Exploring effects of differential observing responses on vocal tact acquisition

Abstract

Two studies were conducted to explore the effects of differential observing responses (DORs) on vocal tact acquisition in preschool‐age children of typical development. In Study 1 with three participants, an identity‐matching DOR was incorporated into tact instruction trials with novel visual stimuli. Acquisition rates were similar in the DOR condition and in a non‐DOR condition. In Study 2 with five new participants, the identity‐matching DOR was implemented as an intervention when standard discrete‐trial instruction failed to produce acquisition of tacts of compound stimuli. Two participants reached mastery after the identity‐matching DOR was introduced, whereas three participants' progress was unaffected. For those three, the identity‐matching DOR was replaced with a verbal DOR (tacting of stimulus components), but although one participant's correct responding increased, none reached mastery. Two participants ultimately reached mastery after a non‐DOR intervention. Conditions under which DORs facilitate stimulus control outside of MTS tasks remain to be identified.

The classification and utility of the differential observing response.

“…Tacting DORs also have been used in studies designed to teach other response types. For example, Devine and Petursdottir (2022) used a tacting DOR with the goal of teaching names of figures with overlapping features (color and shape) after an identity-matching DOR (see below) failed to increase accuracy for some of the participants. The tacting DOR consisted of tacting the color and shape of the figure.…”

“…This response is consistent with what Skinner referred to as a tact, a verbal response evoked by a nonverbal stimulus (Skinner, 1957), hereafter referred to as a tacting DOR. Studies have used a tacting DOR across a variety of tasks, including delayed matching to sample (DMTS; e.g., Broomfield et al, 2008;Constantine & Sidman, 1975;Geren et al, 1997;Gutowski & Stromer, 2003;Gutowski et al, 1995), constructed response matching to sample (CRMTS; e.g., Tanji et al, 2013), sorting (e.g., Duarte & Baer, 1994;Fjellstrom et al, 1988), vocal tacting (e.g., Devine & Petursdottir, 2022), and observational learning (e.g., Blowers et al, 2021). Selected exemplar studies are discussed briefly in the following paragraphs to illustrate the procedures used in these studies.…”

“…A similar procedure was recently described by Devine and Petursdottir (2022), who compared an identity-matching DOR condition to a pointing observing response condition to evaluate vocal tact acquisition. In the DOR condition, the experimenter presented a slide with four stimuli and then handed the participant a card with a picture identical to the target stimulus.…”

“…To date, although only a few studies have used the term, DOR (e.g., Devine & Petursdottir, 2022;Dube & McIlvane, 1999;Kisamore et al, 2013), examples of this approach exist under other names. There have been many studies with procedures that served the same function, such as naming (e.g., Constantine & Sidman, 1975;Gutowski & Stromer, 2003;Gutowski et al, 1995), differential response (e.g., Glat et al, 1994), self-instruction (e.g., Duarte & Baer, 1994), orienting cue (Koegel et al, 1981), collateral response requirement (Petursdottir et al, 2014), and other remediation strategies that have not been given a categorical name (e.g., Stromer et al, 1996Stromer et al, , 1998.…”