Modeling and shaping by parents to develop chewing behavior in their retarded child

A moderately retarded 8-yr-old mongoloid child was taught to chew solid food. A series of steps was used to teach the child to chew his food. They included (1) removing attention for non-chewing behavior (2) having a model demonstrate chewing behavior (3) reinforcing the model with the subject's favorite food (4) reinforcing successive approximations to chewing and (5) attenuating the reinforcement schedule.The child developed chewing behavior during the sixth session. The rate of chewing continued to increase until after 3 weeks of treatment the child's rate of chewing was too high to measure. A 42-week follow-up established that chewing had continued and that the child was chewing additional solid foods.