G1 Design and evaluate positive and negative reinforcement procedures

G.1 Design and evaluate positive and negative reinforcement procedures

Designing and evaluating positive and negative reinforcement procedures involves creating interventions that increase desired behaviors by either providing a rewarding stimulus (positive reinforcement) or removing an aversive stimulus (negative reinforcement). Evaluation ensures that these procedures effectively increase the target behavior while being ethical and appropriate for the individual.

Positive Reinforcement

Positive reinforcement involves presenting a desirable stimulus or consequence immediately following a behavior, which increases the likelihood of that behavior recurring in the future.

Example: A child completes their homework (behavior) and receives praise and a small reward, such as a sticker or extra playtime (positive reinforcer). This positive reinforcement increases the likelihood of the child completing their homework again in the future.

Negative Reinforcement

Negative reinforcement involves removing or avoiding an aversive stimulus or consequence contingent upon a behavior, which increases the likelihood of that behavior occurring again in the future.

Example: A student is given a difficult math assignment (aversive stimulus). The student engages in on-task behavior (behavior) to escape or avoid the difficult task. As a result, the teacher removes the assignment (negative reinforcer). Removing the aversive task increases the likelihood of the student engaging in on-task behavior in the future when faced with similar challenging assignments.

A BCBA is working with a child struggling to complete homework. To design a positive reinforcement procedure, the BCBA implements a system where the child earns extra playtime for each homework assignment completed. The BCBA monitors the child’s behavior to ensure that homework completion increases over time.

Simultaneously, the BCBA designs a negative reinforcement procedure where the child can avoid a disliked chore (e.g., extra cleaning tasks) if they complete their homework on time. The BCBA evaluates both procedures by tracking the child’s homework completion rates and adjusts the reinforcement strategies if needed to ensure effectiveness and ethical use.

It’s important to note that negative reinforcement is not the same as punishment. Negative reinforcement involves removing or avoiding an aversive stimulus to increase behavior, while punishment involves applying an aversive stimulus to decrease behavior.

BCBAs carefully select and implement positive and negative reinforcement procedures based on individualized assessment and analysis of the target behavior. They consider the person’s preferences, the specific behavior they want to strengthen, and the overall goals of the intervention.

In both positive and negative reinforcement procedures, the key is to identify and use meaningful and motivating reinforcers for the individual. This ensures that the reinforcement is effective in strengthening the desired behavior. Additionally, BCBAs monitor the effectiveness of reinforcement procedures over time and make necessary adjustments to maintain their effectiveness and promote continued behavior change.

G. Behavior-Change Procedures

G.1. Design and evaluate positive and negative reinforcement procedures.

G.2. Design and evaluate differential reinforcement (e.g., DRA, DRO, DRL, DRH) procedures with and without extinction.

G.3. Design and evaluate time-based reinforcement (e.g., fixedtime) schedules.

G.4. Identify procedures to establish and use conditioned reinforcers (e.g., token economies).

G.5. Incorporate motivating operations and discriminative stimuli into behavior-change procedures.

G.6. Design and evaluate procedures to produce simple and conditional discriminations.

G.7. Select and evaluate stimulus and response prompting procedures (e.g., errorless, most-to-least, least-to-most).

G.8. Design and implement procedures to fade stimulus and response prompts (e.g., prompt delay, stimulus fading).

G.9. Design and evaluate modeling procedures.

G.10. Design and evaluate instructions and rules.

G.11. Shape dimensions of behavior.

G.12. Select and implement chaining procedures.

G.13. Design and evaluate trial-based and freeoperant procedures.

G.14. Design and evaluate group contingencies.

G.15. Design and evaluate procedures to promote stimulus and response generalization.

G.16. Design and evaluate procedures to maintain desired behavior change following intervention (e.g., schedule thinning, transferring to naturally occurring reinforcers).

G.17. Design and evaluate positive and negative punishment (e.g., time-out, response cost, overcorrection).

G.18. Evaluate emotional and elicited effects of behavior change procedures.

G.19. Design and evaluate procedures to promote emergent relations and generative performance.