Presession attention affects the acquisition of tacts and intraverbals

This study examined the effects of presession attention on the acquisition of tacts (Experiment 1) and intraverbals (Experiment 2) in children diagnosed with autism. Each participant experienced 3 conditions. In the first 2 conditions, participants experienced a 15-min interval of either presession attention (PA) or no presession attention (NPA) followed by a teaching session. The third condition was a control condition. Across experiments, all participants acquired the verbal operants assigned to the NPA condition, whereas only 4 of the 6 participants acquired the verbal operants assigned to the PA condition. Five of the 6 participants required fewer sessions to meet the mastery criterion and a shorter duration of training for the verbal operants assigned to the NPA condition as compared to the PA condition. These outcomes suggest that antecedent manipulations traditionally reserved for mand training can positively affect the acquisition of other verbal operants. Theoretical implications are discussed.