Children As Therapeutic Change Agents: Reinforcement Intervention Paradigms

By far the majority of the literature dealing with therapeutic behavioral change in children casts adults in the role of change agent. For a variety of reasons, including economy, necessity, and scientific curiosity, adults who design therapeutic interventions have begun to look more closely at the role of the child's classmates and playfellows in bringing about desirable behavioral change. The empirical roots of the notion that children may serve as therapeutic change agents are found in investigations of children's effectiveness as reinforcement agents. Patterson and Anderson (1965) conducted a laboratory experiment to demonstrate elementary students' ability to shape a peer's preference in a simple marble game. In a similarly designed study, Hartup (1964) used nursery school children as reinforcement agents to condition a peer's motor response (marbledropping rate). A subsequent study by Tikten and Hartup (1965) was undertaken to expand on the results Hartup originally obtained. Once again, elementary age children demonstrated their prowess as programmed social reinforcers. Evidence that retarded children can serve as agents of reinforcement was presented by Terrel and Stevenson (1965). All of these studies were also concerned with the relationship between differential effectiveness of children and sociometric status. Hartup, Glazer, and Charlesworth (1967) have presented data