Evaluating the Relationship Between Derived Relational Responding, Verbal Operant Development, and Linguistic Structure: Correlating the PEAK-E-PA, the ABLLS-R, and the TOLD-I:4

The increasing prevalence of Autism Spectrum Disorder has produced a longstanding relevance for continued progressive measures towards a systematic approach to the treatment of deficient language repertoires. Current behavior analytic assessments, such as the Assessment of Basic Language and Learning Skills-Revised (ABLLS-R), have demonstrated utility in providing relative measures of the functional characteristics of an individual’s language and learner repertoire, as consistent with a traditional Skinnerian approach. Further assessments have been created under other existing theoretical frameworks, such as the Test of Language Development (TOLD), and the Promoting the Emergence of Advanced Knowledge Relational Training System (PEAK). Each assessment was run with 17 children with Autism. A Spearman’s rank order correlation was then conducted to examine the relationships between the ABBLS-R, the TOLD-I:4, and PEAK-E-PA. Therefore, the purpose of the present investigation was to examine any existing relationships between these assessments in order to evaluate their treatment utility, produced measures, and overall implications towards an understanding of language development in children with Autism