The European Association for Behavior Analysis
The B. F. Skinner Foundation sponsors this award for student research. Two awards of $500 each are available. Winners will be given the award at the European Association of Behavior Analysis (EABA) bi-annual conference.
PURPOSE OF THE AWARD
- To support and encourage research efforts in behavior analysis among students in Europe
- To promote behavior analytic science
- To boost the overall quality of academic research in behaviour analysis
- To provide recognition for students conducting behaviour analytic research
2022 Award Winner:
Ana de Paz
PhD student
Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia (UNED)
Spain
Abstract: The animal model of activity-based anorexia (ABA) mimics the main features of anorexia nervosa disease in humans. In the procedure, the development of excessive physical activity in a running wheel, and the accompanying decrease in food intake and weight loss, are affected both by individual and environmental factors. Social adverse conditions taking place in the critical period of adolescence have been shown to be a relevant determinant of health and survival of many species. Animal models of social stress allow us to understand the relationship between social processes and the behavior of individuals. The lack of experimental research studying social influences in the ABA parameters, the relative over-representation of male subjects, and possible interactions of these variables with developmental factors, suggest the importance of encouraging new efforts aimed to establish the functionality of the excessive wheel running when food is provided intermittently in young female rats living under conditions of social stress or enrichment. Forty-eight adolescent female Wistar rats will be housed isolated, in a social unstable environment, or in a stable group. At the age of a young adult, the animals will be randomly assigned to the ABA group or to the food restricted group, traditionally included to determine the importance of hyperactivity in the development of the phenomenon. Social behavior will be periodically recorded, and measures of body weight, food intake and the number of wheel turns will be registered daily under a modified ABA protocol to assess the possible differences in vulnerability to develop activity anorexia.
2016 Award Winners:
Ruth Kopperud
MA Student
Oslo and Akershus University
Norway
Abstract: According to the Cancer Society, the occurrence of melanoma cancer in Norway is between 1700 and 1800 cases per year. Between 300-400 people discover their malignant melanomas to late each year and consequently die from it. If the death rate is to be reduced, it is crucial to establish discrimination skills so that malignant melanomas are detected and treated early. It is 25 years since it was first launched strategies of self-examination of melanoma. There are few studies that have evaluated these strategies, and the studies shows that the strategies have not been found effective. We are investigating whether the use of a conditional discrimination procedure can establish discrimination skills between different categories of moles. In the present study we will use the same criteria as the Cancer Society use to determine risky moles. Participants are going to be municipal workers and students aged 16 to 51 years. They will conduct a conditional discrimination procedure with different experimental phases; training, test and generalization test.
Anastasia Salma
PhD Student
Panteion University
Greece
Abstract: Three planned experiments examine the possibility that variability in verbal behavior depends upon the stimulus discrimination of events automatically produced by repetition that is inherent in differential reinforcement of variability schedules (VAR) thus establishing the positive reinforcing potency of stimuli associated with the termination of repetition, not only in children diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) but also in typically developing children. Three computer-based experiments are designed to increase variability in verbal behavior by enhancing operant stimulus discrimination of automatic stimuli, utilizing a multiple baseline design across both behaviors and subjects. Initially, children will be exposed to a range of visual stimuli in a given category (e.g., fruits, animals) with differential reinforcement of the naming of animals (non-repetition) utilizing an errorless discrimination procedure designed to enhance the SΔ function of the stimuli produced by repetition; all visual cues will be gradually faded. In a second experiment, reinforcement will require variation in both subject and verb, with initially visual discriminative stimuli as in experiment I; independent VAR schedules will be employed for noun and verb emission, wherein each LAG level will be automatically titrated up or down based on performance. A third experiment extends this procedure to three-word (noun-verb-object) utterances. In each experiment, the discrimination-enhancing procedure will be compared (using other word groups) with those of a typical VAR procedure to assess the effects of enhancing discrimination of self-produced stimuli under VAR schedules.