Date of Award

Fall 12-2008

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Psychology

Committee Chair

Joe Olmi

Committee Chair Department

Psychology

Committee Member 2

Brad A. Dufrene

Committee Member 2 Department

Psychology

Committee Member 3

Heather Sterling-Turner

Committee Member 3 Department

Psychology

Committee Member 4

Daniel H. Tingstrom

Committee Member 4 Department

Psychology

Committee Member 5

James T. Johnson

Abstract

The available literature on children's acceptability of interventions is rather sparse and offers little support for the link between acceptability and effectiveness (e.g., Foxx & Jones, 1978; Shapiro & Goldberg, 1986; Turco & Elliot, 1990). The present study compared the effects of treatment preference to treatment effectiveness using a brief experimental analysis to select skill-based oral reading fluency interventions. The use of a brief experimental analysis (BEA) (Daly, Martens, Hamler, Dool, & Eckert, 1999) has been demonstrated to be an effective procedure for selecting oral reading interventions. However, the studies on brief experimental analysis to date have not examined student acceptability of oral reading interventions. Three participants were selected based on deficits in oral reading fluency. A brief experimental analysis of four reading fluency interventions was conducted with each student. Students were then asked to rank the interventions based on preference. An alternating treatments design was used to compare the preferred intervention to the most effective intervention as identified by the BEA. The mean correct words per minute (CWPM) was greater for two of the students in the effective intervention. For one student the preferred intervention was the most effective. Limitations and future directions for research are discussed.

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