ABA Rocks Registered Behavior Technician (RBT) Practice Exam

Tacting is labeling or describing objects, events, or properties in the environment when the stimulus is nonverbal. Here, the boy sees a stuffed animal that resembles a zebra and says “Zebra!” The toy serves as the nonverbal cue, and the verbal response labels it, which is exactly what a tact does. The social acknowledgment or reinforcement that often follows labeling helps strengthen this response.

This isn’t an echoic response, because he’s not repeating something another person said; he’s naming what he sees in the environment. It’s not an intraverbal moment, since there’s no verbal prompt or social question guiding a verbal answer about a different topic. It’s not an autoclitic, which would involve modifying another verbal behavior (like adding qualifiers such as “I think” or “I want”).