ABAT Verbal Behavior 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: Autoclitics are verbal behaviors that:
- Function as mands for attention
- Modify the effects of other verbal behavior on listeners (Correct answer)
- Serve as prompts for echoic responses
- Replace nonverbal communication
Correct answer: Modify the effects of other verbal behavior on listeners
Autoclitics are secondary verbal operants that modify or qualify the effect of primary verbal behavior on the listener, such as negation, quantification, or relational statements.
Question 2: Which of the following is NOT one of Skinner's primary verbal operants?
- Mand
- Tact
- Prompt (Correct answer)
- Echoic
Correct answer: Prompt
A prompt is a teaching procedure used in ABA, not a verbal operant in Skinner's framework; the primary verbal operants are mand, tact, echoic, intraverbal, textual, and transcription.
Question 3: The reinforcement that typically maintains a tact is:
- Automatic positive reinforcement
- Generalized conditioned reinforcement from the verbal community (Correct answer)
- Specific reinforcement directly related to the stimulus named
- Escape from aversive stimulation
Correct answer: Generalized conditioned reinforcement from the verbal community
Tacts are maintained by generalized conditioned reinforcement (e.g., social praise, attention) provided by the verbal community rather than specific reinforcement tied to the item named.
Question 4: In Skinner's verbal behavior framework, 'listener behavior' refers to:
- The speaker listening to their own speech
- Private verbal behavior in the form of inner speech
- Behavior controlled by verbal stimuli produced by a speaker (Correct answer)
- Behaviors that maintain the speaker's verbal repertoire
Correct answer: Behavior controlled by verbal stimuli produced by a speaker
Listener behavior refers to the behavior of an organism that is under the discriminative control of verbal stimuli produced by another speaker, completing the verbal episode.
Question 5: Writing down spoken words (e.g., taking dictation) is an example of which verbal operant?
- Textual
- Echoic
- Transcription (Correct answer)
- Intraverbal
Correct answer: Transcription
Transcription involves writing or typing spoken verbal stimuli, with point-to-point correspondence between the spoken stimulus and the written response.
Question 6: Jack Michael's concept of the 'establishing operation' was later refined and renamed by Laraway et al. (2003) to:
- Discriminative stimulus
- Motivating operation (Correct answer)
- Conditioned motivating operation
- Abolishing operation
Correct answer: Motivating operation
Laraway et al. (2003) introduced the broader term 'motivating operation' to encompass both establishing operations (which increase behavior) and abolishing operations (which decrease behavior).
Question 7: When a speaker's verbal behavior affects their own subsequent behavior (e.g., making a list to remember items), this is described as the speaker acting as:
- An autoclitic responder
- Their own listener (Correct answer)
- An intraverbal controller
- A tact mediator
Correct answer: Their own listener
Skinner described 'speaker as own listener' to explain self-talk and private verbal behavior where one's verbal behavior controls one's own subsequent actions.
ABAT Verbal Behavior 2
Autoclitics are verbal behaviors that: