Article Critique CHAD 602 Monica Taylor December 12, 2014

Physical Exercise as a Reinforcer to Promote Calmness of an ADHD Child Nathan H. Azrin, Christopher T. Ehle and Amy L. Beaumont

The overall goal of this article is to identify the major academic problems of students with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and addresses the extent to which these problems are secondary to ADHD, rather than a part of a co-occurring learning or cognitive disability. The article delineates the academic problems of students with ADHD in relation to their primary characteristics how one influences the nature of the other. Variants on the AB design introduce ways to control for the competing hypotheses to allow for stronger conclusions. Treatment implications are discussed to indicate how educators might modify classroom settings to enhance the academic achievement of students with ADHD. Listening can also be challenging for all children, who during school hours are required to listen to verbally presented educational materials such as lectures, or lesson and stories, and have to answer comprehension questions based on the content. This can be especially challenging for students who already have attention problems, and are expected to listen without moving or fidgeting.
The causal relationship that the authors attempted to examine with a 4-year-old ADHD boy found attentive calmness was substantially increased from a mean of about 3 seconds per trial to the maximum scheduled duration of 60 seconds by using a scheduled period of physical activity as the reinforcer for the attentive-calmness (Azrin & Ehle and Beaumont, 2006) These results suggest the possible use of this type of reinforcer as an addition or substitution. This study systematically evaluates a young hyperactive boy to determine whether scheduled vigorous activity could serve as a reinforcer for calmness and to provide control measures evaluating whether any increase of calmness might be attributable to the effect of the exercise to the effect of the descriptive praise that normally accompanies reinforcement or whether the contingent aspect was necessary. According to (Azrin & Ehle and Beaumont, 2006) Studies have documented positive effects of physical activity for school aged children through school wide exercise programs incorporating physical activity across curriculum.
The hypothesis of this that that organisms will initiate stimulation-seeking activity to achieve a stimulatory state that might be described as in individuals with ADHD engage in excessive physical movement in an attempt to generate stimulation and reach homeostasis. Adirect implication of the results is the possible utility of using the scheduled availability of exercise as a reinforcer for ADHD children. Such an