Autism and Operant Conditioning Before taking this class, I was dismissive of operant conditioning as a tool for learning and education in human beings. Instead, I thought of operant conditioning as something that people did with pets, teaching them to associate a particular behavior with a treat or a punishment, and I felt as if this type of learning was below the capabilities of most human beings. My own perceptions about this caused me to react in an ugly manner when a friend of mine described the behavioral therapy that she was going to be using on her child, who has autism, in order to help improve functioning. While I said nothing to my friend, I was enraged that she would be treating her child like a pet, literally offering him food rewards in exchange for desired behavior. I simply did not see how such an approach could help her son, who was already seemed so distant and removed from the average human experience, begin to function better in the everyday world. However, watching his progress under his behavioral therapy regime has led me to the conclusion that operant conditioning can be very helpful, particularly in reaching people with special learning challenges.

When applied to people with learning challenges, operant conditioning is often classified under the umbrella of behavioral therapy. "In such cases, therapists use positive reinforcers to shape behavior in a step-by-step manner, rewarding closer and closer approximations of the desired behavior" (Myers,...

Parents frequently use reward systems with neuro-typical children, but they may not be as highly emphasized as with children in special-needs scenarios. "In extreme cases, treatment must be intensive" (Myers, p.519). My friend's son was an extreme case, and the exercises that his behavioral therapist had my friend doing to encourage him to engage were difficult, not just for her, but for her son. However, they were ultimately successful.
One of his challenges was speech. Many children with autism have a difficult time with verbal communication. That does not mean that he was unable to communicate. He would use a picture chart to indicate what he wanted, and was capable of taking an adult and steering her towards a desired object. However, he would also occasionally say words, frequently not in an appropriate context. Knowing that he was physically capable of producing that word, the behavioral therapist would tailor operant conditioning scenarios to illicit that word. One of the challenges was to refuse to give him a cup of his preferred drink (a rice milk) unless he said the word "cup." He was capable of saying the word and would, occasionally, immediately say the word "cup" when he wanted a drink. At other times, he would refuse to say the word, and the scenario would become a stand-off; my heartbroken and frustrated friend refusing to give her child a drink and a crying and stemming six-year-old with autism, communicating in every other way available to…