The use of reinforcement schedules for students with disabilities

For more than half a century reinforcement schedules have been used as a form of behavior modification for children with autism. The purpose of this study was to research the effects of a reinforcement schedule to increase the time-on-task behavior demonstrated by a student diagnosed with emotional/behavioral disorders. The student in this study is a six year-old male diagnosed with emotional/behavioral disorders. This student engaged in off-task behaviors such as playing with any available objects, talking to himself and other students, and daydreaming. The participant also demonstrated low levels of confidence and self-motivation. The reinforcement schedule was used to decrease his off-task behaviors and increase his self-motivation skills. When the reinforcement schedule was successfully completed, the absence of off-task behaviors was followed by reinforcers. Data were collected using an ABAB reversal design in order to analyze the effectiveness of the reinforcement schedule. The off-task behaviors were reduced substantially. The results of this study suggest that the particular reinforcement schedule used for this study was successful. The results are discussed in terms of the features critical to the success of this reinforcement schedule.