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Using Shaping to Teach Eye Contact to Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

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Abstract

The current study used a shaping procedure to teach three preschool-aged children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder to make eye contact with the instructor for a duration of 3 s. Then, eye contact was taught during breaks in instruction. Following the initial intervention, the frequency of reinforcement was decreased while training for generalization across instructors and locations. All three children acquired quick and sustained eye contact, which maintained after 1 month without the need for prompting. This study provides an alternative method for teaching young children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder to make eye contact without the need for prompting; outlines an approach for teaching eye contact when baseline levels of eye contact are severely low and/or the child is actively avoiding eye contact; describes a successful method for thinning the schedule of reinforcement and introducing instructional demands; and recommends a practical technique for gaining attention before delivering an instructional demand.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Western Michigan University, 3740 Wood Hall, Kalamazoo, MI, 49008-5439, USA

    Amelia M. Fonger & Richard W. Malott

Authors
  1. Amelia M. Fonger
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  2. Richard W. Malott
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Amelia M. Fonger.

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Conflict of Interest

The authors declare they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical Approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Informed Consent

Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants in the study.

Additional information

This article is based on a dissertation in preparation by the first author, under the supervision of the second author, at Western Michigan University, in partial fulfillment for the requirements of the Doctorate in Applied Behavior Analysis.

This manuscript has not been previously published and has not been and will not be submitted elsewhere during the review process.

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Fonger, A.M., Malott, R.W. Using Shaping to Teach Eye Contact to Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder. Behav Analysis Practice 12, 216–221 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40617-018-0245-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40617-018-0245-9

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