Transcript Developing Appropriate Behavior with Fading

Changing the Control of
a Behavior with Fading
Chapter 9
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Fading
• Fading
– Gradual change over successive trials of a
stimulus that controls a response so that the
response eventually occurs to a partially
changed or completely new stimulus
– Process of slowly removing prompts after
behavior is established
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Fading
• Useful in a situation in which a stimulus exerts
strong control of a response to be taught to
occur to some other stimulus
• Advantages over trial and error procedures:
1. Errors consume time
2. If an error occurs, it tends to occur many times,
even though it is being extinguished
3. Nonreinforcement of errors (extinguishing of
errors) produces emotional side effects
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Dimensions of Stimuli for Fading
• Fading occurs along dimensions of
stimuli
• Dimension – any characteristic that can
be measured on some continuum
• Fading can occur across specific stimulus
dimensions and across changes in general
situation or setting
– Ex: physical structure of room; number of
other people present
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Factors Influencing the
Effectiveness of Fading
1. Choosing the final desired stimulus
(FDS)
– Stimulus that we want to evoke or produce
the behavior at the end of the fading
procedure
– Important to select FDS in whose presence
responding will be maintained in natural
environment
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Factors Influencing the
Effectiveness of Fading
2. Choosing the starting stimulus – prompt
– Stimulus that reliably evokes the desired behavior
– Teacher behavior as prompts
• Physical prompts/physical guidance – touching the learner to
guide him appropriately
• Gestural prompts – pointing, making motions without
touching, etc.
• Modeling prompts – demonstrating correct behavior
• Verbal prompts – verbal hints or cues
– Environmental alterations as prompts
• Altering the physical environment to evoke desired response
– Extra-stimulus vs. within-stimulus prompts
• Extra-stimulus – something that is added
• Within-stimulus – alterations to the SD or S∆ to make them
more noticeable and easier to discriminate
Copyright © 2011 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.
Factors Influencing the
Effectiveness of Fading
3. Choosing the fading steps:
– Should be chosen carefully
– Need to monitor performance to determine
the speed of fading
– If student begins making errors, prompts
may have been faded too quickly or with too
few steps
• May need to backtrack
Copyright © 2011 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.
Guidelines for Effective
Application of Fading
1. Choose final desired stimulus
2. Set an appropriate reinforcer
3. Choose the starting stimulus and fading
steps
4. Put plan into effect
Copyright © 2011 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.