Danielle L. LaFrance’s scientific contributions

This chapter provides a comprehensive analysis of the strategies for teaching verbal behavior to children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). It explores the fundamental role of language and communication in human development with a focus on the functionality of verbal behavior. By breaking down verbal behavior into teachable units, such as mands, tacts, echoics, and intraverbals, the chapter underscores the necessity of a tailored, functional communication approach in the remediation of language delays and the fostering of an adequate communicative repertoire in children with autism.

The purpose of the current study was to extend the research on the possible role of verbal mediation in the establishment of comparative relations. We conducted four experiments in which 14 participants received conditional discrimination training with nonarbitrary and arbitrary stimuli, followed by derived comparative and transformation of function tests. Participants learned to select the smallest or biggest comparison across multiple exemplars in the presence of abstract samples. Next, participants learned to select arbitrary comparisons in the presence of contextual cues to establish a size ranking among comparisons. To assess verbal mediation during mutual and combinatorial entailment tests, participants were instructed to talk out loud. When they failed to perform correctly during derived relations tests, participants were trained to tact and intraverbally relate stimuli. The results suggest that relational training alone was not sufficient to establish comparative relations and that adult participants engaged in problem solving consistent with intraverbal bidirectional naming during emergent relations tests.