Magnitude
The force or intensity with which a response is emitted provides important quantitative parameters used in defining and verifying the occurrence of some response classes. Responses meeting those criteria are measured and reported by one or more fundamental or derivative measures such as frequency, duration, or latency.
Maintenance
Two different meanings in applied behavior analysis: (a) the extent to which the learner continues to perform the target behavior after a portion or all of the intervention has been terminated (i.e., response maintenance), a dependent variable or characteristic of behavior an (b) a condition in which treatment has been discontinued or partially withdrawn, an independent vaeriable or experimental condition.
Mand
An elementary verbal operant involving a response of any form that is evoked by an MO and followed by specific reinforcement. Manding allows a speaker to get what she wants or refuse what she wants.
Massed Practice
A self-directed behavior change technique in which the person forces herself to perform an undesired behavior (e.g., a compulsive ritual) repeatedly, which sometimes decreases the future frequency of the behavior.
Matching Law
The allocation of responses to choices available on concurrent schedules of reinforcement; rates of responding across choices are distributed the proportions that match the rates of reinforcement received from each choice alternative.
Matching-to-sample procedure
A discrete trial procedure for investigating conditional relations and stimulus equivalence.
Mean Count-Per-Interval IOA
The average percentage of agreement between the counts reported by two observers in a measurement period composed of a series of smaller counting times; a more conservative measure of IOA than total count IOA.
Mean Duration-Per-Occurance IOA
An IOA index for duration per occurrence data; also a more conservative and usually more meaningful assessment of IOA for total duration data calculated for a given session or measurement period by computing the average percentage of agreement of the durations reported by two observers for each occurrence of the target behavior.
Measurement
The process of applying quantitative labels to describe and differentiate objects and natural events. (a) identifying the behavior to be measured, (b) defining the behavior observable terms, and (c) selecting an appropriate observation and data-recording method.
Measurement Bias
Nonrandom measurement error: a form of inaccurate measurement in which the data consistently overestimate or underestimate the true value of an event.
Measurement by Permanent Product
A method of measuring behavior after it has occurred by recording the effects that the behavior produced on the environment.
Mentalism
An approach to explaining behavior that assumes that a mental or “inner” dimension exists that differs from a behavioral dimension, and that phenomena in this dimension either directly cause or at least mediate some forms of behavior, if not all.
Metaphorical (tact) extension
A tact evoked by a novel stimulus that shares some, but not all, of the relevant features of the original stimulus.
Methodological Behaviorism
A philosophical position that views behavioral events that cannot be publicly observed as outside the realm of science.
Metonymical (tact) extension
A tact evoked by a novel stimulus that shares none of the relevant features of the original stimulus configuration, but some irrelevant yet related feature has acquired stimulus control.
Mixed Schedule (mix)
A compound schedule of reinforcement consisting of two or more basic schedules of reinforcement (elements) that occur in an alternating, usually random, sequence; no discriminative stimuli are correlated with the presence or absence of each element of the schedule, and reinforcement is delivered for meeting the response requirements of the element in effect at any time.
Modeling
A behavior change strategy in which learners acquire new skills by imitating demonstrations of the skills by live or symbolic models. The model shows, demonstrates, or conveys exactly the behavior the learner is expected to perform. Models can be live demonstrations or symbolic representations of the desired behavior.
Momentary Time Sampling
A measurement method in which the presence or absence of behavior is recorded at precisely specified time intervals.
Most-To-Least Response Prompts
A technique of transferring stimulus control in which the preactitioner physically guides the participant through the entire performance sequence, and then gradually reduces the level of assistance in successive trials. Customarily, most-to-least prompting transitions from physical guidance to visual prompts to verbal instructions, and finally to the natural stimulus without prompts.
Motivating Operation (MO)
An environmental variable that (a) alters (increases or decreases) the reinforcing or punishing effectiveness of some stimulus, object, or event; and (b) alters (increases or decreases) the current frequency of all behavior that has been reinforced or punished by that stimulus, object, or event.
Motor Imitation (Relating to Sign Language)
A type of duplic verbal behavior in which the form of a motor response is under the functional control of a visual verbal SD that has formal similarity between a verbal stimulus and a verbal response product, and a history of generalized reinforcement.
Multielement Design
An experimental design in which two or more conditions (one of which may be a no-treatment control condition) are presented in rapidly alternating succession, independent of the level of responding; differences in responding between or among conditions are attributed to the effects of the conditions.
Multiple Baseline Across Behaviors Design
A multiple baseline design in which the treatment variable is applied to two or more different behaviors of the same subject in the same setting.
Multiple Baseline Across Settings Design
A multiple baseline design in which the treatment variable is applied to the same behavior of the same subject across two or more different settings, situations, or time periods.
