A study was undertaken to determine whether a group of 26 parents generalized the use of behavior management techniques to their daily interactions with their developmentally disabled, behavior disordered, or normal preschool children at home. Parents participated in a 10 week course on practical parenting and their parent/child interactions were observed both in a setting in which the parent instructed the child to perform a task and in a free play interaction setting. Results indicated that, in the instructional setting, parents made few changes in their use of differential attention as a function of classroom teaching and the children's behavior did not improve. In the free play setting, however, parents did improve in their use of differential attention and their children's behavior improved. (Author/PHR)