Equivalence Class Formation in Individuals With Autism: Predictions From ABLA-R Levels
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Equivalence Class Formation in Individuals With Autism: Predictions From ABLA-R Levels Larissa Bezerra de Melo Wider 1 & Romariz da Silva Barros 2 & André A. B. Varella 1,3 # Association for Behavior Analysis International 2020
Abstract Children who are diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) often fail to show equivalence class formation. This may be related to their difficulty in learning the programmed baseline conditional discriminations. The present study investigated equivalence class formation after training visual identity-matching performance with auditory class-specific consequences in 6 individuals who were diagnosed with ASD and who achieved different levels (Levels 4, 5, and 6) on the Assessment of Basic Learning Abilities–Revised (ABLA-R). The potentially emergent relations were all arbitrary (relations between completely dissimilar stimuli): visual–visual (AB and BA) and auditory–visual (SA and SB). None of the participants who achieved ABLA-R Level 4 or 5 responded in accord with equivalence class formation. They did not present any emergent arbitrary conditional relations (either visual–visual relations or auditory–visual relations). Only participants who achieved ABLA-R Level 6 demonstrated equivalence class formation. These findings are consistent with the predictive ability of the ABLA-R with regard to the acquisition of discriminations and to the emergence of the same type of conditional relations and the same hierarchy of complexity. Keywords ABLA-R . Autism spectrum disorder . Conditional discrimination . Derived
relational responding . Equivalence relations
This study is based on a thesis submitted by the first author under the supervision of the third author to the Programa de Pós-Graduação em Psicologia at the Universidade Católica Dom Bosco. The manuscript preparation was supported by Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq; Process 465686/2014-1). André A. B. Varella contributed to the study’s conception and design. Material preparation and data collection were performed by Larissa Bezerra de Melo Wider. Data analysis was performed by Larissa Bezerra de Melo Wider and André A. B. Varella. The first draft of the manuscript was written by André A. B. Varella, and Romariz da Silva Barros reviewed and commented on subsequent versions. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
* André A. B. Varella [email protected] Extended author information available on the last page of the article
The Analysis of Verbal Behavior
Equivalence relations have been the subject of experimental investigations since the seminal article by Sidman (1971). Sidman and Tailby (1982) operationally defined equivalence relations as stimulus relations with the properties of reflexivity, symmetry, and transitivity. In general, after teaching arbitrary conditional relations via matchingto-sample (MTS) tasks, such properties are inferred when novel (emergent, recombining) conditional discriminations are verified. The term arbitrary relations refers to relations betwee
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