Awareness training can produce decreases in nervous habits during public speaking. A systematic replication of Montes et al. (2020) was conducted to evaluate the independent and additive effects of awareness training components (i.e., response description, response detection) on speech disfluencies during public speaking. We extended prior…

Accidental poisonings can occur for children with disabilities as a result of ingesting household products, such as medications and cleaning chemicals, if the products are not stored safely. Behavioral approaches such as behavioral skills training (BST) have been used in previous research to teach safety skills to children with disabilities.…

This study evaluated the effectiveness of simplified habit reversal in reducing filled pauses that occur during public speaking. Filled pauses consist of "uh," "um," or "er"; clicking sounds; and misuse of the word "like." After baseline, participants received habit reversal training that consisted of…

There are a number of different safety threats that children face in their lives. One infrequent, but highly dangerous situation a child can face is finding a firearm. Hundreds of children are injured or killed by firearms each year. Fortunately, behavioral skills training (BST) and in situ training (IST) are effective approaches for teaching a…

Behavioral research to enhance sports performance has been conducted in numerous sports domains and often involves feedback from the coach to the student. One promising form of feedback is the use of an acoustical stimulus such as a clicker to provide more immediate feedback. Similar to clicker training with animals, acoustical stimuli are used…

Child abduction is a serious problem, with approximately 100 children killed each year by nonfamily abductors. Training programs to teach children the correct skills to use if they ever come into contact with a stranger can be effective when they incorporate behavioral skills training (BST) and in-situ training (IST) into their protocol. However,…

Hundreds of accidental injuries and deaths to children occur annually in the United States as a result of firearm play. Behavioral skills training (BST) and in situ training have been found to be effective in teaching children the skills to use if they find a firearm, but training requires substantial time and effort. The current study examined…

Fifty-nine college students used a modified version of the Treatment Evaluation Inventory-Short Form to evaluate the acceptability of four versions of a sexual abuse prevention program for 10-year-old children. The four versions include an information-based training approach or a behavioral skills training (BST) approach with a focus on strangers…

Binge eating is a serious behavior problem exhibited by individuals diagnosed with binge eating disorder and bulimia nervosa. Binge eating is thought to be maintained by automatic negative reinforcement in the form of relief from negative emotional responding. Current treatments produce only moderate abstinence, perhaps because they do not attempt…

Twelve factors should be considered in justifying techniques selected for treating aberrant behavior in persons with mental retardation. The factors include motivational variables, treatment effectiveness, side effects, abuse potential, treatment restrictiveness/intrusiveness, treatment precedence, social acceptability, regulatory factors, staff…

Evaluates behavioral treatment for trichotillomania in an 11-year-old boy. Simplified habit reversal consisting of awareness training, competing response training, and social support decreased the behavior but did not eliminate it. A number of adjunct treatments further decreased and subsequently eliminated the hair pulling. (Contains 20…

This paper first reviews four classes of habit disorders in children: motor and vocal tics, nervous habits, stuttering, and Tourette's disorder. It then describes the habit reversal procedure and reviews the literature on its use and variations to treat each of the four classes of habit disorders. Emphasis is on simplified versions of the original…

Obesity is a major problem for people in the United States. Individuals with mental retardation also are prone to obesity. The most successful programs for treating obesity typically are treatment packages consisting of multiple behavioral components. Research in the area of weight loss and mental retardation has not evaluated programs for…

This study evaluated the effectiveness of high probability requests and time-out as treatments for noncompliance which appeared to be maintained by contingent attention in two developmentally normal children. The introduction of high-probability requests increased compliance for one child but not the other. Time-out was effective with both…

Staff members (N=72) of 12 community residential facilities for the retarded rated the acceptability of four behavior modification procedures. Treatments were rated according to their restrictiveness with differential reinforcement of other behavior the most acceptable, followed by time-out, overcorrection, and shock. (Author/DB)