Dr. Peter Gerhard, shares his insight and expertise with Bobbi and Cathy about teaching and learning that truly supports the lives of individuals living on the Autism Spectrum (ASD).

ASD and Life Skills - Stupid Is as Stupid Does

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Podcast Episode 15 Behaviour Change - Necessity is the Mother of Invention
Dr. Ron Van Houten, Bobbi Hoadley, Cathy KnightsABA technical concepts covered in this podcast: Behaviour change procedures; pattern analyses; measurement; Functional Analysis; punishment procedures; negative reinforcement by reducing time and effort; positive punishment using delay and exertion; motivating operations and establishing operations; contextual fit; visual contextual cues; efficiency; group contingencies; maintenance Bobbi and Cathy: When we have a problem that isnt being solved, we create an intervention, or an invention, that will address the problem. The person we are talking to is such an interesting man, his name is Doctor Ron Van Houten and he is an ABA doctor and a professor at Western Michigan University. He has done work all over North American and Europe in traffic safety and how to decrease the conflicts that create near misses and people getting hurt. He has changed the behaviour of both drivers and pedestrians using Behaviour Analysis. Ron sets up solutions that engineer the behavior of everybody in those situations to mitigate the risk.  Ron: There were studies done that show that cars coming up to a crosswalk dont have a good line of sight. Places in NY city a number of people crushed to death by trucks. So they put an arrow up high but it didnt work. One simple solution was staggering the stop lines.Cathy: There are times when I would jay-walk, I think to myself could I not have walked down to the corner to the crosswalk? Ron: In essence, we know that people dont like to wait. We find out where people would like to cross. Pedestrian generators. You can try educating with behavioural solutions.Bobbi: I would think all good functional analysis of behaviour is doing that  find out where the behaviour is going and then decide whether you can actually change it or whether its better to go with the behaviour and just change the circumstances. Always juggling the reinforcement. In my situation, I measure a person against themselves. For you, you are dealing with people and conflicts and they all want efficiency.Ron: I wanted to get people to not use the elevator when they didnt need it. I tried putting information about health benefits of using the stairs. Didnt change. So I increased the wait time on the elevator and everyone who could use the stairs went to the stairs. By increasing their effort and time, I changed their behaviour.I did some things for the National Traffic Safety Administration, and we wanted to get people to wear seatbelts. I gave a survey, and sure enough put them into the car and baseline showed they wore their belts. Then we moved it to treatment, which was moving the car increase speed, if you buckled your belt, that force gradually went away. You have to repeat the reminders. A lot of people dont buckle their seats before moving the car. You do a repeat reminder after theyre going. Pedal force-gets 100% seatbelt use, whereas before it was a delay. I used GMs brake shift, to then get seatbelt reminder, and if they dont buckle they cant shift immediately, they have to wait 8 seconds. We had big increases in seatbelt use. They still have some choice.One of the cities in Florida, were having children struck going to and from school. I did the analysis and said 1) you dont have a lot of sidewalks near the school. I looked and people were in such a hurry dropping kids off. Motivating operation-community wants to do something about it. 2) Reduce speeding when kids are going to and from school. Educate parents about kids getting struck, needing to be under speed limit or enforce it aggressively. For years, no more children were struck going to and from school. You need to prepare people before the change that they have to accept it.Bobbi: And this is a project you went back to and took data?Ron: We got the community buy-in to change the way things are done. Four years later, people were telling me it was awesome. They hit a tipping point into the high 70s-people and drivers imitate behaviour. Everyone starts to yield. It become self-sustaining and changing dynamics of culture.Bobbi: Set up the group dynamics to either punish or reinforce.Ron: Some of the worst places Ive seen, people say oh we dont have a problem. When people try and make efforts, thats where change is. Where theres no motivation to change, it becomes harder. Its almost paradoxical, when theres a lot of interest, usually things are happening already.Bobbi: Thats why we follow our data.Ron: Score and look at whats going on in Toronto-measure running lights.Bobbi: The programs to increase biking and decrease risks of biking in Vancouver use tools that are really varied.Ron: Consider for a moment, children used to walk or bicycle to school. Look today at obesity cause-lack of walking and bicycling. Its a good thing to promote walking and bicycling because it saves on our healthcare costs.Bobbi: I do notice the more they put in structures to help bikers be more safe, its also the changing driver behaviour to be politer, I think you do reach a tipping point. I cant hit them, I better join them.Ron: There is a greater acceptance of cycling than there used to be, and a little better with pedestrians. I would say Canada does better in yielding than the United States. I tried something years a go, it was the idea at the start of the walk, we had eyes that animated to look left and right. It would increase looking-so we could prompt people to look for vehicles. In Britain they have signs look right because we in North America look left, to look for moving cars. Winston Churchill was almost killed in NY City stepping off the crosswalk and was hit. Reminding people to look and knowing where to look. Crossing clockwise is different than crossing counter-clockwise. You have to use more behaviour to look at something coming from behind you than ahead of you. With texting you cant see anything.Bobbi: I personally love the scrambling intersections in Europe. I dont see these happening, can we expect that in the future?Ron: Scrambling intersections, creates more delay, but tends to be where theres a lot of people. Match up treatments to people best you can.Bobbi: They have to provide equipment anyway, why not engineer it to be more helpful and safe for everyone. Ron: You can use something called a gateway treatment, so drivers have to cross between them, we can get very good yielding with that and its an inexpensive tool. How much is it just the sign with no message? But going between these signs seems important too.Bobbi: So its a visual contextual fit.Ron: Exactly. We started to look at survival rates of the solutions. We found some that reduce the maintenance cost. Developing new ideas, some low cost. Think of the reminders in the car to wear seatbelt  costs nothing when software is already there.Bobbi: I would contend that most of the time its a lot less expensive to maintain a solution, than maintain a problem. Why I love behaviour analysis, were all about the solution.Ron: The other thing we can do is feedback and reinforcement. When we have a community making progress, we need to convey that to them to keep going in the right direction. It was so nice to have Ron interacting with us and telling us more. The part I really like is that everything he does is the same as what I do. Even though hes applying it to a variety of groups of people and he has a specific goal, he still does an analysis of the behaviour, and uses all the same tools I do, keeps it pragmatically going until he hits a tipping point and then keeps maintaining and generalizing it. Itll be different for me crossing the street now. It just goes to prove that necessity is the mother of invention.

Behaviour Change - Necessity is the Mother of Invention

Habit Reversal - Old Habits Die Hard
Cathy and Bobbi party in Chicago with Applied Behaviour Analysts over the next few episodes. They are at the International Behaviour Analysis Conference and learning lots about habit reversal!
14- Old Habits Die HardBobbi Hoadley, Cathy KnightsABA technical concepts covered in this podcast: Experimental Analysis of Behaviour; empirically supported behaviour change procedures; habit reversal; self-management techniques; schedules of reinforcement; behaviour shaping; differential reinforcement; social significanceBobbi and Cathy are in Chicago at the International Applied Behaviour Analysis Conference 2016.Today we attended one of the Skinner lectures. B.F. Skinner translated behavioural science into concrete understanding of laws, through experimenting with animals. Later on, he wrote on human behaviour and how the laws may apply. His work helped to transition behavioural science from a theory into an applied practice.Our first lecture was given by Michael Kim, whos not an Applied Behaviour Analyst. We are learning from someone whos using the science to demonstrate incredibly effective applications. He leads a company that figures out how to do habit reversal through organizational behaviour  how to motivate people. His website is habitdesign.org.He talked about the steps required for habit change and why its so good to develop routines and habits. He discussed neuroplasticity, which is relevant to our work with people after experiencing a brain injury. When you learn a routine and make it a habit, you dont have to use so much brain power on it. Its critically important to learn routines after a brain injury so that you dont have to stress out just getting through the day. Former habits are easier to re-learn, but you need more new habits when motivation and initiation are so much harder after an injury to your brain. It takes more work to make things happen, so the more things are done routinely and habitually, the less difficult life is. Example, you may not remember when you took your last shower. Its much better to have a routine shower everyday so you dont have to remember and initiate to do it. Its way easier to set up a habit and take the shower every day and it just occurs. The way we do it is set up a task analysis, and break down the small steps. You have to work on establishing a habit at each step of those routines. Companies spend lots of money over organizational habits and the best ones are the ones that encourage maintaining and practicing the routines even after the change.Clicker training is used in shaping behaviour- to ensure youre getting the immediate feedback about what is right. Its way more effective than trying to teach a support person to give a differential verbal reinforcement cue, but we dont use it much with adults. We have various ways of doing shaping. Michael Kim showed a video example of an instructor teaching high jumping. She taught each piece then put them together. We have a variety of techniques and use them to teach a new behaviour. Like any other behaviour change, you have to have stimulus control, and you get stimulus control through rapport.Were not going to teach a behaviour that has no meaning or significance to the person who is doing it. An example of teaching that isnt was the VonTrapp family, Sound of Music, used training to come with a whistle. It wasnt age appropriate and was disregarding as Maria pointed out.

Habit Reversal - Old Habits Die Hard

Bobbi and Cathy review a conference session on the dangers of misinformation, and how our cognitive behaviour can trap us into believing things that aren't true.

Cognitive behaviour - Talk Is Still Cheap

Podcast 13 - You Can't Teach an Old Dog New Tricks
ABA technical concepts covered in this podcast: Discriminative Stimuli or Sd; Evocative MOs; Ontogeny; neuroplasticity; pivotal behaviours; Maintenance; Intrinsic vs. extrinsic reinforcers; Unconditioned R+ and R-; Conditioned R+; Stimulus Control; Pairing; NCR; Topographies of behaviour; Stimulus class; Desensitization; Habit reversal; Flooding procedure; de-stimulation; Cusp behaviours; contextual cues; choosing target behaviour; social validity; dysregulation; behaviour shaping; Positive Behaviour Support; behaviour intensitiesPresenters - Bobbi Hoadley and Cathy KnightsCathy's dog Clara is the star of this discussion about desensitization. Teaching an old dog or an adolescent one doesn't have to be challenging if you know how!We like to talk about behaviour, yours, mine, and the dogs. The theme: you cant teach an old dog new tricks and looking at why thats a myth.We have MOs that are driven by our internal states. Hormones are one example. Cathys dog recently spayed, could be reacting to that internal state. Also the age, adolescence she is creating neuro connections all the time. As you become older, neuro connections become harder and harder to change. Its just a little more work to change when youre older. She will probably mature.Bribing with treats doesnt maintain behaviour unless it turns into an intrinsic reinforcer. Wanting to please the owner will be intrinsic. Can be the same with people. Use an external reinforcer to pair ourselves with it. But we need stimulus control for behaviour change. The best way is to have good rapport, then you have influence. Influence can become stimulus control.Cathys dog appears to be aggressive toward other animals, including dogs. Without knowing the learning history, as she is a rescue dog, it is difficult to understand the behaviour fully. There was a time when people thought that removing the fear of water out of someone was best done by throwing them in the pool. There are still misconceptions around de-sensitization.The first step is rapport. Very often we teach some foundational behaviours first, before a desensitization technique. Cathys dog Clara, it can be hard to de-stimulate her. People can actually be more reactive to the suggestion of the object of fear.People who are afraid of dogs, can become very reactive to hearing the word dog or hearing the dog bark in the distance. Whereas they can look at a picture of a dog and say its cute. The anticipation can create more anxiety than the object itself. Not to say that an aggressive dog wouldnt bring on a huge attack of fear. The suggestion of the dog on a more regular basis can create more reactivity.You dont want to mix up typical behaviour with the challenging behaviour that is so antisocial. You know what the stimulus is for Clara - its another dog. Youve been building rapport with her and gaining some control. Provide non-contingent reinforcement meaning she doesnt have to do anything in return. Caring, generosity, attention, eye contact, smiles, compliments, interest in who they are. The other one is pair yourself with primary reinforcers  food, warmth, all the good things in life. Anyone who cannot build rapport, cannot teach, and then you have no control over stimuli.The next is to understand that labels or suggestions can activate the behaviour. If she is easily overstimulated, you need to get control over that first. Otherwise she cant hear what you are trying to teach. Cathy is now pairing de-stimulation with a command. She is teaching Clara some regulation, but really they are tricks to perform. Without the intrinsic reinforce of how to self-soothe or calm. Tricks are different from habits. Feeling calm is a whole lot better than not feeling calm. Clara needs to learn a foundational behaviour of how to de-stimulate and regulate. Its different for everyone, is it poor waiting behaviour, low frustration tolerance, poor self-monitoring, poor self-regulating  any one of these behaviours can cause a person to become reactive in an environment where they feel threatened. We teach a lot of self-soothing and resilience. Resilience is the ability to have a set-back and be able to bring yourself back from it. Its tied to the self-soothing.Cathys been reinforcing successive approximations of behaviour with Clara and the dishwasher. Thats what she will be doing with desensitization. Any organism is an investment in relationship. Rescue animals are a special commitment.
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ASD and Life Skills - Stupid Is as Stupid Does

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