Decreasing vocal stereotypy in children with autism with limited vocal verbal repertoire

Document Type

Thesis

College

College of Arts and Sciences

Department

Psychology

Degree

M.S. Applied Behavior Analysis

Date Completed

2012

First Committee Member

Ahearn, William

Second Committee Member

Thompson, Rachel

Third Committee Member

Dickson, Chata

Abstract

"Vocal stereotypy (VS) is a commonly encountered and often persistent problem for individuals diagnosed with autism and other developmental disabilities. Stereotypy can interfere with skill acquisition and be socially stigmatizing. Response interruption and redirection (RIRD; Ahearn, Clark, MacDonald, & Chung, 2007) has been proven to be an effective treatment in decreasing VS. Ahearn et al. developed an RIRD-v procedure consisting of redirecting VS with vocal responses. However, many children with autism have a limited vocal verbal repertoire and therefore may not have any appropriate vocalization that could be prompted during RIRD-v. A second effective approach to decreasing stereotypy is to provide items that compete with the sensory consequences produced by the behavior (Piazza, Adelinis, Hanley, Goh, & Delia, 2000). The current study compared the efficacy of RIRD and competing items for decreasing VS. The participants selected had a limited vocal verbal repertoire; thus, an RIRD procedure using motor responses (RIRD-m; Ahrens, Lerman, Kodak, Worsdell, & Keegan, 2011) was evaluated. Three students diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder participated. Data were collected on VS and interobserver agreement (IOA) data were collected for at least 30% of sessions across conditions. Mean IOA was above 90% for all conditions. The results indicated that the treatment of VS is idiosyncractic to the individual. For one participant, both RIRD-m and competing items were effective in decreasing VS. For another participant, RIRD-m was more effective than competing items in decreasing VS, and for the last participant RIRD-m was more effective until an enhanced competing items condition was implemented."

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