Discriminative Stimulus Social Skills Training: The Effects of Video-Based Exemplars of Teacher Requests on the Compliance of Students with Behavioral Disorders

Abstract

Virtually all social skills training (SST) regimens incorporate live or video modeling to effect gains in the targeted skills; there seems to be an implicit assumption that a behavioral model must be shown. The experimental literature to date has not investigated the effects of presenting video-based stimulus exemplars in the absence of video-based response models. In the present study two concurrent, yet independent, experiments evaluated the effectiveness of two SST regimens on the compliance of students with emotional and behavioral disorders. The first experiment represents the initial application of a video-based SST procedure, Discriminative Stimulus Social Skills Training (DS-SST). This intervention included multiple video-based exemplars of teacher requests within instruction designed to establish the requests as discriminative stimuli for individual responses that, collectively, were members of the response class, “compliance.” The second experiment evaluated the effectiveness of a novel, yet more traditional, SST approach on compliance. The Peer Assisted Social Skills Training (PA-SST) included peer modeling, imitation, role playing, and feedback/discussion and was included in the study as a nontechnological point of reference for DS-SST. Both experiments also evaluated the effects of treatment on on-task and talk-out behaviors. Results indicated a functional relation between DS-SST and compliance as well as on-task behaviors. The PA-SST experiment did not demonstrate a functional relation with compliance, but was associated with gains in on-task and a reduction in talk-out behaviors. A discussion is presented on the relationship between the DS-SST video-based elements and factors that promote generalization. Results also are related to the construct of stimulus control. Limitations and implications for future research are presented.