Tangibles, Pictures, and Verbal Descriptions: Which Should Be Used in Choice Presentations?

Little research has examined how stimulus modalities influence choice responding. Should choice alternatives be presented using tangibles, pictures, or verbal descriptions? How should caregivers decide which modality to use? We have completed several studies to examine how discrimination skills, as measured by the Assessment of Basic Learning Abilities test, interact with choice stimulus modalities to influence responding. Our results suggest that for persons with developmental disabilities with limited or no communication skills, the ability to make simple visual, visual matching to sample, and auditory-visual discriminations should be the prime determinant of stimulus modalities in choice presentation and preference assessment. Having choice opportunities is considered an important dimension of quality of life (Hughes, Hwang, Kim, Eisenman, & Killian, 1995). Nowadays, practitioners and caregivers strive to increase choice opportunities by integrating them into everyday activities. When choice presentation is done systematically, it can provide a measure of the person's preference, as indicated by the rate with which an item is chosen relative to others (Lohrmann-O'Rouke & Browder, 1998). Knowing a person's preference has considerable value for caregivers in providing supports in daily living (e.g., by providing preferred meals and leisure activities) and for therapists in designing treatments (e.g., by using effective reinforcers). To identify preferences of persons with developmental disabilities, direct systematic assessment has been shown to be more reliable than caregivers&apos