Increase of speaking and listening behavior in children with minimal verbal repertoire via multiple exemplar instruction

Author(s)

Thais de Souza Mascotti

• Document type: Master's Dissertation
• Press: Bauru. 2019-09-09.
• Institution: Universidade Estadual Paulista (Unesp). Faculdade de Ciências. Bauru
• Defense date: 2019-08-19
• Advisor: Ana Cláudia Moreira Almeida Verdu

Abstract

Considering the need to delineate and to systematize verbal behavior teaching, the Multiple Exemplar Instruction (MEI) has been frequently applied as a teaching strategy for people with minimal verbal repertoire. The MEI consist in rotation on stimulus controls and different topographies responses, and it has the potential to integrate verbal operants. The present thesis conducted three studies. Study 01 presents a literature review with the descriptors "multiple exemplar instruction" OR "multiple exemplar training" in the Web of Science, Scopus, and Pubmed, without year restriction. The objective was to systematize the use of the terms Multiple Exemplar Instruction (MEI) and Multiple Exemplar Training (MET), and also to identify and to describe the MEI arrangements and their results. 65 publications were selected. The most used term was MET. The most frequent population in the studies with MEI were children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Children with other diagnoses needed few exposures to MEI. The approximations and distinctions between the terms MEI and MET in the literature were discussed. Study 02 presents a case study that evaluated the effects of MEI on the integration between listening and speaking operants and on performance variability in a child with Spectrum Disorder of Auditory Neuropathy (SDAN). The participant was seven years old, and he received unilateral cochlear implant (CI) at one year and four months ago. In the tests, the participant showed the highest percentages of correct responses to the trained words sets by MEI. However, this teaching did not guarantee the generalization to other stimulus sets, after listener training (only). The variability (approximation between the percentages of correct answers) between the listening, tacting and echoing operants, in the sets, was reduced, if compared pre and posttests. Finally, Study 03 presents a replication of Study 02, and it verified if participants with ASD would be achieved the same results of functional verbal interdependence and reduction of behavioral variability. Participated three children with eight, six and five years old. The results showed that listening training did not guarantee the emergence of speaker repertoires (echoic and tact), and was necessary the exposure to the MEI. In the MEI, there was an increase in the percentages of correct responses in tacting and echoing. A single exposure to MEI with a stimuli set did not produce the emergence of repertoires not taught directly to other sets, after listener training only. In the posttests and follow-up tests, the variability in percentages correct responses between listening, tact and echoic was maintained. Future studies may propose interventions with more MEI training for participants with ASD, and verify how many exposures necessary for the emergence of the speaker repertoire after of the listener training only. The role of the echoic operant in MEI as a facilitator for the emergence of tact was discussed. (AU)

• FAPESP's process: 17/14311-9 - Amplification of speaker and listener behavior in children with minimal verbal repertoire
• Grantee: Thais de Souza Mascotti
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Master