BCBA Exam (Board Certified Behavior Analyst) — All Questions

In a functional analysis, a child's self-injury occurs at high rates in the demand condition and at near-zero rates in the attention, alone, and play conditions. The most likely maintaining variable is

• a.escape from demands✓
• b.automatic reinforcement
• c.access to tangible items
• d.access to attention

In the analogue functional analysis described by Iwata and colleagues, the demand condition arranges escape from instructional tasks contingent on the target behavior. Elevated responding only there indicates negative reinforcement by escape. Attention would produce elevated responding in the attention condition, automatic reinforcement typically in the alone condition or across all conditions, and tangibles in a tangible condition, none of which appears here.

In a functional analysis, head banging occurs at similarly high rates in every condition, including the alone condition. This pattern most strongly suggests

• a.access to attention
• b.automatic reinforcement✓
• c.an ineffective play condition
• d.escape from demands

Iwata et al. interpreted high rates in the alone condition, or undifferentiated high rates across all conditions, as suggesting that the behavior is maintained independent of the social environment, that is, by automatic reinforcement. Escape and attention functions would produce higher rates in the demand or attention conditions than in the others. The play condition is a control, and a flat pattern across all conditions is not evidence that the control failed.

What is the purpose of the play condition in a standard functional analysis?

• a.Teaching the child a replacement play skill during the analysis
• b.Testing whether problem behavior is maintained by attention
• c.Serving as a control condition✓
• d.Testing whether problem behavior occurs in the absence of others

In the analogue functional analysis the play condition provides preferred items and noncontingent attention with no demands and no programmed consequences for the target behavior, so the motivating operations for social reinforcement are minimized. It is the comparison against which test conditions are judged. The attention and alone conditions are the tests for attention and for behavior in the absence of social stimulation, and teaching is not part of the analysis.

In one functional analysis condition, the therapist reads a magazine and delivers a brief statement of concern each time the target behavior occurs. This is the

• a.control (play) condition
• b.alone condition
• c.attention condition✓
• d.demand condition

Withholding attention by appearing busy, then giving brief attention contingent on the target behavior, tests whether attention reinforces it. The play condition gives attention freely and noncontingently, the demand condition presents tasks with escape contingent on the behavior, and the alone condition provides no social interaction at all.

Staff record, for each episode of aggression over two weeks, what happened just before and just after it in the natural setting. What is the chief limitation of this kind of assessment?

• a.It measures only behavior in the alone condition
• b.It is too slow to produce any usable data
• c.It shows correlation but not a functional relation✓
• d.It requires stopping all ongoing treatment

Antecedent-behavior-consequence recording is a descriptive assessment: it records events as they naturally occur, so it identifies correlations between the behavior and environmental events but cannot demonstrate that those events control the behavior, which requires manipulating them as a functional analysis does. It does not need treatment to stop, it produces usable data quickly, and it has no alone condition.

A behavior analyst gives a caregiver a questionnaire asking when, where, and why the child's problem behavior tends to occur. This is

• a.a descriptive assessment
• b.an indirect assessment✓
• c.a functional analysis
• d.a preference assessment

Indirect assessments gather information through interviews, checklists or rating scales rather than by observing behavior directly. A descriptive assessment observes behavior directly under natural conditions, and a functional analysis manipulates environmental variables. A preference assessment identifies preferred stimuli, not the circumstances of problem behavior.

In each trial, a learner is shown two items at once and allowed to choose one, and every item is eventually paired with every other item. This is

• a.a free-operant preference assessment
• b.a multiple-stimulus-without-replacement assessment
• c.a paired-stimulus preference assessment✓
• d.a single-stimulus preference assessment

Fisher and colleagues (1992) described presenting items in pairs, with each item paired with every other item, and ranking them by the percentage of trials chosen. The multiple-stimulus-without-replacement method presents an array and removes each selected item. The free-operant method gives open access to all items and records time engaged, and the single-stimulus method presents one item at a time.

A therapist lays out seven items, lets the learner choose one, and leaves the chosen item out of the array for the rest of the round, repeating until all items are chosen. This procedure is

• a.multiple-stimulus without replacement✓
• b.single-stimulus preference assessment
• c.paired-stimulus preference assessment
• d.free-operant preference assessment

DeLeon and Iwata (1996) described presenting an array and not replacing each selected item, producing a preference hierarchy in fewer trials than paired presentation. The paired-stimulus method presents two items at a time, the free-operant method measures time with freely available items, and the single-stimulus method presents one item per trial.

A learner often shows problem behavior when a preferred item is taken away. Which preference assessment avoids withdrawing items during the assessment?

• a.Paired-stimulus
• b.Free-operant assessment✓
• c.Multiple-stimulus without replacement
• d.Multiple-stimulus with replacement

In the free-operant preference assessment, all items are freely available throughout a brief session and the duration of engagement is recorded, so items are not removed; Roane and colleagues (1998) reported that it was associated with less problem behavior than a trial-based method. The paired-stimulus and both multiple-stimulus procedures involve presenting and removing items trial by trial.

A preference assessment ranks bubbles as a learner's top item. Before relying on bubbles in teaching, what does this result still need?

• a.The learner's verbal statement that bubbles are liked
• b.A second preference assessment by the same method
• c.A test of whether bubbles increase a target response✓
• d.Confirmation that bubbles were chosen on every trial

A preference assessment identifies stimuli that are likely to function as reinforcers, but only a reinforcer assessment, showing that making the item contingent on a response increases that response, demonstrates a reinforcement effect. Repeating the same assessment, self-report, or perfect selection all describe preference rather than reinforcing effectiveness.

A client's self-injury is dangerous to allow repeatedly. Which functional analysis variation limits exposure by ending each session after the first occurrence?

• a.Latency-based analysis✓
• b.Descriptive ABC analysis
• c.Paired-stimulus analysis
• d.Extended alone-condition analysis

Thomason-Sassi and colleagues (2011) evaluated measuring the latency to the first response and ending the session after it occurs, which reduces the number of responses per session while still producing interpretable functional analysis outcomes. An extended alone condition does not limit exposure, a descriptive analysis does not manipulate variables, and paired-stimulus is a preference assessment.

A teacher needs a functional analysis conducted within ordinary classroom routines rather than in long separate sessions. Which format was developed for this purpose?

• a.An extended analogue analysis
• b.A structured caregiver interview
• c.A latency-based functional analysis
• d.A trial-based functional analysis✓

Bloom and colleagues (2011) described a trial-based functional analysis, in which brief test and control segments are embedded into naturally occurring classroom activities. A latency-based analysis limits responses per session but still uses standard sessions. An extended analogue analysis is the opposite of what the teacher needs, and an interview is an indirect assessment, not an analysis.

In a functional analysis, a child's screaming occurs mainly in the condition where a favorite toy is removed and returned briefly after each scream. The results suggest the screaming is maintained by

• a.escape from demands
• b.attention from the therapist
• c.automatic reinforcement
• d.access to tangible items✓

In the tangible condition, a preferred item is withheld and delivered contingent on the target behavior; elevated responding there, and not in the others, indicates access to tangible items as the maintaining reinforcer. Escape and attention would produce elevated responding in the demand or attention conditions, and automatic reinforcement typically in the alone condition or across all conditions.

Which of the following is the best example of a behavioral cusp?

• a.Learning to read✓
• b.Touching the nose on request in therapy
• c.Sitting still during a single assessment
• d.Naming five colors on a flash-card drill

Rosales-Ruiz and Baer (1997) defined a behavioral cusp as a behavior change that brings the person into contact with new environments, reinforcers, contingencies and responses. Learning to read opens access to a large range of new contingencies. The other examples are useful discrete responses, but each is limited to a narrow context and does not by itself open access to new environments.

A proposed goal is for a child to keep eye contact with adults while being spoken to, but the family explains that in their culture children show respect by looking down when adults speak. The BCBA should

• a.drop the goal without discussing it with the family
• b.keep the goal, since eye contact aids learning
• c.review the goal with the family and revise it together✓
• d.keep the goal but reduce the required duration

The TCO calls for integrating relevant cultural variables in assessment and prioritizing client-informed, culturally responsive goals, and Code 2.09 requires involving clients and stakeholders in selecting goals. Keeping the goal disregards the family's values, and dropping it without discussion also fails to involve them; a collaborative review is what the standards describe.

A skills assessment reports whether a learner has met a fixed mastery standard on each of a set of skills, rather than comparing the learner with same-age peers. This is

• a.a preference assessment
• b.a norm-referenced assessment
• c.an indirect functional assessment
• d.a criterion-referenced assessment✓

Glaser (1963) distinguished criterion-referenced measures, which compare performance to an absolute standard, from norm-referenced measures, which compare an individual's performance with that of others. An indirect functional assessment identifies the function of problem behavior, and a preference assessment identifies preferred stimuli; neither assesses skill mastery.