The Effects of Noncontingent and Contingent Attention for Self-Injury, Manding, and Collateral Responses

Abstract

To date, most functional analysis studies have focused on the effects of treatment contingencies on specific targeted aberrant and altemative responses. In the current investigation, the main and collateral effects of the assessment and treatment of attention-maintained self-injury were assessed. Specifically, we evaluated the effects of noncontingent and contingent social attention on four categories of behavior: self-injury, a novel mand, preexisting prosocial responses (e.g., babbling and reaching out), and other aberrant responses (i.e., aggression and destruction). Results suggested that self-injury, prosocial responses, and other aberrant behaviors were within the same fmctional response class. Possible impact of these results when selecting mands for functional communication training is discussed.