multiple baseline design disadvantages

https://doi.org/10.1177/0741932512452794, Lanovaz, M. J., & Turgeon, S. (2020). However, this kind of support is not necessary: lagged replications of baseline predictions being contradicted by data in the treatment phase provide strong control for all of these threats to internal validity. Neither the within-tier comparison, nor the across-tier comparison depends on the tiers being conducted simultaneously; both types of comparisons only require that phase changes occur after substantially different amounts of time since the beginning of baselinethat is, each tier is exposed to different amounts of maturation (i.e., days) prior to the phase change. WebMultiple Baseline Description Multiple measures are used to obtain data over two or more baselines The end result appears visually as a series of A-B designs on top of one another The DV may consist of 2 or more different behaviors Versatile and relatively easy to understand Perhaps the most common design in use today Multiple Baseline Design If As we argued above, the observation of no change in an untreated tier is not strong evidence against a coincidental event affecting the treated tier. Second, we briefly summarize historical methodological writing and current textbook treatment of these designs. In addition, multiple baseline designs are increasingly used in literatures that are not explicitly behavior analytic. B. 66 : Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of using visual inspection of graphs rather than statistics to evaluate the significance of the results. The consensus in recent textbooks and methodological papers is that nonconcurrent designs are less rigorous than concurrent designs because of their presumed limited ability to address the threat of coincidental events (i.e., history). In the past, there was significant controversy regarding the relative rigor of concurrent and nonconcurrent multiple baseline designs. Cooper et al. Type I Errors and Power in Multiple Baseline Designs, Assessing consistency of effects when applying multilevel models to single-case data. Likewise, in a multiple baseline across settings, selecting settings that tend to share extraneous events would make the across-tier analysis more powerful than would selecting settings that share few common events. Webmultiple baseline (3 forms) 1. across bx 2. across settings, 3. across subjects or groups using 3-5 tiers. This would align the definition with the critical features required to demonstrate experimental control and thereby allow strong causal statements based on multiple baseline designs. It is surprising that there is no single consensus definition of multiple baseline designs. https://doi.org/10.1177/0145445516644699, Department of Special Education & Rehabilitation Counseling, Utah State University, 2865 Old Main Hill, Logan, UT, 84322, USA, Timothy A. Slocum,Sarah E. Pinkelman,P. Raymond Joslyn&Beverly Nichols, You can also search for this author in First, the design assumes that treatment effects will be tier-specific and not spread to untreated tiers. AB Design. Strategies and tactics of behavioral research and practice (4th ed.). Timothy A. Slocum, P. Raymond Joslyn, Sarah E. Pinkelman, Thomas R. Kratochwill, Joel R. Levin, Esther R. Lindstrm, Marc J. Lanovaz, Stphanie Turgeon, Tara L. Wheatley, Jonathan Rush, Philippe Rast & Scott M. Hofer, Perspectives on Behavior Science If the baseline phase provides sufficiently stable data to support a strong prediction of the subsequent data path and the data path prediction is contradicted by the actual data after the introduction of the independent variable, this provides some suggestion that the independent variable may have been the cause of the changea potential treatment effect. WebA multiple baseline design across behaviors was used to examine intervention effects. Single-case research designs: Methods for clinical and applied settings (3rd ed.). Any alternative explanation of this pattern of results would have to posit an alternative set of causes that could plausibly result in changes in the dependent variable in this specific pattern across the multiple tiers. This comparison may reveal a likely maturation effect. The strength of this control is a function of our certainty that no single coincidental event could have caused more than one change in the dependent variable. Hayes argued that fortunately the logic of the strategy does not really require (p. 206) an across-tier comparison because the within-tier comparison rules out these threats. Poor execution can certainly worsen these problems, but good execution cannot eliminate them. Interrater agreement on the visual analysis of individual tiers and functional relations in multiple baseline designs. Child Development, 44, 547554. After implementing the treatment for the first tier, they say, rather than reversing the just produced change, he instead applies the experimental variable to one of the other as yet unchanged responses. Pergamon. However, we can never ensure that any two contexts or any two session times are not subject to unique events during the study. Single-case research designs: Methods for clinical and applied settings (3rd ed.). Concurrent multiple baseline designs are multiple baseline designs in which the tiers are synchronized in real time. Having identified the criticisms of nonconcurrent multiple baseline designs, we now turn to a detailed analysis of threats to internal validity and features that can control these threats. A broad and general impression such as these designs are relatively strong is not sufficient to guide experimental design decisions or to evaluate particular variations of multiple baseline designs. This statement, of course, fails to satisfy the operational desire for a specific number of tiers that accomplishes this function. Google Scholar. This certainty is increased by isolation of tiers in time and other dimensions. Three children (ages 4;3 to 5;3) with moderate-severe to severe SSDs participated in two cycles of therapy. We examine how these comparisons address maturation, testing and session experience, and coincidental events. Each tier involves a unique participant and there is a class of coincidental events that contact a single participant. Adding multiple tiers to the design allows for two types of additional comparisons to be used to evaluate, and perhaps rule out, these threats: (1) replications of baseline-treatment comparisons within subsequent tiers (i.e., horizontal analysis), and (2) comparisons across tiers (i.e., vertical analysis). Taplin, P. S., & Reid, J. These coincidental events would contact all tiers of a multiple baseline that include this individual participant, but not tiers that do not involve this participant. That is, it is not strong evidence verifying the prediction of no change in the initial tier in the absence of an intervention. Kazdin, A. E. (2021). Single-case experimental designs: Strategies for studying behavior change. For example, it is implausible that the effects of maturation would coincide with a phase change after 5 days in one tier, after 10 days in a second tier, and after 15 days in a third. In a concurrent multiple baseline that involves a single participant across settings, behaviors, antecedent stimuli etc., this kind of event would be expected to contact all tiers. Multiple baseline designsboth concurrent and nonconcurrentare the predominant experimental design in modern applied behavior analytic research and are increasingly employed in other disciplines. Pearson Education. Tactics of scientific research. The across-tier comparison of concurrent multiple baseline designs is less certain and definitive than it may appear. https://doi.org/10.1023/B:JOBE.0000044735.51022.5d, Hayes, S. C. (1981). Perspect Behav Sci 45, 647650 (2022). The lack of change in untreated tiers should be interpreted only as weak evidence supporting internal validity given the plausible alternative explanations of this lack of change. This comparison can reveal the influence of an extraneous variable only if it causes a change in several tiers at about the same time. Thus, for any multiple baseline design to address the threat of maturation, it must show changes in multiple tiers after substantially differing numbers of days in baseline. Second, as we have discussed above, the amount of lag between phase changes (in terms of sessions in baseline, days in baseline, and elapsed days) is the primary design feature that reduces the plausibility of any single threat accounting for changes in multiple tiers, and thereby threatening the internal validity of the design as a whole. PubMed Central Any of these types of circumstances may require additional tiers in order to clearly address threats to internal validity. Perspect Behav Sci 45, 619638 (2022). A close examination of threats to internal validity in multiple baseline designs reveals and clarifies the critical design features that determine the degree of experimental control and internal validity of either type of multiple baseline. They do not mention the across-tier comparison, presumably because they believe that this analysis is not necessary to establish experimental control. (1973). Likewise, setting-level coincidental events are those that contact a single setting. PubMedGoogle Scholar. This paper describes procedures for using these designs, Because experimental circumstances and design elements vary so greatly, no universal answer can be given. Research methodologists have identified numerous potential alternative explanations that are threats to internal validity (e.g., Campbell & Stanley, 1963; Cooper et al., 2020; Kazdin, 2021; Shadish et al., 2002). Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative, Over 10 million scientific documents at your fingertips, Not logged in So, similar to maturation, the across-tier comparison is sometimes able to reveal effects of testing and session experience, but it may fail to do so in some circumstances. limitation of alternating treatment designs: o it is susceptible to multiple treatment interference, o rapid back-and-forth switching of treatments does not reflect the typical manner in which interventions are applied and may be viewed as artificial and undesirable. The across-tier analysis can provide an additional set of comparisons that may reveal a maturation effect, but it is not a conclusive test. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. Nonconcurrent multiple baseline designs, however, do not afford this comparison. It is clear that we cannot claim that these assumptions are always valid for multiple baseline designs. For the purposes of this article, we define a multiple baseline design as a single-case experimental design that evaluates causal relations through the use of multiple baseline-treatment comparisons with phase changes that are offset in (1) real time (e.g., calendar date), (2) number of days in baseline, and (3) number of sessions in baseline. Department of Educational Psychology, Neag School of Education, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT, 06269, USA, You can also search for this author in The across-tier comparison provides another possible source of control for maturation. WebWhat are some disadvantages of alternating treatment design? Multiple baseline designs are the workhorses of single-case design (SCD) research and are the predominant design used in modern applied behavior analytic research (Coon & Rapp, 2018; Cooper et al., 2020). Single case experimental designs: Strategies for studying behavior change (3rd ed.). A baseline (A) and an intervention (B) are included in a straightforward AB design psychological experiment (B). WebExtended baselines or interventions may threaten experimental control, delayed intervention may pose a risk to client or others as an ethical concern. In this article, we argue that the primary reliance on across-tier comparisons and the resulting deprecation of nonconcurrent designs are not well-justified. a potential treatment effect in the first tier would be vulnerable to the threat that the changes in data could be a result of Threats to Internal Validity in Multiple-Baseline Design Variations, https://doi.org/10.1007/s40614-022-00326-1, Concurrence on Nonconcurrence in Multiple-Baseline Designs: A Commentary on Slocum et al. Oxford University Press. Further, it is impossible to know how many events, which events, or the severity of the events that are missed by an across-tier comparison. The point is that although the across-tier comparison may reveal a maturation effect, there are also circumstances in which it may fail to do so. The assumption that all tiers respond similarly to maturation may be somewhat more problematic. To understand the ability of concurrent designs to meet these assumptions we must distinguish different types of coincidental events based on the scope of their effects. https://doi.org/10.1002/bin.1510. Thus, to the degree that nonconcurrent designs support longer lags between phases changes than concurrent designs, they may support stronger control of the threat of coincidental events through replicated within-tier comparisons. This has at least two effects: first, the multiple baseline is seen as weaker than the withdrawal design because of this dependence on the across-tier analysis; and second, when nonconcurrent multiple baseline designs are introduced years later, their rigor will be understood by many methodologists in terms of control by across-tier comparisons only, without consideration of replicated within-tier comparisons. Using Single-Case Designs in Practical Settings: Is Within-Subject Replication Always Necessary? Watson and Workman did not explicitly address threats to internal validity other than coincidental events. In particular, within-tier comparisons may be strengthened by isolating tiers from one another in ways that reduce the chance that any single coincidental event could coincide with a phase change in more than one tier (e.g., temporal separation). (p. 206). The multiple baseline design is useful for interventions that are irreversible due to learning effects, and when treatment cant be withdrawn. Google Scholar, Harvey, M. T., May, M. E., & Kennedy, C. H. (2004). Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content: Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article. Concurrent and nonconcurrent multiple baseline designs address maturation in virtually identical ways through both within- and across-tier comparisons. The within-tier analysis seeks replication of these potential treatment effects in additional tiers of the design. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315150666, Chapter They never raise the question of whether replicated within-tier comparisons are sufficient to rule out threats to internal validity and establish experimental control. The dimension of time is recognized in the requirement that phase changes be lagged in real timethat is, the date on which the phase changes are made. However, researchers in clinical, educational, and other applied settings recognized that they could expand research much further if the tiers of a multiple baseline could be conducted as they became available sequentially rather than simultaneously. This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13428-011-0111-y, Article It would be an even greater concern if the treatment were an instructional program that requires several weeks or months to implement. Sometimes, the multiple baseline design may be more appropriate to use in interventions with small sample Journal of Consulting & Clinical Psychology, 49(2), 193211. Type I errors and power in multiple baseline designs. However, in a concurrent multiple baseline across participants, participant-level events contact only a single tier (participant)the coincidental event would not contact other tiers (participants)we might say that the across-tier analysis is inherently insensitive to detecting this kind of event. The within-tier comparison may be further strengthened by increasing independence of the tier in other dimensions. Recommendations for reporting multiple-baseline designs across participants. The Nonconcurrent Multiple-Baseline Design: It is What it is and Not Something Else. Kazdin, A. E. (2021). Further, if the potential treatment effect is more gradual (as one might expect from an educational intervention on a complex skill), maturational changes may be impossible to distinguish from treatment effects. Wacker, D., Berg, W., Harding, J., & Cooper-Brown, L. (2004). Google Scholar. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0005-7894(75)80181-X, Kratochwill, T. R., Hitchcock, J., Horner, R. H., Levin, J. R., Odom, S. L., Rindskopf, D. M., & Shadish, W. R. (2013). However, the specific issues in this controversy have never been thoroughly identified, discussed, and resolved; and instead a consensus emerged without the issues being explicitly addressed. Coincidental events (i.e., history) are specific events that occur at a particular time (or across a particular period) and could cause changes in behavior. Thus, a multiple baseline with phase changes sufficiently lagged (in terms of number of sessions) provides rigorous control for this threat. The replicated within-tier analysis looks to patterns of results within the other tiers. It is interesting that this emphasis on across-tier comparisons is the opposite of that evident in Baer et al. WebOften creates lots of problems BAB Reversal Design Doesnt enable assessment of effects prior to the intervention May get sequence effects May be appropriate with dangerous behaviors Addresses ethics of withholding effective treatment Need to be careful when using NCR Reversal Technique Noncontingent reversal Baer, D. M., Wolf, M. M., & Risley, T. R. (1968). With stable data, the range within which future data points will fall is Use of brief experimental analyses in outpatient clinic and home settings. WebThe first quality of ideal baseline data is stability, meaning that they display limited variability. Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. The first is the reversal design and the authors describe the important applied limitation with this designsituations in which reversals are not possible or feasible in applied settings. If each tier of a multiple baseline represents a different participant in a different environment (e.g., school versus clinic) located in a different city, this would further reduce the chance that any single event or pattern of events could have contacted the participants coincident with the phase changes. in their classic 1968 article that defined applied behavior analysis. It is possible that a coincidental event may be present for all tiers but have different effects on different tiers. Campbell, D. T., & Stanley, J. C. (1963). Throughout this article we have argued that controlling for the three main threats to internal validitymaturation, testing and session experience, and coincidental eventsin multiple baseline designs requires attention to three distinct dimensions of lag of phase changes across tiers. Thus, to demonstrate experimental control, the effects of the independent variable must not generalize; and to detect an extraneous variable through the across-tier comparison, the effects of that extraneous variable must generalize. Carr, J. E. (2005). An important drawback of pre-experimental designs is that they are subject to numerous threats to their validity. If a potential treatment effect is seen in one tier and on the same day there is no change in other tiers, this is taken as strong evidence that the potential treatment effect was not a result of a coincidental event, because a coincidental event would have had an effect on all tiers. Google Scholar, Gast, D. L., Lloyd, B. P., & Ledford, J. R. (2018). Horner, R. H., Carr, E. G., Halle, J., McGee, G., Odom, S., & Wolery, M. (2005). (2022), Revisiting an Analysis of Threats to Internal Validity in Multiple Baseline Designs, Moderation analysis in two-instance repeated measures designs: Probing methods and multiple moderator models, Examining and Enhancing the Methodological Quality of Nonconcurrent Multiple-Baseline Designs, How Many Tiers Do We Need? The time lag must be sufficiently long so that no single event could produce potential treatment effects in more than one tier. In general, a longer lag is better because it reduces the chance that an event could impact multiple tiers. We can strongly argue that all tiers contact testing and session experience during baseline because we schedule and conduct these sessions. WebWeaknesses of multiple baseline designs: There are certain functional relations that may not be clearly understood by this design This design is time consuming and This provides clear information about the number of sessions that precede the phase change in each tier, and therefore constitutes a strong basis for controlling the threat of testing and session experience. Ten sessions of baseline would be expected to have similar effects whether they occur in January or June. Correspondence to If factors other than the experimenters manipulation of the independent variable could plausibly account for the obtained data patterns, experimental control has not been demonstrated and functional relations cannot be inferred. If a potential treatment effect is observed in the treated tier but a change in the dependent variable is also observed in corresponding sessions in a tier that is still in baseline, this provides evidence that an extraneous variable may have caused both changes. Use the Previous and Next buttons to navigate the slides or the slide controller buttons at the end to navigate through each slide. Only through repeated measurement across all tiers from the start of a study can you be confident that maturation and history threats are not influencing observed outcomes. This might be conveniently reported in the methods section or a small table in an appendix. . Article The key characteristic that maturational processes share is that they may produce behavioral changes that would be expected to accumulate as a function of elapsed time in the absence of participation in research.Footnote 2 In order to control for maturation, we must attend to the passage of timetypically, calendar days. Single-case intervention research design standards. In this section, we examine how within- and across-tier comparisons may support (or fail to support), internal validity in concurrent and nonconcurrent multiple baseline designs. These events would contact all tiers of a MB that take place in that single setting, but not tiers in other settings. However, it does not rule out maturation as an alternative explanation of the change in behavior. The reversal model is fine for many questions, but in some instances, removing a type of treatment could be unwise or even unethical. An alternative explanation would have to suggest, for example, that in one tier, experience with 5 baseline sessions produced an effect coincident with the phase change; in a second tier, 10 baseline sessions had this effect, again coinciding with the phase change; and in a third tier, 15 baseline sessions produced this kind of change and happened to correlate with the phase change.
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