Anxiety can cause a multitude of negative effects within various facets of a child's life. Although academic skill-based and therapeutic interventions for reducing test and math anxiety are well-documented, limited research exists on brief, classroom-based techniques to alleviate test anxiety in real-world academic settings. This study investigated the effectiveness of a mindful deep breathing (MDB) exercise as an intervention to reduce test anxiety in middle school settings. Prior to a regularly schedule classroom math exam, 90 sixth graders were randomly assigned to either the MDB intervention or control (e.g. reading a book). Results showed that approximately 2 min of mindful deep breathing significantly decreased self-reported math test anxiety scores prior to the exam (d =.51). Practical implications and future directions are also discussed.

Individuals with ASD display deficits in social interaction and communication across multiple contexts, making social communication a primary intervention target in school and community-based settings. Social narratives (SN) are designed to be implemented easily and flexibly by numerous caregivers and interventionists, provided that correct training is given. However, research findings regarding the efficacy of SN have been mixed. Much previous research has used generic forms of SN, in which pictures are not individualized to the child and the setting in which change is desired. In addition, the presumed mechanism of change in most social narrative research has been that narratives are skill-building, thus resulting in long-term and persistent effects. However, little research has supported or examined that assumption. The present study examined the efficacy of SN presented via various delivery methods, including written narratives with generic pictures, written narratives with personalized pictures, and written narratives with personalized pictures plus role play. Brief experimental analysis followed by extended analysis facilitated an examination of whether SN resulted in rapid generalization, or may function more similarly to antecedent interventions, such as prompts. Findings with three children with ASD whose special education teacher implemented SN indicate that some degree of personalization is more effective than generic presentation of SN. While SN appeared to sometimes produce generalizable gains, such effects were neither immediate nor as strong as when SN was used immediately prior to observation. Implications and future directions are discussed.

The current study evaluated the effectiveness of individualized math‐to‐mastery (MTM) interventions, selected though brief experimental analysis (BEA), at increasing math fluency skills for three elementary‐aged females. As MTM has only been investigated as a multicomponent intervention, the present study utilized BEA to identify those specific components that led to math skills gains in the most efficient manner possible. BEA results indicated that for two of three participants only a partial MTM intervention was necessary to prompt fluency gains, while the entire intervention was the most effective for the third. During extended analysis all three participants displayed math skills gains above those seen during repeated baseline assessments. Results are discussed in terms of further refining MTM through BEA procedures so as to individually target math skill deficits by considering both intervention effectiveness and efficiency.

The current study evaluated the effects of the Look-Ask-Pick (LAP) mnemonic on the addition and subtraction of fraction skills of 3 general education sixth graders. Following identification of fraction skill deficits, participants were taught to add and subtract fractions with like denominators, unlike denominators where one divides evenly into the other, and unlike denominators where one does not divide evenly into the other. Using a concurrent multiple baseline across participants design, results indicated increases in both percent problems correct and digits correct per minute for all participants during the LAP intervention. Gains were also sustained at 3-week maintenance. Results are discussed in terms of extending previous LAP mnemonic usage.

Although past research has examined repeated reading (RR) and listening passage preview (LPP) in great detail, several issues related to their applied usage with individual students remain. Questions including the number of times students are required to engage with the instructional materials during treatment and tracking fluency gains on untrained probes become important during individualized intervention. In addition, most RR and LPP work has been conducted by school personnel during the academic year rather than by parents over the summer months. As such, the current study used brief experimental analysis to identify the most effective number of RR or LPP implementations for two second graders, which was then employed by each child's mother during the summer months. Progress monitoring included tracking fluency gains on untrained AIMSweb probes. Results indicated both increased correct words per minute during intervention and maintenance at 6-week follow-up and are discussed in terms of applied decision making for individual students.

This is the second study to investigate the clinical use of the Parent-Instruction Game with Youngsters (PIGGY) which is a structured observation system derived from the Dyadic Parent-Child Interaction Coding System II (DPICS-II; Eyberg, Bessmer, Newcomb, Edwards, & Robinson, 1994) and the Behavior Coding System (BCS; Forehand & McMahon, 1981). In a previous study, the PIGGY demonstrated strong reliability and validity as well as clinical utility (Hupp, Reitman, Forde, Shriver, & Kelley, 2008). The present study is a replication of the previous research on clinical utility by using the PIGGY to monitor changes in parent and child behavior during and after behavioral parent training.

The current data-based review encompasses 30 years of research involving parental use of time-out (TO). Although extensively researched for decades, parental usage of TO continues to vary widely across a number of procedural variables. As such, the current review provides descriptive data for 40 articles published between 1977 and 2007 along both participant-related and TO procedural variables. Although results indicate wide parental usage of TO as a behavior management strategy, the application of specific procedural variables remains diverse and often unable to be ascertained. Based on current data, the review also includes specific practitioner recommendations and cautions in easily accessible bulleted form related to parental use of TO.

Time-out (TO) has been, is, and in all likelihood, will remain one of the most widely applied interventions employed as consequence for childhood problem behavior. Although not singularly defined, collectively TO is viewed as procedure to decrease behavioral frequency (Gerhardt, Holmes, Alessandri, & Goodman, 1991; Shriver & Allen, 1996) through, a period of time in less reinforcing environment made contingent on (Brantner & Doherty, 1983, p. 87). As behavior change strategy, TO may produce variety of behavioral consequences including those that are both punishing (Brantner & Doherty, 1983; Shriver & Allen, 1996) and reinforcing (Plummer, Baer, & LeBlanc; 1977; Solnick, Rincover, & Peterson, 1977). In addition, Knoff (2009) describes the effects of TO on future behavior via its categorization as an accountability (pg. 6) employed to both decrease inappropriate behavior (i.e., punishment) while increasing (i.e., reinforcing) appropriate behavior. In this manner, TO is viewed as an educative technique designed to not only teach children what not to do, but also instruct in what to do and, therefore, serve an important role in well conceived programs addressing children's school-based behavior management. Regardless of behavioral consequence, in practice TO is not singular one-size-fits-all intervention, but rather an interconnected series of procedural variables (Turner & Watson, 1999). Such is contrasted with the empirical reality that most TO studies evaluate the sum effectiveness of the intervention (e.g., TO versus another intervention in the treatment of tantrums) rather than the contributions of individual procedural variables (e.g., component analyses of differing TO variables). As such, researchers and practitioners often conduct TO in different ways, leaving no formulation of variables available to guide appropriate implementation or make effective empirical comparison. Previous TO reviews provide some guidance regarding which variables should be included in TO, although they are complicated by some limitations. More specifically, both Harris (1985) and Wilson and Lyman (1982) discuss the implementation of important TO parameters and Turner and Watson (1999) provide practical guide outlining the use of TO in the schools. Complicating their interpretation and potentially limiting their utility in school-based settings is that these works are primarily theoretical, rather than empirical, in nature. That is, they discuss the how's of TO implementation (i.e., How one would go about using given procedural variable?), rather than the what's of TO usage (i.e., What TO parameters have been employed in previous TO research?). In addition, the most recent of these works was conducted 10 years ago (i.e., Turner & Watson) and although this signifies the longevity of TO research, it also indicates that new developments have yet to be incorporated into the research base. Regarding school-based usage, TO has been employed successfully with variety of child behavior problems across multiple educational settings. Although no doubt used in regular education programming, its application in special education (SPED) settings is without question (Ryan, Peterson, & Rozalski, 2007) and may provide more solid foundation from which to review previous school-based practice. Past study clearly indicates that TO is effective in the treatment of behavior problems including (but not limited to) aggression (Luiselli & Greenidge, 1982), disruption (Mace & Heller, 1990), noncompliance (Marlow, Tingstrom, Olmi, & Edwards, 1997), and tantrums (Taylor & Miller, 1997), although such work is often complicated as the important TO variables responsible for behavior improvement are frequently not outlined. This has limited the practical utility of previous TO study in that teachers and researchers may be unable to determine exactly how it was implemented, therefore, complicating efforts at classroom usage or further investigation. …

The present study evaluates the effectiveness of two time-out (TO) procedures in reducing escape-maintained noncompliance of 4 children. Noncompliant behavioral function was established via a functional assessment (FA), including indirect and direct descriptive procedures and brief confirmatory experimental analyses. Following FA, parents were taught to consequate noncompliance with two different TO procedures, one without and one with escape extinction following TO release. Although results indicate TO without escape extinction is effective in increasing compliance above baseline levels, more optimal levels of compliance were obtained for all 4 children when escape extinction was added to the TO procedures already in place. Results indicate efficacy of TO with escape extinction when applied to escape-maintained noncompliance and are discussed as an initial example of the successful application of TO to behaviors maintained by negative reinforcement.