Increases in social initiation toward an adolescent with autism: reciprocity effects

Level of spontaneous social initiating by three adult caregivers toward a youth with autism was studied during a program to increase the youth's level of social initiating. The adult participants were three staff members of a program for individuals with autism; they were assigned to the classroom of the youth participant, but none was directly involved in his educational program. Under a multiple-baseline across subject design, in combination with a multi-element design, the youth's social initiations toward each adult were systematically reinforced. Two sessions were conducted daily: one in which prompts, token reinforcers, and verbal praise for the youth's social behavior were presented (baseline and training sessions), and one in which prompts were absent and only verbal praise was presented (probe sessions). Frequency of spontaneous initiating toward the youth increased for each adult during treatment when the youth's frequency of initiating toward a given adult increased. It was higher during training vs. probe sessions, where level of social initiating by the youth was also higher.