Discriminação de expressões faciais por crianças: um treino de discriminação condicional

• Autor(a) principal: Chamati, Ana Beatriz Dornellas
• Data de Publicação: 2013
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Biblioteca Digital de Teses e Dissertações da PUC_SP
• Texto Completo: https://tede2.pucsp.br/handle/handle/16700
• topic: Análise do comportamento; Crianças; Discriminação condicional; Expressões faciais; Behavior analysis; Children; Conditional discrimination; Facial expressions; CNPQ::CIENCIAS HUMANAS::PSICOLOGIA::PSICOLOGIA EXPERIMENTAL

The study of facial expressions has been a recent concern in Behavior Analysis. The aim of this study was to test a procedure for establishing discrimination of facial expressions in children, using a conditional discrimination training, and to verify the generalization of the results of training to an untrained set of the same facial expressions. Participants were five children, between five and six years old, from a private school. We performed a total of 15 stages. The first and last stages, Baseline and Final Test, were conducted with photos on paper. In both phases it was requested that participants grouped all photos of the same expression. The other phases, performed by a computer program, consisted of conditional discrimination training and testing, in which we used four sets of facial expressions as the model stimulus and geometric figures as comparative stimuli. The difference between the test and training sessions was that correct responses were reinforced after each trial of the training sessions and not of the test sessions. Participants first performed a pretest with one set of photos, followed by a conditional discrimination training with the same set. After reaching criterion for the termination of the exercise, participants took a post-test with the same set of pictures and then a generalization test with a new set. If the participant reached the criterion in the post-test, he or she took the generalization test with another new set, and so on, until all sets had been tested. If participants did not meet the criteria for any of the generalization testes, they retook the conditional discrimination training with the same set of photos, then the post-test with this same set and the generalization test with a new set. Initially, after each trial, the consequence for correct responses consisted of a picture of a smiling star on the computer screen, and participants received a small amount of toys at the end of each session. As the results of the participants changed little over the sessions, it was decided to make the toys, not just the star, contingent to the participant s correct responses. After each correct attempt, the child earned a sticker and, after collecting twelve stickers, the child could exchange them for a toy at the end of the session. The results showed that, while participants showed differences in terms of final performance, everyone got the number of correct responses required for phase change in training, post-test and, at least, in the last generalization test, indicating that the procedure was sufficient for establishing discrimination and generalization to untrained pictures. The results of the last phase, Final Test, varied from participant to participant and, when considering the results of Participants 1, 2 and, to some extent, Participant 3, it can be stated that the training was effect ive in generating the discrimination of facial expressions