The current study investigated the effectiveness of stating and modeling contingencies in increasing food consumption for two children with food selectivity. Results suggested that stating and modeling a differential reinforcement (DR) contingency for food consumption was effective in increasing consumption of two target foods for one child, and stating and modeling a DR plus nonremoval of the spoon contingency was effective in increasing consumption of the remaining food for the first child and all target foods for the second child.

Previous research has concluded that presenting individuals with the opportunity to choose is a viable treatment for general escape-maintained behavior. Considering food refusal has been generally described as avoidant behavior, the present study aimed to evaluate the role of choice between non-preferred foods on the food consumption and problematic mealtime behavior of two children with food selectivity. Each participant was allowed to choose between four non-preferred foods in the choice condition and was not allowed to choose in the no-choice condition. Further, the role of choice as an antecedent manipulation in mediating the negative effects of escape extinction was evaluated when choice alone was demonstrated to be ineffective in increasing consumption. Results indicated that providing choices is an effective non-aversive intervention strategy in increasing the food consumption of individuals with food vi selectivity as well as advantageous in decreasing the negative side-effects of more intrusive consequence interventions when necessary to implement.

Mands for information (MFIs) play an important role in language development and are important for successfully acquiring new information from one's environment. Yet many individuals with autism do not acquire mands for information without direct teaching. Research has demonstrated effective procedures for teaching all "wh" forms, except for "why." This study investigated procedures to teach the MFI "why" under control of the establishing operation and examined the extent to which teaching resulted in generalization. The intervention was effective in establishing the MFI "why" for 3 children with autism, and generalization to novel scenarios occurred for all participants.Keywords Abolishing operations . Establishing operations . Mand for information . Why questions Mands for information (MFIs) are classified as behavior in the form of question asking that is under the control of an establishing operation (EO), the consequence being information related to the EO (Sundberg, Loeb, Hale, & Eigenheer, 2002). This behavior often occurs in the form of "wh" questions, though any topography can serve as an MFI (e.g., "tell me"; Ingvarsson & Hollobaugh, 2010). MFIs play an important role in language development (Chouinard, 2007), and many researchers (e.g., Sundberg et al., 2002) have stressed the importance of investigating effective procedures to teach this skill because MFI repertoires allow individuals to acquire unknown information about the environment. For example, asking "What's that?" may help an individual acquire new tacts (Lechago, Carr, Grow, Love, & Almason, 2010), and asking "How?" may allow an individual to navigate novel problems he or she encounters