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SELF‐STIMULATION AND LEARNING IN AUTISTIC CHILDREN: PHYSICAL OR FUNCTIONAL INCOMPATIBILITY? 1
Author(s) -
Klier Jolynn,
Harris Sandra L.
Publication year - 1977
Publication title -
journal of applied behavior analysis
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.1
H-Index - 76
eISSN - 1938-3703
pISSN - 0021-8855
DOI - 10.1901/jaba.1977.10-311
Subject(s) - stimulation , psychology , developmental psychology , autism , physical stimulation , task (project management) , audiology , cognitive psychology , neuroscience , medicine , management , economics
This study investigated whether an observed inverse relationship between self‐stimulation and learning in autistic children is due to a physical inability of the subject to use the same body part for self‐stimulation and task responding, or whether self‐stimulation “distracts” the subject from task responding. Four actively self‐stimulating autistic children were taught two discrimination tasks; one required a response that physically interferred with their self‐stimulation; the other did not. Results were: (a) all subjects responded similarly across both tasks; (b) the three subjects with higher mental age scores learned both tasks without external suppression of self‐stimulation; and (c) none of the subjects showed an inverse relationship between self‐stimulation and learning. The study demonstrated that elimination of self‐stimulation is not a necessary prerequisite for the acquisition of a new behavior in all autistic children.