Please wait while the transcript is being prepared...
0:00
Hello, everyone. My name is Mark Palmieri.
I'm a licensed psychologist and
board-certified behavior analyst and
the co-director of the Center for Children with Special Needs,
a community-based practice in Glastonbury,
Connecticut, in the United States.
This talk is on applied behavior analysis and
its conceptual foundations and core applications.
0:22
In the first part of the talk,
we reviewed some of the historical context relevant to understanding ABA,
it's common principles, and the key dimensions of behavior.
Importantly, the learning model,
establishing reinforcement and punishment procedures as ways to
shape behavior using an antecedent behavior consequence perspective.
This part of the talk,
we'll begin with an understanding of
how applied behavioral analysis considers challenging behavior,
a learned behavior which can be understood functionally, and addressed therapeutically.
We'll then move into common treatment procedures evident in many ABA-based interventions,
the data collection which are associated with these,
and then examples of how applied behavior analysis uses visual analysis of
data to offer an analytic model to determine treatment effectiveness.
1:14
When you're considering how ABA understands behavior,
you can always be confident that it will be based in
a foundational knowledge that behavior is largely a product of its immediate environment,
that it is shaped over time and maintained by the consequences which follow it,
and that we understand that
past behavior patterns are the best predictors of future behavior.
Now when you're considering these concepts,
they can be somewhat open-ended and difficult to understand.
It's always helpful to think about your own behavior and to
consider how your behavior is a product of your own environment.
When you learn a new skill,
you understand if it's successful based on whether or not it works for you,
based on whether or not you've found yourself to be succeeding in the work you do.
If you are successful,
you're likely to continue it.
If you struggle tremendously and you're unsuccessful in reaching your intended outcomes,
you're likely to change your behavior or to stop what you're doing.
So all of our behavior is shaped by our environments.
It's just a matter of understanding that ABA allows us to study behavior very precisely,
which is so valuable,
particularly if we are working with individuals who are
unable to describe their experiences successfully,
if they have language deficits which make it
difficult for them to communicate with those around them,
or if they have challenges which make it hard for
them to communicate why they are currently doing a behavior,
when for many of us we would see that behavior as
dangerous or as unsuccessful in the environment they're in.
Always remember that from an ABA perspective,
behavior is shaped by its environment,
and the environmental events which follow a behavior,
help reinforce that behavior and make it more likely to occur again in the future.
There's going to be more attention to this in
the coming slides so that we can get more precise with
our understanding of this foundational principle of
behavioral science considering an ABA approach.
