It's all fun and games until someone figures out the function of your behavior!

As promised, we'll be digging into functions of behavior more in this blog post (super fun stuff!).

ALL behavior happens to access one of the four functions (yes, even yours).  In our last blog post, we briefly covered S.E.A.T  (sensory, escape, access and tangibles).

Sometimes it's easy to figure out what the function of a specific behavior is.  For instance, if you child asks you for a cookie and starts to tantrum or hit when you say no, then the function can be identified as access to a (T)tangible.

If you ask your child to clean their room, sit down, or something similar and they run the other way, then your function is (E)escape.

Typically, behaviors that happen regardless of the presence of demands, and occur with or without other people being present (think hand flapping, spinning, etc) are occurring for access to (A) automatic.  You've probably heard the term "stimming" or SSB's; these are occurring for this function.

Now, (A) attention can be harder.  We have a tendency as adults to think that attention only means good attention, but this is untrue.  You can provide attention to your child by giving high fives, snuggles, etc but you're also providing attention when you're raising your voice, becoming upset, putting your child in time-out, etc etc.

This is the key to why those generalized behavior strategies won't work.  If your child hits to escape a demand, and is placed in time out every time they hit - then they've successfully escaped the demand.  So next time they want to escape, they'll hit.  If your child wants attention, and knows if they hit their sibling that they'll end up in time out - they'll probably hit their sibling a lot (lots of time outs equals lots of attention, especially if you have to keep reminding them to sit in their seat).

Remember those handy ABC charts I gave you last time.  If you fill those out, you'll be able to see what the common consequence for your child's behaviors are!

Here's where things get interesting.  Take a peek at the chart below.

Got it?  Nope, probably not.  That's because we've been taught that "punishment" means bad and "reinforcement" means good.  Just to mess with you a little bit, I need you to forget everything you thought you knew about those two terms. 

Next time, we'll discuss this more in depth!

But why doesn't it work?! (The problem with generalized behavior strategies)

As a continuation of our last post, here is some more information on behavioral interventions.


Now, we know that there are four functions for behavior.  Think of S.E.A.T  (Sensory, Escape, Attention, Tangible).  Every. Single. Behavior, occurs to access one of these 4 functions. (Remember this, it'll come in handy later).

Every single day I see posts asking for advice or interventions for a child engaging in some behavior that the parent/caregiver/teacher doesn't like.  I've seen everything from use essential oils, give him sensory breaks, use time out, spank him, and I get it.  Parents reach a point where they are willing to try anything to change the behavior they're seeing.  They'll turn to the internet, family members, pastors, teachers, psychologists.  Anything to get an answer and some help.

On each post I see, I offer the same advice.  Take some data, determine the function, and then find a replacement behavior.  Typically, people ignore me and that's ok!  I'm only here to offer advice based in scientific knowledge; I am not the perfect parent or the perfect person.  I cannot (and will not) make decisions for other families.

Taking data and finding the function isn't hard, it just sounds overwhelming, and to a parent that's already struggling, they want don't want more work they want an answer NOW.  The problem is, is that any interventions given without this knowledge are just a band-aid (shout out to Paradigm Behavior for this term).  Time out, removing toys, tokens, quiet time (etc etc) may all work in the short term, but eventually the behavior of concern will come back because the function of the behavior was not addressed.  This is why asking the internet for advice is a bad idea; the function of  a behavior are not static for every person and interventions can't be created without data!  (This is also why I have a hard time with School Districts that don't have BCBA's on staff - what happens if you put a kid in time out that wanted to escape from a task?  You guessed it - they're MORE likely to engage in the behavior you wanted to decrease).

So, now you're probably saying "Fine, I'll take your data if I have to but I don't even know where to start".  Ta-Da!  Presenting A-B-C forms for you to complete!

See!  Easy as pie!  Next time, we'll discuss how to start creating interventions!

What to do when I don't know what to do (Dealing with challenging behavior)

I stayed up too late last night creating Pinterest boards for our families (you should check out our boards - we found some cool stuff). and I was thinking about the mission for our company.  There are so many kiddo's on the waiting list for ABA services that it can be a bit overwhelming.  Throughout the years, I hear parents say "I've tried everything and nothing works" so many times, and I can feel their frustration and anxiety over the situation.  It might be a kiddo that hits themselves, or throws tantrums at the store, or bites, or any combination of things that make life as a parent just a bit harder.  While human behavior is a complicated thing, there is an entire field of us out here to help you!  Here's a brief overview of what we know about challenging behavior:

The A-B-C's

Antecedent - Behavior - Consequence

The A (Antecedent) is anything that happens before the behavior, that acts as a trigger for the behavior.  (Hint; as adults we're usually looking for something drastic here - but it can be as simple as sensory overload, or a stubbed toe).

The B (Behavior) is the behavior of concern.  There's a few that are pretty consistently a concern to parents of all kids - tantrums, hurting themselves or others, and bolting.  It's important that when you're identifying the behavior, that you are as objective as possible.  When describing the behavior,  we want to be able to read the definition to someone who has never seen it and have them act it out perfectly. (Hint; it's important to include the duration of the behavior here and any non-examples)

The C (consequence) is what happens directly after the behavior.  Do me a favor here, and remove what you think you know about the word consequence.  We are not talking about time outs, or corporal punishment - it is simply what happens directly following the behavior and can include anything (attention from Mom, escape from a task, etc).  What's important here, is to know that the consequence is what dictates the future frequency of a behavior.   If I throw a chair, and a cookie magically appears in front of me, I'm more likely to throw a chair when I want a cookie in the future.  If my boss asks me to do something, and I scream which results in my being sent to time-out (and escaping the task) - I'm way more likely to scream at my boss in the future.

How many times have you tried time out, just to find that it doesn't work and your kiddo is still tantruming/bolting/hitting?  That's probably because we didn't consider the function of the behavior when we created the intervention!

My next blog post will cover the functions of behavior in-depth!  But for now, process that information :)



Now, I'm a firm believer in creating collaborative teams and teaching parents to do what I do (ask my clients, I always tell them that I want them to know how to teach and help their kiddo if I randomly fall off a cliff one day), and it was this thought process that lead me to start creating my parent training and outreach aspect of the business.   I want parents to be able to assess if their current ABA program is effective and appropriate, I want parents to be able to identify and prioritize challenging behaviors and appropriate replacement behaviors for those, and I want parents to be familiar with collecting data, that way if they're on a wait list for a diagnosis or ABA services, they can start to do what the program will do earlier.

Our parent training class will cover the basics of ABA, the functions of behavior, data collection, and lots of collaborative conversations about what interventions work, which ones don't, and how to make sure they're working.

The good news is that this class is open to everyone!  Behavior doesn't just exist in kiddo's with a diagnosis, we all engage in behavior and ABA can be applied to parenting and kids of all age.  Our classes will be a judgement free zone, we're we'll work together to come up with workable solutions for each family!

Launch Date and other goings-on!

We've chosen our official launch date as 1/1/2018.  This gives us time to establish classes, get the office set up and make sure we're ready to hit the ground running!