Token Economy for Children with Developmental Disabilities

Token Economy for Children with Developmental Disabilities
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Token Economy for Children with Developmental Disabilities
Introduction
Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) capitalizes on learning principles to enhance behaviors of societal relevance. The analyzed functional relationships between a behavior and the antecedents and consequences that affect its manifestation. According to Ryan (2011), ABA has demonstrated potentiality in catering to the requirements of children suffering from developmental impairments, especially autism spectrum disorder (ASD). This methodology is renowned for applying reinforcement and evidence-driven decision-making and is primarily adapted to assist children with ASD or related disorders. As Ryan (2011) indicates, ABA techniques involve breaking down skills into small, achievable steps and providing positive reinforcement to shape behaviors. One such technique is the token economy, which is a strategy that utilizes tokens as positive reinforcement to shape and sustain preferred behaviors. Tokens are symbolic substitutes for rewards that can be traded for commodities or services (Tan et al., 2022). Rooted in Skinner’s operant learning theory, it is deemed the benchmark behavioral intervention for ASD (Skinner, 1953). It can boost communication, societal, scholastic, self-care, and behavioral skills, enabling children to engage meaningfully at home, school, and community.
Strengths
In a study conducted by Cihon et al. (2018), the effectiveness of a token system with a flexible earning prerequisite was examined regarding increasing the incidence of comments during snack time for three children diagnosed with ASD. This study offers an initial assessment of the token system, also known as the "magic number", and its ability to enhance the frequency and diversity of comments made by three children with ASD during snack time. A nonconcurrent multiple-baseline design was employed over several weeks to monitor the children's progress. From an acceptability perspective, the study reports a social validity questionnaire that showed high satisfaction and preference for the token system among the participants, their teachers, and the parents. The results demonstrated that the flexible token system effectively elevated the comments rate and the cumulative number of novel comments. These findings indicate significant behavioral changes that enhance social communication skills. The detailed descriptions of the procedures, materials, and data collection account for the paper’s specificity. It includes graphs and tables that show each participant's data and the token system's overall effects on the rate and novelty of comments. Cihon et al. (2018) also highlight the potential of the token system for shaping other complex and socially significant behaviors. Besides, the focus on naturalistic settings suggests that the benefits of the token system extend to other contexts and situations. In a general sense, the paper demonstrates an understanding of its limitations, including the small sample size, absence of a control group, and reliance on a single setting and activ...