To distinguish contingency from temporal contiguity in assessment, define Valeria's response and consequence, then compare consequence probability within matched windows after the response and during valid nonresponse periods. Record base rates, timing precision, overlapping windows, prompts, and availability. A consequence that often follows a response may simply occur often overall. Functional impact requires evidence beyond sequence and conditional probability.

Define the temporal sequence

Specify response offset or onset, consequence onset, window length, and timestamp precision. Record simultaneous, delayed, repeated, and overlapping events consistently.

Create a valid nonresponse comparison

Sample periods when the response could have occurred and did not, with the same consequence window. Exclude times without opportunity or observation coverage.

Show the base rate

Report how often the consequence occurs across the observation period and within each state. A common scheduled event can follow many responses by chance.

Calculate before interpreting

Present raw response-consequence, response-no-consequence, nonresponse-consequence, and nonresponse-no-consequence cells. Then calculate conditional probabilities and their difference.

Reserve functional claims

A contingency measure describes response-consequence dependence in the coded sample. Reinforcement requires a later strengthening or maintenance effect, and treatment causality needs an appropriate design.

Use this sequence to distinguish contingency from temporal contiguity in assessment

Define Valeria's events and windows, construct comparable response and nonresponse states, preserve base rates and invalid windows, calculate raw conditionals, and limit the interpretation to the observed dependency.

Build Valeria's contiguity-versus-contingency comparison

Create one versioned contiguity-versus-contingency comparison for the accessible transit-help observation. Include Valeria's priority, response class, consequence class, learning history, response and nonresponse states, time windows, value, availability, effort, delay, magnitude, quality, duration, rules, prompts, access, health, integrity, agreement, raw cells, invalidity, missingness, withdrawal, direct experience, result, uncertainty, decision, owner, correction, and review trigger. Store only decision-relevant information with role-limited access.

Validate Valeria's contingency evidence

Confirm that Valeria's response and nonresponse windows share duration, context, opportunity, and consequence definition. Reproduce 14/20, 12/20, 0.70, 0.60, and 0.10. Review overlapping events, truncated windows, serial dependence, schedule-driven help, partner location, prompts, and time precision. Also examine whether scheduled transit assistance, crowded periods, or one partner's shift explains both the message and the arrival of help before adding more observation. A positive difference describes this sampled dependency; it does not establish reinforcement or causation.

Keep Valeria's dependency, function, and experience separate

Measure response-consequence dependency within eligible response and nonresponse states. Evaluate later functional effects with evidence suited to that question. Ask Valeria separately about clarity, effort, comfort, usefulness, burden, and whether assessment should continue. A strong conditional difference can coexist with an unwanted or inaccessible arrangement. Positive experience can also improve while the measured dependency stays unchanged.

Work through Valeria's example

Across 20 response windows, transit help arrives in 14/20. Across 20 matched nonresponse windows, it arrives in 12/20. The conditional difference is 0.70 minus 0.60, or 0.10. Help frequently follows Valeria's message, yet its high base rate leaves weak response dependency in this sample. Four overlapping windows are invalid and remain in planned coverage only. Preserve every planned and valid unit, raw count, denominator, response state, nonresponse state, consequence delivery, contact, value, prompt, rule, access condition, integrity result, withdrawal, direct report, system failure, correction, and unresolved item. This fictional example demonstrates one assessment control. It offers no universal contingency, behavioral function, diagnosis, trait, treatment effect, legal conclusion, coverage decision, payment promise, or outcome guarantee.

Address Valeria's main assessment risk

Reporting 14/20 alone creates a strong-looking 70% sequence while hiding that help also arrives during 60% of nonresponse windows. Temporal proximity cannot carry the contingency conclusion by itself. Review response and consequence definitions, comparison states, timing, base rates, learning history, value, availability, effort, rules, prompts, access, health, context, client experience, authority, and causal scope separately. A large conditional difference cannot repair an inaccessible or ethically unsound arrangement.

Keep contingency concepts and authority clear for Valeria

The ABAI Basic Principles page lists behavioral contingencies in higher-education content. The BACB Test Content Outline covers contingencies, reinforcement, schedules, rule-governed behavior, measurement, assessment, and intervention as examination content. The current BACB Ethics Code addresses competence, involvement, consent and assent when applicable, assessment, risk, data, documentation, and evaluation for covered people. These sources do not create licensure, payer approval, or an individualized plan for Valeria.

Treat contingency as more than close timing for Valeria

Lattal's conceptual review presents contingency as a functional relation with empirical, theoretical, and practical dimensions. Poling and Li critique vague technical use of the word. For Valeria, define the response, consequence, dependency, time window, history, and claimed functional effect instead of letting the label carry missing evidence.

Use sequential measures cautiously for Valeria

McComas and colleagues discuss challenges in calculating contingencies from natural-environment sequential data. Valid response and nonresponse states, comparable windows, base rates, temporal precision, and raw cells matter. A conditional difference can describe Valeria's sampled events while leaving reinforcement, behavioral function, and causality unresolved.

Preserve rules, alternatives, and mixed control for Valeria

Tarbox and colleagues discuss rule following and report a small teaching study. Reed and Kaplan explain relative response allocation and obtained reinforcement in matching analyses. These sources help frame rules, prompts, direct outcomes, concurrent alternatives, bias, and effort. They provide no universal protocol or source-of-control conclusion for Valeria.

Preserve treatment scope, AAC, assent, and access for Valeria

The CASP public summary supplies high-level ABA behavioral-health-treatment scope for autistic people, with licensed detail outside this page. ASHA's AAC portal says AAC users should always have access to their communication tools or devices. Breaux and Smith provide assent-focused guidance in an evolving evidence base. Follow governing sources and keep health care, food, water, bathroom access, communication, mobility, rest, relationships, safety, and emergency help available to Valeria.

Choose Valeria's next bounded action

Valeria asks the transit partner to acknowledge messages directly, giving the team a clearer and more respectful delivery record. Record the qualified owner, supporting evidence, effective date, current supports, health and access state, implementation check, accessible explanation, disagreement route, and reassessment trigger. Preserve the original assessment when people, systems, responses, consequences, or preferences change. A new arrangement creates a dated version rather than an error in Valeria's earlier performance.

Close Valeria's contingency review

Review the contiguity-versus-contingency comparison with Valeria, the qualified behavior analyst, relevant partners, access owners, and specialists named in the manifest. Confirm that close timing stays separate from response dependency and later functional effect, raw cells and denominators are reproducible, AAC and basic access remain protected, health questions stay with qualified professionals, and conclusions remain bounded to the sampled response, consequence, time, and context. Keep this page draft and noindex until every required review is complete.

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