Interview Skills Project Update

Hello all!

In addition to our own projects this semester, we are still collaborating with Dr. Corey Stocco on the Interview Skills project. Sessions began last week to insure that the skills developed in training were maintained at appropriate levels over time. This is an important feature of behavior change therapies known as generalization; the skills developed in training should extend across time, setting, people, and similar behaviors.

If there are skill maintenance issues, then the project continues as extra training sessions. If the participants can display acceptable levels of skill maintenance, the project moves into the next phase. In the next phase, participants will be interviewed by someone other than Dr. Corey Stocco, in a completely unrelated setting to his office (where sessions have been conducted up until this point). This phase is also being used to assess generalization.

It is exciting to see participants taken through the entire process (baseline-generalization) and this project exemplifies the characteristics of quality behavior change procedures just as we are learning in class this semester. 

Hello!

We are back into the full swing of things with our spring semester here at BCU. We have lots going on with practicum this semester, including the implementation of my pitching mechanics project. Writing and conducting my own behavioral change project under close, guided supervision has given me invaluable hands-on experience. I feel like I have learned more about the behavior change process on a more meaningful level than I ever could have in just a classroom or by completing random (though still valuable) projects to fulfill my practicum experience hours.

One of the most important characteristics of behavior change treatments we are covering in classes this semester is social validity. Social validity includes implementing behavioral change procedures that address participant goals, implementing procedures that are acceptable to all persons involved (e.g. you would not add a punishment component using hands downs methods if parents did not want to use that method with their child), and implementing procedures that are effective.

After conducting 2 sessions of the mechanics project during pitching practice, the participants, and coaches, agreed that the procedures as they were were not acceptable. In order to adjust this, we moved sessions to outside of regular practice times. This simple (though more time consuming) change made the procedures socially acceptable for the participants and the coaches. Nothing like a real-world example to share in class and bring context to the classroom material!