title: Examination of the relation between an assessment of skills and performance on auditory-visual conditional discriminations for children with autism spectrum disorder.
abstract: The current investigation evaluated repertoires that may be related to performance on auditory-to-visual conditional discrimination training with 9 students who had been diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder. The skills included in the assessment were matching, imitation, scanning, an auditory discrimination, and a visual discrimination. The results of the skills assessment showed that 4 participants failed to demonstrate mastery of at least 1 of the skills. We compared the outcomes of the assessment to the results of auditory-visual conditional discrimination training and found that training outcomes were related to the assessment outcomes for 7 of the 9 participants. One participant who did not demonstrate mastery of all assessment skills subsequently learned several conditional discriminations when blocked training trials were conducted. Another participant who did not demonstrate mastery of the auditory discrimination skill subsequently acquired conditional discriminations in 1 of the training conditions. We discuss the implications of the assessment for practice and suggest additional areas of research on this topic.
authors.affiliation: University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
authors.forename: Tiffany
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kodak
authors.forename: Andrea
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Clements
authors.forename: Amber R
authors.initials: AR
authors.lastname: Paden
authors.forename: Brittany
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: LeBlanc
authors.forename: Joslyn
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Mintz
authors.forename: Karen A
authors.initials: KA
authors.lastname: Toussaint
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology; D001307:Auditory Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D000067877:Autism Spectrum Disorder / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000523:psychology / Q000534:rehabilitation; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D004193:Discrimination Learning / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007062:Identification, Psychological; D007100:Imitative Behavior; D008297:Male; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000502:physiology*; D012054:Reinforcement, Psychology; D014796:Visual Perception / Q000502:physiology*
keywords: autism spectrum disorder; brief experimental analysis; conditional discrimination; skills assessment