Advisor(s)

Cammarie Johnson

Contributor(s)

Paula Braga-Kenyon, William Dube

Date of Award

2012

Date Accepted

5-2012

Degree Grantor

Northeastern University

Degree Level

M.S.

Degree Name

Master of Applied Behavior Analysis

Department or Academic Unit

Bouve College of Health Sciences, Department of Counseling and Applied Educational Psychology

Keywords

psychology, behavioral sciences, reinforcers, stimulus equivalence, class members, class-specific reinforcement

Disciplines

Psychology

Abstract

In this systematic replication of Meleshkevich (2007), a typically-developing adult was taught two separate, non-overlapping sets of conditional discrimination baselines (AC, BC; and DF, EF) with common class-specific reinforcers (e.g., A1-C1-Reinforcer1 [R1], A2-C2-R2...; D1-F1-R1, D2-F2-R2...) in PowerPoint® using a match-to-sample format. Performances on unreinforced tests for emergent relations between stimuli from the separate baselines met criterion (at least 16/18 correct), indicating that the separately established equivalence classes had merged to include all conditional and discriminative stimuli associated with particular reinforcers (e.g., A1, B1, D1, F1; A2, B2, D2, F2). Further tests indicated that the class-specific reinforcers (e.g., R1 and R2), and unique stimulus features of the class-specific reinforcers (i.e., token color and name/logo of back-up reinforcer) were also class members. These data support Sidman's (2000) assertion that equivalence relations are comprised of "ordered pairs of all positive elements that participate in the contingency" (p. 128).

Document Type

Master's Thesis

Rights Information

copyright 2012

Rights Holder

Elizabeth S. Morrison


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