerwin, E. J. (2012). Increasing the mand repertoire of children with autism through the use of an interrupted chain procedure.Behavior Analysis in Practice,5(2), 65–76.

American Psychiatric Association. (2013).Autism spectrum disorders. Arlington, VA: American Psychiatric Publishing.

Retrieved fromhttp://www.dsm5.org/Documents/Autism20Spectrum20Disorder20Fact20Sheet.pdf

Baer, D. M., Wolf, M. M., & Risley, T. R. (1968). Some current dimensions of applied behavior analysis.Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis,1(1), 91–97.

Barbera, M. L., & Kubina, R. M. (2005). Using transfer procedures to teach tacts to a child with autism.The Analysis of Verbal Behavior,21(1), 155–161.

Baum, W. (2004).Understanding behaviorism: Behavior, culture, and evolution(2nd ed.). Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.

Behavior Analyst Certification Board. (2012).BACB fourth edition task list. Littleton, CO: Author. Retrieved fromhttp://bacb.

com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/160101-BCBA-BCaBA-task-list-fourth-edition-english.pdf

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (U.S.). (2007).Morbidity and mortality weekly report: MMWR. Atlanta, GA:

Author. Retrieved fromhttp://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/ss5601a2.htm Chomsky, N. (1959). A review of B. F. Skinner’s verbal behavior.Language,35(1), 26–58.

Christensen, D. L., Baio, J., Van Naarden Braun, K., Bilder, D., Charles, J., Constantino, J. N.,…Yeargin-Allsopp, M. (2016).

Prevalence and characteristics of autism spectrum disorder among children aged 8 years–autism and developmental disabilities monitoring network, 11 sites, United States, 2012.Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. Survellience Summaries,65(3), 1–23. Retrieved fromhttp://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/65/ss/ss6503a1.htm.

Claus, C. K. (2007). B. F. Skinner and T. N. Whitehead: A brief encounter, research similarities, Hawthorne revisited, what next?The Behavior Analyst,30(1), 79–86.

Dawson, G., Rogers, S., Munson, J., Smith, M., Winter, J., Greenson, J., …Varley, J. (2010). Randomized, controlled trial of an intervention for toddlers with autism: The Early Start Denver Model.Pediatrics,125(1), e17–e23.

Esch, B. E., Carr, J. E., & Grow, L. L. (2009). Evaluation of an enhanced stimulus–stimulus pairing procedure to increase early vocalizations of children with autism.Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis,42, 225–241.

Fernell, E., Eriksson, M. A., & Gillberg, C. (2013). Early diagnosis of autism and impact on prognosis: A narrative review.

Clinical Epidemiology,5(1), 33–43.

(12)

Finkel, A. S., & Williams, R. L. (2001). A comparison of textual and echoic prompts on the acquisition of intraverbal behavior in a six-year-old boy with autism.The Analysis of Verbal Behavior,18, 61–70.

Goldsmith, T. R., LeBlanc, L. A., & Sautter, R. A. (2007). Teaching intraverbal behavior to children with autism.Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders,1(1), 1–13.

Grannan, L., & Rehfeldt, R. A. (2012). Emergent intraverbal responses via tact and match-to-sample instruction.Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis,45(3), 601–605.

Greer, R. D., & Ross, D. E. (2008).Verbal behavior analysis: Inducing and expanding new verbal capabilities in children with language delays. New York: Allyn & Bacon.

Ingvarsson, E. T., & Hollobaugh, T. (2010). Acquisition of intraverbal behavior: Teaching children with autism to mand for answers to questions.Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis,43(1), 1–17.

Koegel, R. L., O’Dell, M. C., & Koegel, L. K. (1987). A natural language teaching paradigm for nonverbal autistic children.

Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders,17, 187–200.

Leaf, J. B., Leaf, J. A., Alcalay, A., Dale, S., Kassardjian, A., Tsuji, K.,…McEachin, J. (2013). Comparison of most-to-least to error correction to teach tacting to two children diagnosed with autism.Evidence-Based Communication Assessment and Intervention,7(3), 124–133.

LeBlanc, L. A., Esch, J., Sidener, T. M., & Firth, A. M. (2006). Behavioral language interventions for children with autism:

Comparing applied verbal behavior and naturalistic teaching approaches.The Analysis of Verbal Behavior,22(1), 49–60.

Lovaas, O. I. (1987). Behavioral treatment and normal educational and intellectual functioning in young autistic children.

Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology,55(1), 3–9.

Lovaas, O. I. (1993). The development of a treatment-research project for developmentally disabled and autistic children.

Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis,26(4), 617–630.

Luyster, R., Lopez, K., & Lord, C. (2007). Characterizing communicative development in children referred for autism spectrum disorders using the MacAurthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory (CDI).Journal of Child Language, 34, 623–654.

van der Meer, L., Kagohara, D., Achmadi, D., O’Reilly, M. F., Lancioni, G. E., Sutherland, D., & Sigafoos, J. (2012). Speech- generating devices versus manual signing for children with developmental disabilities.Research in Developmental Disabilities,33(5), 1658–1669.

Michael, J. (1985). Two kinds of verbal behavior plus a possible third.The Analysis of Verbal Behavior,3, 1–4.

Moxley, R. A. (2004). Pragmatic selectionism: The philosophy of behavior analysis.The Behavior Analyst Today,5(1), 108.

Partington, J. W., & Sundberg, M. L. (1998).Assessment of basic language and learning skills. (The ABLLS): An assessment for language delayed students. Pleasant Hill, CA: Behavior Analysts, Inc.

Peterson, N. (1978).An introduction to verbal behavior. Grand Rapids, MI: Behavior Associates.

Pickett, E., Pullara, O., O’Grady, J., & Gordon, B. (2009). Speech acquisition in older nonverbal individuals with autism: A review of features, methods, and prognosis.Cognitive and Behavioral Neurology,22(1), 1–21.

Prelock, P. A., Paul, R., & Allen, E. M. (2011). Evidence-based treatments in communication for children with autism spectrum disorders. InEvidence-based practices and treatments for children with Autism(pp. 93–169). New York, NY:

Springer.

Rader, L., Sidener, T. M., Reeve, K. F., Sidener, D. W., Delmolino, L., Miliotis, A., & Carbone, V. (2014). Stimulus-stimulus pairing of vocalizations: A systematic replication.The Analysis of Verbal Behavior,30(1), 69–74.

Rice, M. L., Warren, S. F., & Betz, S. K. (2005). Language symptoms of developmental language disorders: An overview of autism, Down syndrome, fragile X, specific language impairment, and Williams syndrome.Applied Psycholinguistics,26, 7–27.

Ross, D. E., & Greer, R. D. (2003). Generalized imitation and the mand: Inducing first instances of speech in young children with autism.Research in Developmental Disabilities,24(1), 58–74.

Sautter, R. A., & LeBlanc, L. A. (2006). Empirical applications of Skinner’s analysis of verbal behavior with humans.The Analysis of Verbal Behavior,22(1), 35–48.

Schneider, S. M., & Morris, E. K. (1987). A history of the term radical behaviorism: From Watson to Skinner.The Behavior Analyst,10(1), 27–39.

Skinner, B. F. (1938).The behavior of organisms: An experimental analysis. Oxford, UK: Appleton-Century.

Skinner, B. F. (1945). The operational analysis of psychological terms.Psychological Review,52(5), 270–277.

Skinner, B. F. (1957).Verbal behavior. New York, NY: Appleton-Century-Croft.

Society for the Advancement of Behavior Analysis. (2016).What is behavior analysis?Portage, MI: Association for Behavior Analysis International. Retrieved fromhttps://www.abainternational.org/about-us/behavior-analysis.aspx

Sundberg, M. L. (1991). 301 research topics from Skinner’s book Verbal Behavior.The Analysis of Verbal Behavior,9, 81.

Sundberg, M. L. (2008).VB-MAPP verbal behavior milestones assessment and placement program: A language and social skills assessment program for children with autism or other developmental disabilities: Guide. Retrieved fromhttp://

www.marksundberg.com/vb-mapp.htm

Sundberg, M. L., & Michael, J. (2001). The benefits of Skinner’s analysis of verbal behavior for children with autism.

Behavior Modification,25(5), 698–724.

Sundberg, M. L., Michael, J., Partington, J. W., & Sundberg, C. A. (1996). The role of automatic reinforcement in early language acquisition.The Analysis of Verbal Behavior,13, 21–37.

(13)

Sweeney-Kerwin, E. J., Carbone, V. J., O’Brien, L., Zecchin, G., & Janecky, M. N. (2007). Transferring control of the mand to the motivating operation in children with autism.The Analysis of Verbal Behavior,23(1), 89–102.

Tincani, M., Crozier, S., & Alazetta, L. (2006). The picture exchange communication system: Effects on manding and speech development for school-aged children with autism.Education and Training in Developmental Disabilities,41(2), 177– 184.

Tsiouri, I., & Greer, R. D. (2007). The role of different social reinforcement contingencies in inducing echoic tacts through motor imitation responding in children with severe language delays. Journal of Early and Intensive Behavior Intervention,4(4), 629–647.

United States Office of the Surgeon General. (1999).Mental health: A report of the surgeon general. Washington, DC:

Author. Retrieved fromhttps://profiles.nlm.nih.gov/ps/retrieve/ResourceMetadata/NNBBHS

Ward, S. J., Osnes, P. J., & Partington, J. W. (2007). The effects of a delay of noncontingent reinforcement during a pairing procedure in the development of stimulus control of automatically reinforced vocalizations.The Analysis of Verbal Behavior,23(1), 103–111.

Watson, J. B. (1913). Psychology as the behaviorist views it.Psychological Review,20(2), 158–177.

Zablotsky, B., Black, L. I., Maenner, M. J., Schieve, L. A., & Blumberg, S. J. (2015). Estimated prevalence of autism and other developmental disabilities following questionnaire changes in the 2014 national health interview survey.National Health Statistics Reports, (87), 1–21.

View publication stats