General case analysis
A systematic way of choosing teaching examples so they represent the full range of stimulus variations and response requirements the learner will meet in real settings.
General case analysis is a planning method used by the supervisor to select which examples to teach. First, the range of situations where the skill should occur is defined, such as all the vending machines a client might use. Then the important variations are listed, such as where the coin slot is, whether it takes cards, and how the item is selected. Finally, a set of teaching examples is chosen that samples that range, often including negative examples, such as a machine that is out of order, where the response should not occur.
The goal is generalization to untrained situations with as few teaching examples as possible. Because the examples were chosen to cover the variations, success with them predicts success with new examples. It is a more systematic form of multiple exemplar training.
Classic uses include teaching street crossing, using different vending machines and phones, and shopping. The approach fits community skills where real settings vary in many ways.
RBTs usually do not design the analysis, but they carry it out: teaching with each selected example, presenting examples in the planned order, and probing untrained examples to measure generalization.
Example and non-example
| Example | To teach a teen to use self-checkout, the supervisor selects machines at three stores that differ in screen layout, payment method and bagging area. The RBT teaches with all three and then probes a fourth store. |
|---|---|
| Non-example | An RBT teaches the client to use one self-checkout machine at one store over and over, hoping it will transfer. That is single-example teaching, not general case analysis. |
Don't confuse it with
| Multiple exemplar training | Multiple exemplar training uses many examples; general case analysis chooses them systematically to cover the full range of real-world variation. |
|---|---|
| Task analysis | A task analysis breaks a skill into steps; general case analysis selects examples of the situations where the skill must occur. |
Test yourself
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Question 1To teach a teen to use vending machines, the supervisor picks teaching machines that together show the range of features the teen will meet in the community: coin slots, card readers, push buttons and keypads. What is this approach called?
Show answer
A: General case analysis. General case analysis selects teaching examples that sample the full range of stimulus and response variations found in the natural environment, so the learner can use any machine they meet, not just the ones taught.
- B: Programming common stimuli makes the teaching setting resemble one target setting; it does not sample a full range of variations.
- C: Training loosely varies noncritical features of teaching, while these machine features are the relevant ones the teen must respond to.
- D: Indiscriminable contingencies concern reinforcement schedules, not the choice of teaching examples.
Task C.8 · 40-hour curriculum section E
Answer every question to see your score.
On the RBT exam
This term belongs to task C.8 Generalization in content area C, Behavior Acquisition, which is 19 of the 75 scored questions.