Effects of different social partners on the discriminated requesting of a young child with autism and severe language delays

We examined the effects of two adult social partners on the requesting repertoire of a young child with autism and severe language delays. We used a multiple-schedule design (Kazdin, 1982) to evaluate the request topography that the participant emitted relative to each social partner's contingent differential reinforcement for specific requesting forms. The contingencies associated with each adult were reversed after the participant reached a preestablished criterion of discriminated responding. The participant learned to request in a discriminated manner in the presence of each social partner. Implications of these results are discussed.