BCaBA Practice Exam

When using a token economy, what can a behavior analyst do to increase a learner's motivation to earn tokens?

Auction off the backup reinforcers by allowing the person who offers the most tokens for an item to have it.

A behavior analyst creates an intervention from their newly established treatment plan. After a couple weeks the client successfully learns to set the table for meal-time. Who will determine the social validity of this intervention?

Community members

A behavior analyst is collecting baseline data for a client's physical aggression. The client typically engages in physical aggression several times per day. For the past 3 days, however, the client has not engaged in physical aggression. What is the best course of action the behavior analyst could take at this time?

Continue to collect baseline data

Jerry takes part in short-distance sprint competitions. After walking up to the starting line, he must wait for the sound of a gunshot before he can start sprinting forward, or he will be disqualified. However, Jerry consistently sprints across the starting line before the sound of the gunshot, resulting in disqualification. With regards to starting to sprint, Jerry needs to work on:

None of the above (increasing his latency, decreasing his latency, decreasing his interresponse time.)

You hold up a plastic apple. Daniel says, "apple." Since Daniel can tact toy apples, we can also assume that he can:

None of the above (mand for toy apple, echo, "apple" after you say, "apple., and or pick up the toy apple after you ask him to.)

Which teaching method was created by Fred Keller in the 1960's

Personalized Systems of Instruction

Jill is a behavior analyst who works with the elderly in group homes. She receives a referral to work with a child diagnosed with autism and traumatic brain injury, but has never worked with a child or an individual diagnosed with traumatic brain injury before. Of the following options, what is the most appropriate course of action she could take?

Politely decline the referral.

A(n) __________ is a stimulus that, when present, means that a particular response will likely be reinforced. A(n) __________ is a stimulus that, when present, means that a particular response will likely be punished.

SD; SDP

Jillian is travelling to see the Eiffel Tower in France. She did not know how to speak French before she arrived there. When she arrives, she is taught to say, "Salut" when someone waves to her. Then, without being taught, she begins waving to people when they say, "Salut." What type of stimulus equivalence is this an example of?

Symmetry

It would be appropriate to conduct a functional analysis for which of the following behavior(s)?

Tantrums

ou are teaching a client how to make a call on their new cell phone. To make a call, your client will need to unlock his phone, dial the correct phone number, and press "Call". You are using a backwards chaining procedure to teach your client this skill. What would be the first thing YOU need to do?

Unlock your client's phone.

What is NOT a possible unwanted side effect of punishment?

Withholding reinforcement for a previously reinforced behavior may result in an unintended increase in that behavior.

When conducting a functional analysis, a behavior analyst should use a(n):

continuous schedule of reinforcement.

Jebb is a behavior analyst who works with a client named Brandon, who lives in a rural and poverty-stricken area. During a session with Brandon, his guardian says to Jebb, "Hey, I remember that you said that you enjoyed working on cars. Mine stopped working and I can't afford a mechanic right now. Could you take a look at it to see what is wrong?" What would be the most appropriate response for Jebb to give?

"I apologize. But according to the ethical code that I have to follow, I cannot work on your car since I already provide behavioral support services for your family."

How many data points should each phase of an alternating treatments experimental design have?

1

A grocery store manager is tracking how often a specific cashier says "thank you for shopping with us today." The manager tracks this behavior for 1 hour, which is broken up into four 15-minute intervals. During the first 15-minute interval, the cashier said "thank you for shopping with us today" 14 times. During the second 15-minute interval, the cashier said "thank you for shopping with us today" 26 times. The cashier did not say "thank you for shopping with us today" during the third or fourth intervals. What is the cashier's rate of saying "thank you for shopping with us today"?

40 instances per hour

Vick loves basketball. He wants to improve his free throw percentage so that he can make his high school's basketball team. On the first day, Vick took 10 free throw shots and made 60% of these shots. On the second day, Vick took 5 free throw shots and made 2 of them. On the final day, Vick took 10 free throw shots and made 80% of these shots. What is Vick's overall free throw percentage from these 3 days?

64%

Bill is tracking how much rain falls on his farm in a week. Every day at 8pm, Bill checks a bucket to see how much rain had fallen that day. He writes down how much rain is in the bucket, and then dumps it out. On Sunday, there was 1 inch of water in the bucket. On Monday, there was 0.5 inches of rain in the bucket. There was no precipitation in the bucket any of the other days that week. If Bill were using a cumulative record to track the amount of times he checked the precipitation, what number would the data be on at the end of Day 7?

7

An 11-year-old is having difficulty waking up on time in the morning for school, taking a shower, and preparing her school lunch. Her parents begin a rewards system where each day of the week she will receive a smiley-face sticker if she does all of her morning routine and an "X" if she does not complete all of them. If she has 5 smiley-face stickers by the end of the week, she gets to pick out a $10 item from a nearby store of her choice. They keep the chart on their daughter's bedroom wall that includes what behaviors are expected, what it will take to earn the reward, and when the reward will be delivered. What type of procedure did her parents use?

A contingency contract

Jennifer is having difficulty showing up to school on time, paying attention in class, and doing her homework. Her parents set up a rewards system where each day of the week she will receive a "+" if she does all 3 of these tasks and a "-" if she does not complete all of them. If she has 4 "+" marks by the end of the week, she receives $20 from her parents. The chart is kept on Jennifer's bedroom wall and includes what behaviors are expected, what it will take to earn the reward, and when the reward will be delivered. What type of procedure did her parents use?

A contingency contract

A behavior analyst holds up a candy bar and a stuffed animal and says, "Hey Spencer, which one do you want?"

A forced choice preference assessment

Which procedure would be most beneficial for determining whether or not a stimulus will function as a reinforcer?

A multiple schedule reinforcer assessment

An experimenter is analyzing the effects of 3 particular interventions on a single behavior of one person. After a steady baseline was achieved, the first intervention was introduced. When steady responding was achieved with this intervention over the course of 3 days, the experimenter returned to baseline by removing this intervention. After 5 days of steady baseline, the experimenter implemented the second intervention. The second intervention was conducted for 3 days before the experimenter withdrew this intervention and returned to baseline. After 4 days of steady baseline, the experimenter introduced the third intervention for 3 days. The third intervention lasted for 3 days before the experimenter withdrew it and returned to baseline. After 3 days of steady baseline, the experimenter re-introduced the first intervention. What kind of experimental design was the experimenter using?

A multiple treatment reversal design

You begin to work with an 8 year-old client by the name of Seth, your new client. His parents informed you in an interview of a few items that he prefers, but said that what he enjoys to play with is very limited. You decide that you will attempt to identify some new stimuli that will function as effective reinforcers for Seth. You consider several options and decide that ___________ is the LEAST effective method out of those you are considering for determining whether a particular stimulus will or will not function as a reinforcer for this client.

A multiple-stimuli preference assessment

A school teacher asks his student if she wants to read a comic book or magazine, while holding each item up to show her. His student chooses the magazine to read. Which type of preference assessment did the teacher conduct?

A paired-stimuli preference assessment

Your friend asks you if you want to hang out. You ask her if she wants to go to the beach or go to the movies. Which type of preference assessment did you conduct?

A paired-stimuli preference assessment

Of the following statements, which is NOT true regarding alternating treatments experimental designs?

A stable baseline is necessary before starting the intervention.

In order to identify a punishing stimulus that can be used during a punishment procedure, a BCBA® first presents items non-contingently to the client and records the number of times the client moves away from that particular item. This is an example of:

A stimulus avoidance punisher assessment

A behavior analyst is working with a client who swallows large items such as rocks, pencils, and cotton balls. Which experimental design(s) would be recommended for this target behavior?

An alternating treatments design

A client frequently attempts to elope in high-traffic areas such as parking lots. A behavior analyst determines that the client is eloping in high-traffic areas for attention. The behavior analyst implements a planned ignoring procedure. What is wrong with this scenario?

An extinction burst could result in serious injury or death, A functionally appropriate replacement behavior to gain attention should have been taught, and The behavior analyst is unlikely able to control all stimuli in the natural environment.

Miranda says, "Say elephant" to her daughter. Her daughter says, "Elephant". What is her daughter's verbal behavior an example of?

An intraverbal

How often should interobserver agreement (IOA) data be collected?

Around one-third of the time and at least once per experimental phase

You meet with the therapist that works with your shared client, Tony, each day. She voices that the token economy you previously established to assist in increasing Tony's motivation to perform tasks each day has begun to be less and less effective. What can you do to increase Tony's motivation to earn tokens?

Auction backup reinforcers; the learner who offers the most tokens for that particular item will earn it., Add a highly motivating item to the selection of backup reinforcers, and Increase the number of tokens required to "buy" the backup reinforcer.

Blaine is spending the weekend at his grandparents' house. Blaine's grandmother says, "First eat your salad, then you can have some candy." Which procedure did Blaine's grandmother use in this scenario?

Cannot determine - (High-probability request sequencing, contingency contract, and or The Premack Principle)

A client that works with therapists in a center politely asks his therapists to take him to the nearby playground around 30 times per day. However, it is only feasible to take him to the playground 2 times per day and the therapists are annoyed that he constantly asks them to take him. Which differential reinforcement procedure would be best to use for decreasing his "asking to go to the playground" behavior?

DRL

You enter your client's third-grade classroom to observe their behavior in an environment outside of the one you typically observe them in (their home). You notice the teacher is using a teaching style that involves teaching the students with a script and having them all answer with choral responding. You identify that it leaves her little room to deviate from her lesson plan, but is effective nonetheless. Which teaching method is the school teacher using?

Direct Instruction

What are the three different methods for determining the function of behavior in a functional behavior assessment?

Direct assessments, indirect assessments, and functional analyses

A child is learning to prepare his lunch independently. A therapist stands behind the child and follows the child's hand movements with her own hands, slowly increasing the distance between her hands and the child's hands as steps are completed correctly. If the child does a step incorrectly, the therapist is ready to use hand-over-hand prompting to help with the difficult steps.

Graduated guidance

A behavior analyst is using a partial-interval recording method to see if her client will sit down during class. Each interval is 5 minutes long and there are 12 total intervals.

If he never sat in his seat during the entire hour

A behavior analyst is using a whole-interval recording method to see if her client will stay in his seat the entire class. Each interval is 5 minutes long and there are 12 total intervals.

If he stayed in his seat for the entire hour.

What is the most appropriate response a behavior analyst could make when a learner responds incorrectly on a matching-to-sample trial?

Immediately remove the sample stimulus and comparison stimuli and start another trial.

Joe used to have very long hair, but recently shaved his head. Joe has a habit of jerking his head to clear his hair away from his face. Even though Joe got a haircut, he still jerks his head randomly throughout the day. His peers are starting to make fun of him. Therefore, Joe implements a procedure where if he catches himself jerking his head, he forces himself to do it 25 times in a row. Joe's intervention was successful. What type of intervention did Joe use?

Massed practice

A preschooler often headbutts her fellow classmates who sit next to her during circle sing-along time, resulting in her being taken away by the classroom assistant from the other children and the activity. It is determined that the headbutting behavior is escape-maintained. Which function-based intervention would likely be the most effective for reducing the headbutting behavior?

Non-contingent negative reinforcement

A behavior analyst is working with an adult who engages in self-injurious behavior. One day, the client's psychiatrist discontinues one of the client's medications and prescribes him a new one. Since this switch, the client's self-injurious behavior has tripled. What should the behavior analyst do?

None of the above (Tell the psychiatrist that the new medication is not working, Tell the psychiatrist that the old medication worked better than the new one, Refer the client to a new psychiatrist.)

A behavior analyst wants to decrease her adult client's offensive language toward others. The behavior is tracked at the client's group home during meal times and social times in the lounging area and the behavior analyst records 12 occurrences per hour during baseline conditions. The behavior analyst begins the intervention in the client's personal quarter's of the group home and the behavior occurs 3 time per hour on average there. Which of the following statements regarding the intervention is true?

None of the above (The intervention is not working, The intervention appears to be working but it should be extended to show the intervention itself was responsible for the behavior change, The intervention appears to be working.)

Dale is in second grade. He wants to prove that he is the smartest person in his class. His teacher wants the students to raise their hand after she asks a question, if they know the correct answer. Dave nearly always raises his hand while the teacher is in the middle of asking a question. With regards to Dale's hand raising behavior, he should work on:

None of the above (increasing his latency, decreasing his latency, decreasing his interresponse time.)

The teacher says, "Can I have everyone's attention please? If Jeremy gets 80% or better on this quiz, he will get a pizza tomorrow!" This is an example of:

None of the above - (A dependent group contingency, An interdependent group contingency, An independent group contingency)

Joey curses for attention. Of the following, which intervention option is functionally-appropriate?

None of the above - (Punishing all behaviors that are part of the same functional response class, Reinforcing appropriate responses that are part of a different functional response class than the target behavior, and or Providing reinforcement after the occurrence of the target behavior.)

Janice pulls into a parking lot. She reads a sign that says, "DO NOT PARK HERE." She decides to park in another parking lot instead. Janice's behavior is an example of:

None of the above - (rule-governed behavior, behavioral momentum, and a contingency contract.)

Which of the following is/are properties of an operational definition

Objective, Unambiguous, and Completeness

Jerry is a behavior analyst who is a veteran in the field of ABA. He has been using a procedure to teach his clients how to wash their hands for the past 20 years. Mallory is a recently certified behavior analyst who discovered a more beneficial way to teach clients how to wash their hands. Even though Jerry has been using the same method to teach hand washing for the past 20 years, he starts using Mallory's strategy instead because the data show it is more effective. What attitude of science does this describe?

Philosophic doubt

Wendy learns how to use polite manners in social interaction at home. She says "please" and "thank you" 100% of the time at home when asked to do so. However, she doesn't say "please" or "thank you" at school when asked to do so by her teachers. This is most likely due to:

Poor stimulus generalization

Which teaching procedure is most associated with Standard Celeration Charts?

Precision teaching

A behavior analyst is teaching her client to exchange coins and bills for monetary transactions. This is a necessary skills for most learners and is one that her client could use as she plans to volunteer at the school library during the upcoming book fair to sell school supplies and library books to her fellow students. The behavior analyst first teaches her client how to exchange bills only in a training room that is adjacent to the library. The behavior analyst has some of her client's actual schoolmates come into the training room to see if she will exchange currency with them, prior to having her do so independently during the book fair. Which method of stimulus generalization is being used in this scenario?

Programming common stimuli

Sally is a behavior analyst. She is trying to decrease her client's purposeful fire-alarm-pulling behavior. It has been determined that the fire-alarm-pulling is maintained by attention. Of the following options, what is the most effective way Sally can help decrease her client's frequency of fire-alarm-pulling?

Provide a dense schedule of reinforcement for all appropriate responses that are in the same functional response class as the fire-alarm-pulling.

You are the supervising behavior analyst working with a behavior therapist and your shared client. During supervision, you notice that the therapist implements one of your interventions with a minor mistake, but does so consistently. You reread the intervention you wrote and confirm that you are correct. How should your corrective feedback be given?

Provide immediate praise for the parts of the performance that were correct. At a later time, and before her next opportunity to perform the intervention, address the minor flaw and describe what actions she can take to perform better next time.

Your client broke her collarbone last month. Her doctor prescribed her a pain medication to help her manage the pain. The label on the bottle says that she is supposed to take 2 pills at 8:00am each day. However, your client wants to discontinue taking the medication. As a behavior analyst, what is likely the best course of action you could take in this situation?

Recommend that your client take 2 pills per day at 8:00am until her doctor instructs her otherwise.

A behavior analyst identifies that her client Susan throws rolled up paper balls at classmates to get their attention. She then creates a replacement behavior that serves the same function, instructs the teacher and classroom aide on the replacement behavior as well as the created function-based operational definition so that they can record how frequently Susan utilizes this new replacement behavior. What would be a function-based operational definition for gaining a peer's attention?

Saying, "Hello", waving, tapping on a peer's shoulder, or any other behavior that results in gaining eye contact from a peer

A student belches loudly in class. A behavior analyst determines that he belches loudly because he has a history of receiving attention from his peers. What is a function-based replacement behavior for belching loudly in class?

Saying, "Would you like to play a board game with me?", Telling dirty jokes and or Passing gas loudly during class

A token economy would work best for which of the following behaviors?

Teaching a child to ask his teacher to use the restroom before leaving the classroom every time (instead of only asking his teacher only half of the time)

Today is a basketball coach's first day coaching a new team. He hears a player curse during the first minute of practice. He wants to let the team know that kind of behavior is unacceptable so he tells that player to do 30 pushups. The player never cursed again in practice. What is wrong with this scenario?

The coach should have tried reinforcement procedures prior to using punishment procedures.

What is the ultimate goal of intraverbal training?

The intraverbal becomes evoked by a verbal stimulus and is reinforced with generalized conditioned reinforcers.

What is the ultimate goal of tact training?

The tact becomes evoked by a nonverbal stimulus and is reinforced by generalized conditioned reinforcement.

During the contingent attention phase of a functional analysis, what should a therapist do prior to the target behavior occurring?

The therapist should be in the same room but withhold attention by engaging in an activity such as drawing a picture.

When using Personalized System of Instruction (PSI) procedures, what is the lecture-time of the class primarily used for?

To demonstrate skills and help motivate the students

What is the main purpose of collecting interobserver agreement data?

To increase the believability of data

You see a behavior therapist working with her client throughout the day teaching him to respond to greetings with a "Hi" or similar message. The therapist greets him first in the morning saying, "Hi, pal!" at the clinics entrance. She then makes a point to say, "Hey there!" to him when she returns to the play area after a bathroom break. The final time you see the therapist is near the end of the day when she returns from a quick conversation with her supervisor and returns to her client in the table work area saying, "Hello!" to her client. Which method is MOST likely being used by the therapist to promote stimulus generalization that involves changing non-critical aspects of the target Sd so that the response occurs under multiple stimulus conditions?

Training loosely

When presented with a picture of a guitar, the learner is taught to say, "guitar." When presented with the word, "guitar", the learner is taught to write the word, G-U-I-T-A-R. Without prior training, the learner sees a picture of a guitar and writes down the written word, G-U-I-T-A-R. What type of stimulus equivalence is this? Correct answer: B)

Transitivity

A dog is watching a movie filled with other animals with its owner. When a dog appears on the television screen and begins to stand on its hind legs so too does the pet dog. In this example, the dog movie star on screen serves as a(n) ___________ and the pet dog serves as a(n) ____________.

Unplanned model; imitator

Which reinforcement schedules are characterized as NOT having a post-reinforcement pause?

Variable-ratio and variable-interval

A behavior analyst begins working with a client who has several target behaviors. Which one of his problem behaviors would be considered the MOST important to address immediately?

Visual self-stimulatory behavior of looking up at the ceiling lights. He engages in this behavior 4 hours per day, on average, and it gets in the way of him interacting with peers and performing tasks at home and school.

A child pinches his mother because he has a history of gaining his mother's attention for this behavior. A behavior analyst wants to teach the child how to appropriately gain his mother's attention. What is a functionally-appropriate replacement behavior that a behavior analyst could teach Eric, using a DRI procedure?

Waving to his mother from across the room.

You are working with your new 7-year-old client, Ryan, who has two aggressive behaviors and a significant deficit in requesting for help when necessary. His guardian expressed that they would like to make these 3 behaviors the current main focus for services. When will you know that a targeted behavior no longer needs to be treated with an intervention?

When the target behavior occurs at a frequency that is similar to the client's typically developing peers

A cumulative record would be most appropriate to use for tracking which of the following behaviors?

Whether or not an employee goes to work each day he was supposed to

You are a swimming coach. You want to increase the amount of time that Quinton, a swimmer on your team, can hold his breath underwater. Which measurement procedure would be the best to use in this scenario?

Whole-interval recording

You are visiting an old friend, who is also a behavior analyst. He is conducting research in an attempt to discover a new intervention technique to use with people who are diagnosed with Prader-Willi Syndrome. He asks you to take some treatment integrity data on his supervisees. You are trained at collecting treatment integrity data. However, you are not trained in working with individuals who are diagnosed with Prader-Willi Syndrome. Could you collect treatment integrity data in this situation?

Yes

Albert has a dog named, Buster. One day Albert was driving his pickup truck and Buster was sitting in the passenger seat. Albert turned on his blinker and then took a sharp turn. Buster accidentally bumped on the dashboard. Now, whenever Buster hears Albert turn on the turn signal, he lays down on the floor board and shakes/whines. In this scenario, the sound of the blinker is:

a conditioned punisher.

A tree falling in the woods and you are the only person to hear it, is what?

a private event

A therapist has just begun working with a child named Jenson. She wants to determine what Jenson likes to do for fun. She walks with him to the play area of the clinic and he gains access to dozens of toys and different activities. Jenson begins playing with a picture book with buttons that make sounds. He plays with the book for an entire hour. In this scenario, we can confirm that the book is:

a stimulus

A baseline phase is not necessary for

alternating treatment designs.

A behavior analyst is considering two different interventions that may work well for her 12-year-old client's severe self-injurious head-banging behavior on hard surfaces. However, she doesn't have enough time to collect baseline data due to the safety concern of her client. Her client needs an intervention immediately. The best experimental design for her to use would be:

an alternating treatments design.

Lora is in the car with her daughter. She says, "Repeat after me. A, B, C, D, E, F, G." Her daughter says, "Repeat after me. A, C, B, D, E, F, G." Her daughter's verbal behavior is an example of:

an intraverbal.

If a target behavior occurs at high rates during the play condition of a functional assessment, the behavior's function is likely:

automatic.

In a token economy, tokens can be exchanged for:

backup reinforcers, conditioned reinforcers, and unconditioned reinforcers.

A multiple probe design may be preferred over a traditional multiple baseline design because:

baseline data does not have to be continuously collected.

You begin writing behavioral interventions and a treatment plan for your client Benny. You are certain you would like to implement your interventions with Benny. When should you obtain consent from a guardian?

before changing an intervention goal.

A changing criterion experimental design would be MOST beneficial for:

helping a client reduce his echolalia.

Travis, a behavior analyst, accepts a referral for a new client. Shortly after, he identifies that he will need to conduct a functional behavior assessment due to a frequent behavior that the parents would like reduced. What can the conducted functional behavior assessment tell Travis?

if a particular intervention is effective, which interventions could worsen the target behavior, and the function of the target behavior.

Donald had four hours to complete his BCBA® exam, which included 160 questions. Donald finished the exam in 14 minutes. He broke a record for the quickest exam time ever (and also broke the record for the worst exam score of all time). With regards to recording an answer on the test, next time Donald takes the test he should work on:

increasing his interresponse time.

Reversing an intervention will not result in a reduction in skills for behaviors that cannot be "unlearned."Reversing an effective intervention is not always practical in applied settings Reversing an effective intervention can be dangerous and unethical under certain circumstances. These are what?

limitations of a reversal experimental design

You are visually analyzing a graph. You can calculate a behavior's LEVEL using the ___________ of the behavioral data.

mean and median

Partial-interval recording tends to _________ the duration of a behavior.

overestimate

A teacher requests the use of a behavior analyst because her 8-year-old student, Billy, has severe aggressive behavior of destroying classroom property. The behavior analyst decides to conduct a functional analysis. During what conditions should the behavior analyst provide attention before the target behavior occurs?

play condition and escape conditions.

A manager at an office scolds a worker's cellphone use. This scolding resulted in the worker never using his cellphone at work again. During the worker's lunch break, the worker asks his coworkers, "Wasn't it funny how upset Mr. ToughGuy got when I took a call?" All of his coworkers thought it was hilarious and said he should start doing comedy shows down at the theater as his new job.

positive punisher.

You are a behavior analyst who is monitoring treatment integrity. You notice that your supervisee seems nervous and he begins to collect data inaccurately. Which of the following factors is most likely impacting the reliability of a data collection procedure?

reactivity.

Personalized System of Instruction is beneficial because:

students learn at their own pace, which may reduce frustration for some students.

Tiffany's mother hands her a picture of a giraffe. Tiffany says, "Giraffe." Later on in the day, Tiffany's mother says, "Giraffe." Tiffany hands her the picture of a giraffe. This is an example of:

symmetry.

Unwanted side effects of punishment include all of the following, EXCEPT:

the person learns different ways to access the reinforcement.

Partial-interval recording tends to _________ the rate of a behavior.

underestimate

Whole-interval recording tends to _________ the duration of a behavior.

underestimate