A corroborative study on the methods of shaping and impairing behaviors in preschool children.

Research Project

Project/Area Number	59510061
Research Category	Grant-in-Aid for General Scientific Research (C)
Allocation Type	Single-year Grants
Research Field	Psychology
Research Institution	HIROSHIMA UNIVERSITY
Principal Investigator	KAWAI Iroku Faculty of Education, Professor, 学校教育学部, 教授 (80040682)
Project Period (FY)	1984 – 1986
Project Status	Completed (Fiscal Year 1986)
Budget Amount *help	¥1,800,000 (Direct Cost: ¥1,800,000) Fiscal Year 1986: ¥300,000 (Direct Cost: ¥300,000) Fiscal Year 1985: ¥400,000 (Direct Cost: ¥400,000) Fiscal Year 1984: ¥1,100,000 (Direct Cost: ¥1,100,000)
Keywords	Normal preschooler / Analysis of behavior / Behavior modification / Kindergarten / Nursery school / 実践事例
Research Abstract	1. Practical studies in the Kindergaraten setting. The main purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of applying the behavior modification techniques,in the Kindergarten setting, for both shaping desirable behaviors and impairing undesirable behaviors of preschool children. As the target behavior to be modified, each teacher took up the behavior with which they have confronted in each class. The target behavior was as follows: "to master complex motor activities of ball-handling" or "to reduce inappropriate behaviors during the radio-listening-session". Some graduate students have assisted us in observing and recording both children's and teacher's behaviors. The results of these studies suggested that some of the behavior modification techniques were applicable effectively to the daily nursing activity, and teacher's verbal praise and physical contact directed to the children have important effects on increasing children's appropriate behaviors. Furthermore,two graduate students and I performed experimental studies in which we intended,by using the shaping procedure,to promote children's learning of the concept of "conservation" and "space relations",and promotion of learning of these concepts was observed. 2. Collecting the literatures. The literatures which have following characteristics were collected:(1)the subject treated was normal preschooler,(2)the behavior modification techniques were applied,and(3)treatment was administered in Kindergarten and nursery-school settings. Some of the literatures reviewed in my book,titled "Nursing activities and the analysis of behavior" that was published last year. Now, I am proceeding this work and the product would be public in the near future.