Subjects completed a baseline stimulus matching procedure designed to produce two symmetrical stimulus relations; A1-B1 and A2-B2 There has been considerable recent interest in developing behavior analytic "implicit" tests for assessing histories of relational responding and stimulus relations during a subject's social history may interfere with the formation of novel stimulus as a seminal study, Watt, Keenan, Barnes, and Cairns (1991) used a simple stimulus
The recently developed Function Acquisition Speed Test (FAST) represents an effort to assess the relative strength of stimulus relations by traditional behavior-analytic means (i.e., acquisition curves). The current study was the first application of the FAST to the assessment of natural, preexperimentally established stimulus relations. Specifically, this experiment assessed the sensitivity of the FAST to pervasive gender stereotypes of men as stereotypically Bmasculine(e.g., dominant or competitive) and women as stereotypically Bfeminine^(e.g., nurturing or gentle). Thirty participants completed a FAST procedure consisting of two testing blocks. In one block, functional response classes were established between classes of stimuli assumed to be stereotype-consistent (i.e., men-masculine and women-feminine), and in the other, between classes of stimuli assumed to be stereotypeinconsistent (i.e., men-feminine and women-masculine). Differences in the rate of class acquisition across the two blocks were quantified using cumulative record-type scoring procedures plotting correct responses as a function of time. Acquisition rates were significantly faster (i.e., displayed steeper learning curves) for the stereotype-consistent relative to the stereotype-inconsistent block. Corroborating stereotypes were observed on an Implicit Association Test containing identical stimuli.
Background
The development of implicit tests for measuring biases and behavioral predispositions is a recent development within psychology. While such tests are usually researched within a social-cognitive paradigm, behavioral researchers have also begun to view these tests as potential tests of conditioning histories, including in the sexual domain.
Objective
The objective of this paper is to illustrate the utility of a behavioral approach to implicit testing and means by which implicit tests can be built to the standards of behavioral psychologists.
Design
Research findings illustrating the short history of implicit testing within the experimental analysis of behavior are reviewed. Relevant parallel and overlapping research findings from the field of social cognition and on the Implicit Association Test are also outlined.
Results
New preliminary data obtained with both normal and sex offender populations are described in order to illustrate how behavior-analytically conceived implicit tests may have potential as investigative tools for assessing histories of sexual arousal conditioning and derived stimulus associations.
Conclusion
It is concluded that popular implicit tests are likely sensitive to conditioned and derived stimulus associations in the history of the test-taker rather than ‘unconscious cognitions’, per se.
This report describes the development of the first national undergraduate interprofessional standardised curriculum in chronic disease prevention for healthcare professionals in the Republic of Ireland. This project brought together for the first time all higher education institutions nationwide in a novel collaboration with the national health service i.e. the Health Service Executive (HSE), to develop a standardised national curriculum for undergraduate health care professions. The curriculum sits within the framework of Making Every Contact Count (Health Service Executive, 2016), the goal of which is to re-orientate health services to embed the ethos of prevention through lifestyle behaviour change as part of the routine care of health professionals. The core focus of Making Every Contact Count is chronic disease prevention, targeting four main lifestyle risk factors for chronic disease; tobacco use, alcohol consumption, physical inactivity and unhealthy eating.Making Every Contact Count is a key component of Healthy Ireland, the Irish national framework for health and wellbeing (Department of Health, 2013). The aim of the curriculum is to prepare newly qualified health professionals with the skills needed to support patients to achieve lifestyle behaviour change delivered as part of routine clinical care.
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