ABA Exam Questions & Answers 2026 (11–20)

Question 1

If a problem behavior is maintained by escape, what behavioral principle best describes the behavioral consequence?

TheoryPractice · Accepted Answer

【0】Social negative reinforcement. "Social" means that a behavior's consequence is delivered by another person. "Negative" means that a stimulus is removed after the behavior. The escape function describes behavior maintained by the removal of socially-mediated demands. For instance, if a client is asked to clean his room, then he engages in a tantrum, and the parent gives up on the demand, it would be escape (e.g., social negative reinforcement).

Question 2

A child walks with his father in the street and comes across a dog running after a freebie. The child asks, “What is it running for” and the father responds, “A freebie”. what does it exemplify?

TheoryPractice · Accepted Answer

【3】Incidental teaching. Incidental teaching occurs when an opportunity to teach a new skill arises naturally. In this case, it was not planned to teach the student about freebies, but because the opportunity arose, the father seize it and teach the new skill.

Question 3

The principles of ABA are used to teach clients at feeding clinics to eat yogurt. During the process, we teach the client how to eat the yogurt by scooping it into their mouth with a spoon. The client then notices a bowl of cereal on the ledge then begins eating it with the spoon.

What concept can explain this behaviour:

TheoryPractice · Accepted Answer

【2】Response generalization. Response generalization is the extent to which the learner can issue a behaviour that is functionally equal to the behaviour that was taught.  This is the case of stimuli that occasion novel responses. The client in this question knows how to eat yogurt with a spoon but has never been taught how to eat cereal with a spoon.

Question 4

The function of a behavior refers to _________ a behavior is occurring

TheoryPractice · Accepted Answer

【1】Why. The function of behavior refers to why a behavior is occurring. Functions include automatic positive, social positive, automatic negative, and social negative reinforcement. Other similar terms include attention, escape, tangibles, and automatic reinforcement.

Question 5

During three 30-minute observations, Linda gouged her eye 8, 17, and 12 times, respectively. Each incident lasted between 1 and 3 seconds, with an average duration of 1.3 seconds.

Which is the BEST dimension to continue to measure?

TheoryPractice · Accepted Answer

【3】rate. Rate refers to the number of occurrences of a behavior within a specified time frame. In this scenario, Linda's behavior of gouging her eye has been observed for three 30-minute sessions, and the number of occurrences have been recorded. Since the duration of each incident is relatively short and consistent, and the duration dimension has already been measured, duration may not be the best dimension to continue measuring.

Inter-response time refers to the time between each occurrence of a behavior. While this measure could provide additional information about the behavior pattern, it may not be the best dimension to continue measuring since it does not provide a measure of how frequently the behavior occurs.

Latency refers to the time it takes for a behavior to occur after a specific event or instruction. In this case, it may not be the best dimension to continue measuring since the behavior has already been observed and recorded, and latency would measure the time between the start of each observation session and the first occurrence of the behavior.

Rate is the best dimension to continue measuring since it would provide information on the frequency of the behavior occurring within each 30-minute session. This measure would allow for tracking changes in the behavior over time and could be used to evaluate the effectiveness of any interventions implemented to address the behavior.

Question 6

A client receives sessions that are sometimes 1 hour in length, and other times 2 hours in length. Therefore, the RBT analyzes instances of elopement using the following formula: the total number of responses divided by the hours in the session. This results in the number of responses per hour.

What type of measurement is the RBT using?

TheoryPractice · Accepted Answer

【3】Rate. Rate is often used for sessions that vary in their duration (e.g., some sessions are 1 hour, whereas others are 2 hours). Rate allows you to compare across sessions with different durations. A limitation of frequency is that it does NOT allow you to analyze across multi-duration sessions. The equation for rate is as follows: the total frequency of behavior / session duration. For a 1-hour session with 2 instances of elopement, the equation for rate would be: 1 / 2. This would result in a rate of 0.5 instances of elopement per hour.

Question 7

A client starts to have head clapping behavior during the intervention session.

What should be the next step?

TheoryPractice · Accepted Answer

【3】Suggest a medical examination before taking on further actions. This is a difficult scenario because you may want to intervene immediately on a dangerous behavior. However, in this case, behavior that occurs in clusters and goes months without occurring would necessitate a medical examination. Before considering a purely behavioral problem, it is best practice to rule out any possible medical factors.

Question 8

Stimulus fading is a procedure in which:

TheoryPractice · Accepted Answer

【0】a stimulus is gradually introduced to an individual. Stimulus fading is a procedure in which a new stimulus is gradually introduced to an individual to help them become accustomed to and comfortable with the stimulus. This might involve introducing the stimulus at a low intensity or for short periods and gradually increasing the intensity or duration over time. The goal of stimulus fading is to help the individual learn to tolerate or respond appropriately to the stimulus rather than exhibiting a negative or avoidant response.

Question 9

Is free-operant procedure a procedure in which reinforcement is delivered based on a predetermined schedule, regardless of the occurrence of the behavior?

TheoryPractice · Accepted Answer

【1】no. The free-operant procedure is not a procedure in which reinforcement is delivered based on a predetermined schedule, regardless of the occurrence of the behavior. Instead, a free-operant procedure is a procedure in which reinforcement is delivered based on the occurrence of a specific behavior.

Question 10

You are a behavior analyst working with a client with a trauma history. During a session, the client begins to disclose details about their past trauma. Unfortunately, you are not trained to provide trauma therapy and feel overwhelmed by the client's disclosure.

In this situation, it would be most appropriate for you to:

TheoryPractice · Accepted Answer

【2】refer the client to a qualified mental health professional. As a behavior analyst, it is your responsibility to use evidence-based interventions and strategies that have been proven to be effective in promoting positive behavior change. It is not your responsibility to provide therapy for issues outside of your scope of practice, such as trauma therapy. In this situation, it would be most appropriate to refer the client to a qualified mental health professional to provide trauma therapy. It would not be appropriate to ignore the client's disclosure or attempt to provide trauma therapy, even though you are not trained.

ABA Exam Questions & Answers 2026 (11–20)

More ABA practice questions

Free practice here. Timed mocks when you are ready.