Token Economies - Using sticker charts as reinforcement

To follow-up my reinforcement post, I thought I would talk about token economies (i.e. sticker charts, token boards, etc.)  This strategy can be helpful both for parents and teachers.  A couple examples might be to use sticker charts at home for performing chores or at school for completing homework.  Stickers could be traded for reinforcers, with each reinforcer having a different "cost" (i.e. number of stickers needed to trade in for the item).  The ultimate reinforcers don't have to be tangible items and don't have to cost you any money.  Maybe your child likes to watch TV or play on the computer.  These activities don't have to be "free" - they can be EARNED!  Imagine that, right?! 

Parents and teachers can easily create a chart using cheap items from the Dollar Store or the $1 bins at Target.  These stores often have sections with cheap school supplies, including chore charts, calendars, stickers, etc.  You can even make your own chart using your computer (WordArt, Clip Art, Tables, etc.)  It's helpful to make your stickers/tokens removable (I LOVE velcro dots and foam shape stickers).  For one thing this allows you to reuse the chart, but you may also set up contingencies that stickers can be removed if your child engages in certain behaviors.  For example, if your child is a big "complainer" then maybe they lose a sticker for complaining about how many chores they have to do.  Google is filled with ideas of sticker charts - take a look for yourself!    

Schedules of Reinforcement

There are so many ways to use reinforcement!  It can be overwhelming when trying to determine what will work best for the situation at hand.  I will do my best to explain various schedules of reinforcement and when to use them.

Immediate and Delayed:  Reinforcment can occur immediately after a behavior or it can be delayed.    When teaching a new behavior or when initially trying to increase a behavior, it is best to reinforce the behavior immediately (and also continuously but we'll get to that in a bit...).  Once your child is pretty consistently engaging in the behavior, you can move to less immediate reinforcement.  Delayed reinforcement is pretty difficult for very young children, though preschoolers (3+ years) can adapt pretty well with practice.  It often helps to have some form of reinforcement in between the behavior and the ultimate (delayed) reinforcer.  You might think of token boards or sticker charts in this way.  The ultimate reinforcer (i.e. cookie, playtime, etc.) comes after earning a set number of tokens or stickers.  The older the child is (and the more practice the child has) the less likely you are to need the tokens/stickers and you can begin to fade these out. 

Continuous and Intermittent:  As stated previously, when teaching a new behavior or when initially reinforcing a behavior, it is best to use continuous (and immediate) reinforcement.  In other words, reinforce EVERY time the behavior occurs.  As your child masters the new behavior (will engage in the behavior without prompting, in a variety of settings, and across different people), then you can begin to move to intermittent reinforcement.  Schedule thinning is the term used to describe how you would transition from continuous to intermittent reinforcement.  At first, you may reinforce every other time the behavior occurs, then every third time, every fifth time, every tenth time, and so on.  The best way to ensure that this intermittent schedule will sustain the behavior long term is to use a variable ratio schedule (which I will get to soon).

Fixed and Variable:  You can reinforce behaviors on a fixed schedule (for example, always every 2 minutes) or on a variable schedule (for example, on average every 2 minutes - meaning sometimes 1 minute sometimes 3 minutes).  Fixed schedules are easy for children to figure out therefore variable schedules have the advantage in most cases.  For example, if your child knows you are going to deliver reinforcement only every 3 minutes, then he/she will likely wait until it's just about time for reinforcement delivery to start engaging in the behavior you want to see.  If you child knows you are going to deliver reinforcement only after every 5 behavior occurences, then you are setting a ceiling on how often they will engage in the behavior.   

Ratio and Interval:  To go along with the fixed and variable schedules, you have to determine if you will provide reinforcement based on a time schedule (interval) or based on the number of behavior occurences (ratio).  Ratio has the advantage here as you are reinforcing a certain number of occurences, rather than a minimum of one occurence in a certain time frame (as seen in interval schedules).  With regard to maximum performance, the variable ratio (discussed above) has the advantage over all other combos (variable interval, fixed interval, or fixed ratio).  The reason is that it is not predictable (due to its variability) and it is based on a certain number of behaviors.  Predictability is important because if a child can predict the schedule, he/she is likely to manipulate it and you will see minimum performance.   

Punishment:  With all of these schedules in mind I find it important to say that with regard to punishment, the least effective techniques are intermittent and delayed.  When using punishment techniques ALWAYS use IMMEDIATE and CONTINUOUS schedules.  In other words, provide the punishment for every occurence of the problem behavior with the least amount of time delay as possible. 

Understanding these schedules seems to be one of the most complex components of reinforcement.  If you are confused, don't worry!  I'm a professional and I had to reread this post several times to make sure I stated these schedules correctly.  If you'd like further discussion, feel free to comment.

Reinforcing New, Appropriate Behaviors

I’ve written several posts on reducing problem behavior (it’s a pretty popular topic) but in this post I want to focus on increasing appropriate behaviors.  By definition, in order to increase behaviors one must reinforce those behaviors.  If you are reinforcing a new behavior, you should be sure to reinforce the behavior EVERY time it occurs (in the appropriate context).  In ABA, this schedule of reinforcement is called continuous reinforcement.  Obviously this is time and labor intensive on your part!  Don’t worry, the next step is called “schedule thinning”.  This involves decreasing the schedule of reinforcement by increasing the number of times the behavior occurs before you provide reinforcement.  In other words, at first you reinforce every time the behavior occurs, then every other time, every third time, and so on.  Eventually you will be reinforcing the behavior on a rather random schedule.  This intermittent schedule of reinforcement will help maintain the behavior for the long run.    

Just to provide an example, let’s go back to when I began teaching my toddler to ask for “up” when she wanted me to pick her up.  Every time she said “up” I picked her up because I wanted her to understand the correlation between her behavior (saying “up) and my behavior (picking her up).  Obviously I can’t pick her up every time she says it for the rest of her life.  She’s going to get heavy for one (she’s already pushing 30 lbs)!  And sometimes it’s just not feasible for me to hold her – cooking dinner with hot oil, taking the dogs for a walk, etc.  Now that she has really mastered and understands what the word “up” means - she uses it in a variety of contexts, such as “help me get up in my highchair”, “pick me up”, and so on - I can start reducing the number of times I reinforce that behavior.  When I am cooking dinner and she asks “up” I tell her “not right now” or “wait”.  This has not by any means reduced the number of times she asks to be picked up; if anything it has increased the number of times she asks (which is very tiring by the way so be careful what you ask for!)  To my daughter, it may seem pretty random as to when her behavior is reinforced and when it isn’t reinforced.  That’s what “intermittent reinforcement” is designed to do.  Since she doesn’t know when her behavior will be reinforced, she tries again and again and again until she receives the reinforcement.  When you use this intermittent schedule it is pretty unlikely that your child will ever stop engaging in that behavior.  With that in mind, be sure to reinforce behaviors in the correct context so that your child will learn when it is appropriate to engage in the behavior and when it is not.  It’s not a good idea to ask mommy to pick you up when she is cooking with hot grease; therefore, I should never reinforce that behavior under that condition.

By the way, this intermittent reinforcement schedule is exactly the reason that you must be sure (when using punishment techniques) to punish a problem behavior EVERY time it occurs.  If you are only punishing intermittently, then you must also be reinforcing intermittently.  And as we just discussed, if you reinforce something intermittently then it is pretty unlikely your child will ever stop engaging in that behavior!! 

Well, I almost made it through a post without talking about decreasing behavior, ALMOST.             

We've All Been There - The Public Meltdown

Have you ever found yourself in the cookie aisle with a screaming child looking around at all the other normal people (you know, the ones without kids) and think to yourself "What? That's not my kid!"  For a second you think about actually saying that phrase and walking away (c'mon, we've all been there).  But, of course, you can't walk away so you stand there, embarrased, pleading with your child and inevitably you give in just so the tantrum will STOP!  I see it happen at the grocery store ALL THE TIME!  It makes me cringe because I know that the same scenario will just happen again the next time.  I feel bad for the mom (or dad) and do my best to pretend like I didn't see anything so I don't add to their embarrassment.  So what are you supposed to do if you find yourself in this situation?  To spare yourself the embarrassment and nasty looks from those "normal people" I suggest you scoop up your child and walk right out of the store.  Will the tantrum continue?  OF COURSE because your child has not gotten what they wanted - those darn cookies!  What now?  This insomnia induced mini-post is about antecedent manipulations (i.e. what happens before the behavior) to avoid those tantrums in the future.

You are the walking, talking, breathing functional behavior assessor now and you need to assess the situation.  Review the data in your head:
Antecedent - You went down the cookie aisle, your child asked for oreos, you said "Not today."
Behavior - Your child screams "But I want cookies," and falls to the floor in an all out tantrum (screaming, kicking, crying)
Consequence - You left the store, or maybe you didn't but PLEASE tell me you didn't get him the cookies!       

The data tells us that the cookie aisle and you saying "no cookies" are the source of the problem.  So, you have some options:
A) Avoid the cookie aisle like the plague
B) Prepare your child by saying "We're going to go on the cookie aisle but we're not buying any today.  But if you are a good boy then when we get to the check-out line I'll get you a candy bar - or a soda, gum, tic tacs, whatever (reinforcement people!)
C) Why the heck did you bring that kid back to the grocery store?!  Oh sorry, I mean endure a tantrum (and the embarrassment) while you continue to shop
D) Go down the cookie aisle, throw some oreos at your child, and finish your shopping in peace

I hope you chose option B.  It was the only serious option.  And maybe next time you could bring some cookies in your purse.  'Cause sometimes a kid just needs a cookie:)

Reinforcement (and other stuff)

Reinforcement is one of the most important principles of behavior and is a key element to behavior change programs.  The addition of a stimulus following a behavior that serves to increase the likelihood of that behavior is termed positive reinforcement. The removal of a stimulus following a behavior that serves to increase the likelihood of that behavior is termed negative reinforcement.  In short, when a behavior is reinforced (either positively or negatively) then the behavior occurs more often.  This is not always a good thing.  We frequently and inadvertently reinforce problem behaviors.  For example, when my daughter hangs on my leg and whines I usually pick her up.  Do I want my daughter to hang on my leg and whine? NO!  But I have just effectively reinforced that behavior because what she wanted was for me to pick her up.  Now, she is only 15 months old and I can't expect too much; however, she is learning to say "up" and this is the behavior I should be reinforcing.  So what should I do?  Well, that leads us to the next principle of behavior: extinction.

Extinction is the technical term to describe the procedure of withholding/discontinuing reinforcement of a previously reinforced behavior, resulting in the decrease of that behavior.  In the example above, when my daughter hangs on my leg and whines, the reinforcement for that behavior was picking her up.  Instead, I should use extinction - meaning that when she does this behavior I should not pick her up.  If she does not recieve reinforcement (picking her up) when she engages in the hanging and whining behavior then she will eventually stop that behavior.  It's important to remember 2 things:  First, when you extinguish a behavior you must provide/teach an alternative behavior.  I have taught my daughter to request "up" which provides her the same reinforcement (i.e. picking her up).  Second, the extinguished behavior is most likely going to get worse (i.e. occur more often) before it gets better.  This is called an extinction burst.  Be consistent (i.e. NEVER reinforce the behavior) and the behavior will eventually decline and even stop completely.  If you find yourself occasionally reinforcing the behavior, do not fret!  It does not mean you have failed and it does not mean that you cannot continue using extinction.  It just means it may take a little longer to get rid of the behavior until you can train yourself to stop reinforcing the behavior you don't want to see.  

Sometimes reinforcement and extinction just aren't enough.  When you find yourself in this situation, it often leads to the use of the least desirable behavior principle: punishment.  The addition of a stimulus following a behavior that serves to decrease the likelihood of that behavior is termed positive punishment. The removal of a stimulus following a behavior that serves to decrease the likelihood of that behavior is termed negative punishment.  In short, when a behavior is punished (either positively or negatively) then the behavior occurs less often.  Punishment gets a bad rap for a lot of reasons.  Punishment can result in undesirable emotional responses, may cause escape and avoidance responses, and may lead to aggressive responses.  However, there are many advantages to using punishment: results are rapid, behavior that may be resistant to other forms or treatment may respond to punishment, there may be positive side effects such as generalization, and it may lead to complete suppression of the unwanted behavior.  With these things in mind, here is what you should consider before using punishment:  use only after other less restrictive procedures have failed, punishment is more easily justified when the behavior can cause injury (to themselves or others), and it may be necessary when the behavior is maintained by strong reinforcers that we cannot control.  To use punishment effectly you must punish EVERY instance of the behavior immediately, when possible provide instructions about the contingencies (i.e. when you do this then this will happen), and identify appropriate alternative behaviors and reinforce them if they occur.  In the example above, if I were to use punishment to decrease my daughter's hanging and whining behavior I might add a firm "No" whenever my daughter engages in that behavior.  Be careful - we adults often think of the word "no" as an aversive (i.e. something we don't like); however, many children will see this as a form of attention to their behavior which is often HIGHLY reinforcing.  It is often hard to determine exactly what is reinforcing an unwanted behavior.  And with that comes the next post: Functional Behavioral Assessment and The ABCs of Behavior.  Stay tuned...