Examining the Effects of Behavioral Skills Training on Social Praise Delivery in Malaysian Classrooms

Abstract

Abstract Malaysia launched the Inclusive Education Program (IEP) in 1997 to integrate students with special needs into mainstream classrooms and local researchers have recently asserted that more training is necessary for Malaysian teachers to effectively work with IEP students. The purposes of this research, therefore, were to (1) introduce the use of social praise via behavioral skills training (BST) to teachers of students in IEP, (2) increase the use of social praise by teachers of students in IEP via written feedback provided by the experimenter following each post-BST classroom session; and (3) increase the likelihood of individually selected target behavior in students who attend IEP. A multiple-baseline across four teacher-student dyads was conducted. Results indicated that BST and written feedback were effective in increasing the frequency (converted to responses per minute) of social praise issued by all four teachers and that collateral effects were seen by an increase in target behaviors for two out of four student participants. A posttreatment social validity survey completed by teacher participants indicated that the BST goals, procedures, and outcomes were practical and important.