ABA Exam Coach

B.11: Identify and distinguish between operant and respondent extinction as operations and processes.

Free practice questions for this part of the BCBA, with an explanation for every option.

A client developed a fear reaction to barking after being knocked over by a barking dog. In treatment, recorded barking is played many times with no harmful event following it, and the fear reaction gradually weakens. This is best described as:
  1. A. Negative punishment
    Incorrect. No reinforcer is removed contingent on a response.
  2. B. Respondent extinction
    Correct. Repeatedly presenting the CS without the US weakens the CR, which is respondent extinction.
  3. C. Habituation
    Incorrect. Habituation is a decrease in an unconditioned response with repeated presentation of the unconditioned stimulus, not of a conditioned stimulus.
  4. D. Operant extinction
    Incorrect. Operant extinction withholds the reinforcer for an emitted response. Here a CS is presented without the US.
A BCBA stops giving attention for whining that had been maintained by attention. Whining briefly increases in rate and intensity, then gradually declines to near zero across sessions. Which statement correctly uses extinction terminology?
  1. A. Because attention was removed, the procedure is negative punishment rather than extinction
    Incorrect. Negative punishment removes a currently available reinforcer contingent on a response. Extinction withholds the specific reinforcer that maintained the behavior.
  2. B. The early increase shows that extinction was not working and should have been stopped
    Incorrect. An initial burst is a well-documented feature of extinction, not proof that it failed.
  3. C. Withholding attention is the extinction operation, the gradual decline is the extinction process, and the early increase is an extinction burst
    Correct. The operation is discontinuing the maintaining reinforcer, and the process is the resulting decrease in responding. A temporary burst is common.
  4. D. The gradual decline is the extinction operation, and withholding attention is the extinction process
    Incorrect. This reverses the terms. The operation is what the analyst does, and the process is the change in behavior.
A parent has been giving her 5-year-old a cookie whenever he whines at the pantry. On the BCBA's advice, she stops giving cookies after whining. Which part of this describes operant extinction as an operation?
  1. A. The gradual decrease in whining across days
    The decrease in responding is the extinction process, the effect of the operation. It is not the operation.
  2. B. No longer delivering the cookie after whining
    Correct. As an operation, operant extinction means discontinuing the reinforcer that has been maintaining the behavior.
  3. C. Showing the child the pantry repeatedly without opening it
    Repeatedly presenting a stimulus by itself resembles the respondent extinction procedure. Operant extinction is defined by withholding the reinforcer after the response, not by presenting antecedent stimuli.
  4. D. Adding a reprimand each time whining occurs
    Adding a reprimand is a punishment procedure, not extinction.

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