Individuals diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) often have difficulty acquiring a tact repertoire. Given that functional language skills are correlated with better long-term social and educational outcomes, teaching individuals with autism to use language is a high priority in Early Intensive Behavioral Intervention (EIBI) programs (Paul, 2008). The current study examined an natural environment training (NET) procedure on tact acquisition using a multiple-probe design across sets. Participants were taught to tact nine, common, three-dimensional toys during sessions. During sessions, the experimenter modeled three play routines. Tact trials were presented approximately every 30 s until each target stimulus was presented three times, for a total of nine trials per session. Two pre-school aged children diagnosed with autism, who received 30 hours of applied behavior analysis therapy per week participated in the study. Results of the study indicated that NET is effective in teaching young children with autism to tact. However, for one of the two participants these tacts did not maintain during the last probe sessions. Limitations and future research are discussed.
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