Results of recent research have shown that noncontingent reinforcement (NCR) can be effective in reducing the frequency of behavior problems. In typical NCR applications, the reinforcer that is responsible for behavioral maintenance (as demonstrated through a functional analysis) no longer follows occurrences of the target behavior but instead is delivered according to a time-based schedule. Thus, it is unclear if NCR would be effective if the target behavior continued to be reinforced or if arbitrary reinforcers (i.e., those irrelevant to behavioral maintenance) were substituted for the maintaining reinforcers in the NCR procedure. In this study, 2 individuals whose self-injurious behavior (SIB) was maintained by positive reinforcement were exposed to conditions in which arbitrary and maintaining reinforcers were withheld and were delivered either contingently or noncontingently. Results indicated that noncontingent delivery of arbitrary reinforcers was effective in reducing SIB even though occurrences of SIB produced access to the maintaining reinforcer. These results suggest that (a) arbitrary reinforcers may sometimes be substituted for maintaining reinforcers, (b) an important component of NCR procedures is alteration of a behavior's establishing operation, and (c) NCR with arbitrary reinforcers might therefore be effective when maintaining reinforcers cannot be identified or withheld during the course of treatment.

The scatter plot is a commonly used assessment tool for identifying temporal patterns in the occurrence of behavior problems. However, the extent to which such patterns are frequently observed is unknown because little research has evaluated the general utility of the scatter plot. We conducted a large-scale analysis of within-and across-day occurrences of problem behavior by conducting continuous observations of 20 individuals living in four residential facilities. Data were recorded during 30-min intervals throughout participants' waking hours for 30 days by direct care staff and were converted into scatter plot formats. Five sets of data were excluded from further analysis due to poor interobserver agreement (below 80%). Visual analysis of the remaining 15 scatter plots indicated that none showed any reliable temporal pattern of responding. However, when the data were transformed into aggregate ''control charts'' based on statistical process control procedures, 12 of the 15 sets of data revealed one or more 30-min intervals during which problem behavior was more likely to occur. Results are discussed in terms of the practicality of applying statistical analyses to scatter plot data and of collecting data for the length of time needed to show statistical significance. It was concluded that detailed functional or descriptive analyses, which would reveal cause-effect or correlational relationships between behavior and specific environmental events, may be both more precise and more efficient forms of assessment.DESCRIPTORS: behavior problems, behavioral assessment, descriptive analysis, observation procedures, scatter plot, statistical process controlResearch on the treatment of severe behavior disorders conducted over the past 15 years has focused greater attention on the

Results of functional analyses for 36 individuals whose self-injurious behavior (SIB) was maintained by attention indicated that SIB was highest during a condition in which the individual was deprived of attention (establishing operation) except as a consequence (reinforcer). Deprivation in the absence of reinforcement produced marginal increases in SIB in 5 individuals, and a relatively rich schedule of noncontingent attention produced the lowest levels of SIB. These results suggest that clearer functional analysis outcomes are likely to be obtained when test conditions contain both an establishing operation to evoke behavior as well as a reinforcement contingency to maintain it.DESCRIPTORS: establishing operation, functional analysis, self-injurious behaviorResearch on the functional analysis of behavior disorders has shown an exceptional degree of generality across results from many studies in spite of significant variations in assessment methodology. Occasionally, however, it has been shown that certain test or control conditions, or even parametric variations within a given condition, can affect the outcome of a functional analysis. For example, Fisher, Piazza, and Chiang (1996) recently showed that duration of reinforcement can exert differential control over responding during assessment.In the methodology described by Iwata, Dorsey, Slifer, Bauman, and Richman (1982/1994), the test condition for a given behavioral function contains an establishing operation (Michael, 1982) to evoke behavior as well as a reinforcement contingency to maintain it. For example, as a test for attention-maintained behavior, the individual is deprived of attention (establishing operation) except as a consequence (reinforcer). The control condition contains neither the This research was supported in part by a grant from the Florida Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services.Reprints may be obtained from Brian A. Iwata, Psychology Department, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida 32611. establishing operation nor the reinforcement contingency: Attention is delivered frequently but on a response-independent basis. Another condition often included in the analysis is one in which the individual is observed while alone. Although designed as a test condition for behavioral maintenance in the absence of social consequences, the alone condition contains the establishing operation for attention-maintained behavior (deprivation from attention) but not the reinforcement contingency. In effect, for an individual whose behavior is maintained by attention, the alone condition amounts to extinction.Although both antecedent and consequent events may affect behavior during a functional analysis, their relative influence has not been studied extensively. In this study, we examined a large set of data for individuals whose self-injurious behavior (SIB) was maintained by attention. By comparing data from three conditions, we sought to determine the relative influence of (a) the establishing operation and reinforcement contingency (at...