Lovaas Workshop Observation Essay
An Abstract for the Lovaas Workshop Observational Study
Objectives
Autism can be treated through behaviour modification, typically in the form of Applied Behavioural Analysis (ABA). ABA is the process of systematically applying interventions, based upon the principles of learning theory, to significantly improve social behaviours. The principles of ABA were adopted by Lovaas (1987) for his research, in which operant conditioning techniques were used to punish self-injury and reinforce the acquisition of language skills in autistic children.
Lovaas focused his approach on very young autistic children, below the age of 4 years, as they would be less likely to discriminate between environments and the treatment was more likely to have a bigger …show more content…
Video 1 featured an autistic boy named Valentine, being instructed by his teacher, to point to either a piece of black or white card. When Valentine pointed to the correct colour, he was infrequently given verbal praise. If he did not point or he became agitated, the teacher shouted at …show more content…
In video 2, the teacher was very successful as the autistic girl produced the desired response on every trial. However, in video 5, the teacher had little success, as in each trial, the girl failed to follow verbal instructions and had to be prompted by her mother.
Conclusions
The Lovaas approach is successful in videos 1 and 2 as both children produce the desired response. This supports Lovaas’ (1987) claims that reinforcement can be used to induce good behaviour in autistic children. However, this success is undermined by the procedure in video 5 as the child does not follow the teacher’s instructions. This may be due to this teacher using reinforcement differently. In video 2, the girl was given reinforcement immediately after conduct in the forms of food and verbal praise, which may indicate why this procedure was most successful. In video 1, Valentine’s correct behaviour was not always reinforced. In video 5, the girl was reinforced even on prompted trials, so no learning was taking
Objectives
Autism can be treated through behaviour modification, typically in the form of Applied Behavioural Analysis (ABA). ABA is the process of systematically applying interventions, based upon the principles of learning theory, to significantly improve social behaviours. The principles of ABA were adopted by Lovaas (1987) for his research, in which operant conditioning techniques were used to punish self-injury and reinforce the acquisition of language skills in autistic children.
Lovaas focused his approach on very young autistic children, below the age of 4 years, as they would be less likely to discriminate between environments and the treatment was more likely to have a bigger …show more content…
Video 1 featured an autistic boy named Valentine, being instructed by his teacher, to point to either a piece of black or white card. When Valentine pointed to the correct colour, he was infrequently given verbal praise. If he did not point or he became agitated, the teacher shouted at …show more content…
In video 2, the teacher was very successful as the autistic girl produced the desired response on every trial. However, in video 5, the teacher had little success, as in each trial, the girl failed to follow verbal instructions and had to be prompted by her mother.
Conclusions
The Lovaas approach is successful in videos 1 and 2 as both children produce the desired response. This supports Lovaas’ (1987) claims that reinforcement can be used to induce good behaviour in autistic children. However, this success is undermined by the procedure in video 5 as the child does not follow the teacher’s instructions. This may be due to this teacher using reinforcement differently. In video 2, the girl was given reinforcement immediately after conduct in the forms of food and verbal praise, which may indicate why this procedure was most successful. In video 1, Valentine’s correct behaviour was not always reinforced. In video 5, the girl was reinforced even on prompted trials, so no learning was taking