title: An assessment of self-echoic behavior in young children.
abstract: In the behavioral literature, self-echoic behavior has been hypothesized to play an important role in, for example, emergent conditional discriminations (e.g., Lowenkron, 1991), emergent verbal operants (Horne & Lowe, 1996), and problem solving (Skinner, 1957). Although early behavioral intervention programs for children with autism emphasize the establishment of accurate echoic repertoires, the type of stimulus control that defines a self-echoic response is typically not addressed. We report the development of a self-echoic assessment procedure that was administered to children with and without autism spectrum disorders. Preliminary results indicated that a discrepancy between echoic and self-echoic repertoires was more likely to be present among participants with autism than among typically developing participants. Future research should evaluate the extent to which interventions to establish self-echoic responding might produce other collateral benefits.
authors.affiliation: Esch Behavior Consultants, Inc.
authors.forename: John W
authors.initials: JW
authors.lastname: Esch
authors.forename: Barbara E
authors.initials: BE
authors.lastname: Esch
authors.forename: Jordon D
authors.initials: JD
authors.lastname: McCart
authors.forename: Anna Ingeborg
authors.initials: AI
authors.lastname: Petursdottir