Increasing Task Engagement and Decreasing Challenging Behavior via a Work-Reinforcement Contingency

This study was a single-case study of a verbal and pictorial-plus-verbal work-reinforcement contingency prompt with a three year-old child with autism/ASD who engaged in challenging behaviors and task avoidance when faced with task demand. In baseline, he received no prompt regarding any reinforcement contingency and was simply presented with task demand. For the verbal-only prompt, he was given a gestural and verbal prompt indicating that he would receive access to a preferred item after working. For the pictorial-plus-verbal prompt, he was given the same verbal and gestural prompt but was also shown a “first-then” card with pictures representing both ‘work’ and his preferred reinforcer. Results showed a notable decline in challenging behavior and increase in task engagement over the course of the study; however, there also appears to be notable bleed across the different conditions. There is also some limited support for the superiority of a pictorial-plus-verbal contingency prompt.

본 연구는 단일 대상 연구 설계인 중다 기초선 설계와 교대-처치 설계를 사용하여 언어적 촉진만 사용했을 때와 언어적 촉진과 시각적 촉진(그림)을 함께 사용하였을 때에 아동의 문제 행동과 과제 참여 행동에 미치는 효과를 비교하고자 설계 되었다. 연구 대상으로 만 3세의 자폐아동이 참여하였다. 이 아동은 과제가 주어졌을 때 언어적인 공격 행동과 신체적인 공격 행동을 보였다. 연구 결과 아동의 과제 참여 행동은 증가하였고, 아동의 문제행동은 감소되었다. 제언에서는 연구 결과를 바탕으로 이 연구의 제한점과 연구 방향 등에 대하여 논의되었다.