Applied Behavioral Analysis: Creating Habits That Stick

the New Jersey Senate for Tourette Syndrome and Associated Disorders, its directors and employees assume no responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, objectivity, or usefulness of the information presented on our site. We do not endorse any recommendations or opinions made by any member or physician. Nor do we advocate any treatment. You are responsible for your own medical decisions. So now it is my pleasure to introduce our speaker for this afternoon and Jillian …. So … is the resident sleep expert at Graham Behavior Services. She earned her Master’s and applied Behavior Analysis at Caldwell University. She has worked in the area of sleep skills for over six years. 4:04 Has received specialized training from F T F F T F consulting, and as a Certified Sleep Science coach, Miss …. We are so so happy to have you here. The floor is all yours. 4:18 Thank you so much. 4:20 I am so excited and happy to be here as well. 4:24 And I will just share my screen right now. 4:33 OK so I also, I would love to see your reactions no shouted out a couple of times. The other thing we’re gonna do is, I’m going to do some poll responses. So, you guys can participate in them as well. Thanks, Katie, for the heart. OK, so, I am the Clinical Director at Graham Behavior Services like, was, mentioned, I’m also sleep specialist there. I’ve been a BCBS now for over 10 years so. 5:00 I am happy to be here and today we’re going to talk about you guys will have a basic understanding of ABA You’ll have an understanding of implementing the standard ABA procedures with the people that you work with Also with yourselves. 5:19 And then an understanding of applying principles of ABA to different areas of your life So who’s GBS, who is grab behavior services? This, in the center, is our mission statement. We deliver services all over. So we’ve delivered trainings to parents, to staff, to police officers, many other types of people in different settings. 5:44 Predominantly, we do work with individuals with autism, although it is not defined to only individuals with autism or special needs. So, we work with individuals from the age of diagnosis. Our youngest client ever was 18 months old up through to adulthood. And our oldest client, right now, is, I believe, 32, or 33 to There really is no limit. We deliver ABA Therapy in Home, in the community, in clinics, and in school settings. And we also deliver sleep, consultation, health and wellness support groups and parents and siblings support programs. And that is all within the use of ABA science. 6:31 So it’s not like, oh, we do other things in addition to our work with individuals with Autism, we work with individuals with really, many different diagnoses or no diagnosis at all to help people achieve their goals. 6:49 And, we focus on three major things: collaborations. We want to work together with families and the staff in other areas. Co-ordination services will go together with individual families and their lifestyle, so we never want a family to be kind of like, I have to like fit in ABA Therapy or something like that. We want to work together with families and consistency. We want to offer continued support, see through the services until the clients reach their goals. 7:22 Alright, so we’re gonna get started with poll number one, and you guys should be able to see the poll on your screen. So, what do you think is the main purpose of applied behavior analysis? 7:34 I have some options here, so just go ahead and select what you think is the main purpose to teach individuals with autism, make meaningful changes, to work with individuals of all ages, or maybe you’re not sure. 7:51 Awesome. I see some people responding. 7:56 So, maybe like, one more minute. 7:58 Um, But this is great. 8:02 Thank you, guys, for participating in the poll. 8:05 I can see, like a lot of people are thinking, make meaningful changes for the client and clients caregivers, that’s a really good one. 8:13 And it’s OK if you’re also not sure. It’s kinda like what we’re going to talk about today. 8:19 Awesome. Yeah. So, it looks like the majority of people think, make meaningful changes for the clients and clients caregivers. I would agree. We also work with individuals of all ages. We do teach individuals with autism, new skills. So, we will talk about all of these things today. 8:41 First, we’re gonna started out with, what is behavior? Behavior is just the activity of living organisms. So, anything that you do say or think a way that we in behavioral analysis quantify. This is the dead man’s test. If a dead man can’t do it, it isn’t behavior. 9:00 So, non examples of behavior would be like laying down, being quiet, getting knocked over by the wind, those are all things that could happen to a dead man. 9:10 But, examples of behaviors would be talking driving, eating, showering, breathing, anything that you say or do or anything that you think. 9:21 So really, a behavior is anything an organism, exhibits. 9:27 That being said, what are challenging behavior and what makes it behavior challenging? If it interferes with learning of the student or the client or others in the environment, it can result in injury. It can cause property damage, or it’s dangerous, dangerous to the client, dangerous to the family. That’s what makes it behavior challenging. So, not all behavior is challenging. Not all behavior has to be changed. Sometimes we work to teach new behaviors, actually, very often, we teach that, we work to teach new behaviors, and sometimes we work to reduce behaviors that are challenging or that are interfering with the progress of the clients that we work with. 10:09 Then, you want to think about how you describe behavior, and we call these operational definitions. So you want to include observable actions. 10:18 What are the things that the person is actually doing, that are the behavior getting out of chair, Not beginning their tasks, hitting someone or talking loudly. It should not include language that is subjective. So oftentimes, I’ll hear behavior described like, Well, I don’t know. 10:38 I want to help my child, my spouse, or myself, but they’re so lazy. 10:44 Well, what does that mean? What does that look like? I really, I don’t know what that is. Or you can’t. You might want to help somebody because they’re so angry. 10:53 Well, I don’t really know what angry looks like, but what are the things that they’re doing? 10:58 What are their behaviors that are indicating to you that they are angry? Are they hitting things? 11:05 Are they ripping up papers to indicate that they are lazy, quote, unquote? Are they sitting on the couch a lot? Are they not participating in activities? Like, what are the behaviors? What are the things that they’re actually doing? So, when we look at behaviors, we’re looking for what are the observable actions. 11:27 Also, by describing it like this, it can be measured by anyone, and it’s specific. 11:33 You want to be as specific as possible because sometimes sitting and watching TV on the couch is totally OK. I wouldn’t want to reduce that behavior 100%. But maybe I want my child to incorporate going outside a little bit more, or participating with the family playing games. So you want to be as specific as possible when a behavior is occurring. That makes it problematic. 12:01 And, a really good way to think about things, is, that a person’s behavior is not always what it seems, we’d like to consider all behavior as communication. So, what you see is the behavior, what you see might be hitting a child, who hits a lot, but what you don’t see is everything that’s under the surface. Maybe they are having self-esteem issues. Maybe that’s their developmental level. Maybe their communication is not all the way formed And so they can’t get their basic needs met. But when they engage in the hitting behavior, they get their needs met quicker. Maybe they’re seeking out attention but without hitting they don’t know any other way to request attention. Can I get a reaction to this like a thumbs up or a heart if you guys agree you know, anything to indicate like Yes, I can. 12:55 see how that that makes sense. 12:59 So we like to think of all behavior as a form of communication, Thank you guys so much for responding with your reactions. And what we’re really trying to get at is what’s underneath the surface to figure out how can we address that behavior. 13:16 Alright, so we’re gonna go to poll number two, what is the most common myth? You’ve heard about ABA? 13:21 I’m sure that there are some things going through your mind right now something that you’re thinking like it’s only done at the table. It does not address problem behavior. It’s damaging or harmful. 13:33 It’s just for kids, or reinforcement doesn’t work, and there’s no wrong answer. 13:41 If you think it is harmful, or if you think like, it doesn’t work, Definitely, you could share your thoughts. There is no wrong answer here. 13:52 We’ll talk all about the common myths of ABA, too. 13:58 Alright, thank you guys for voting. 14:05 And like I’m another couple minutes or a couple of seconds for us to get everybody’s votes. 14:17 Right. I’m seeing a lot of people say it’s just for kids. 14:22 Little bit on, it’s damaging or harmful, It does not address problem behavior. Reinforcement doesn’t work, but about 62% says it’s just for kids. 14:34 That was good. We’ll talk a lot about the ABA therapy that we do for kids. Here are some common myths of ABA that we had so it’s only done at the table A lot of people think you know I don’t want my child to do ABA because I don’t want them to just sit at the table all the time. ABA or Behavioral Therapy. It’s so much more than tabletop work. We go out into the community. We do what’s called natural environment teaching. More of, some people might consider that, that, like a play therapy, where we’re really interacting with the client to also teach them skills. It does not address problem behavior. 15:12 So we address problem behavior all the time. And sometimes, the way that we addressed problem behavior is by teaching new skills. Because, like I mentioned, sometimes they’re engaging in that challenging behavior, because they have a lack of communication. They can’t communicate. I want attention. I want to stop this task, my head hurts, or I’m having pain somewhere. So we will actually teach what we call functional communication. So, it will reduce the problem behavior, it’s damaging or harmful. When ABA is done correctly by a professional by a B CBA, it should never be damaging or harmful At Graham. Actually, we are not allowed to put our hands on the clients in any way. We might do some regular hand over hand prompting to help them complete a task, but no protective holds or anything like that. So, it’s certainly not damaging and it never should be manipulative. 16:11 It’s just for kids. I said at the beginning that we service clients straight through to adulthood. It’s also not just for autism. So I, I didn’t use that as one of the myths. But I think a lot of people think that ABA is exclusively used for the diagnosis of Autism, but we teach typically developing people, people, with a variety of diagnoses. How to achieve skills that they want That they’re seeking out our services for and Reinforcement doesn’t work is the final one. So reinforcement is just the process of increasing behaviors. 16:49 So if a reinforcer doesn’t seem like it’s working, it’s probably just not functioning as a reinforcer, which we’ll talk about too. 16:59 So a major thing that we are trying to determine when we are working with a client is, what’s the function? So, it could be one of these four functions. It could be attention, I’m trying to get somebody’s attention, and intention is a really big function, especially for kids, but really for all people. You’re always trying to get some attention. And if you want to think about it in the form of adults, or for adults, and how it might be applicable in our regular lives, think about how great it feels when your boss says to you, hey, I love the work that you did. I really loved that presentation, like, if my boss says to me, after this, like, Hey, watched your presentation, and I really loved it. That’s a form of attention. And I would love that. 17:45 I think most people would feel like that’s reinforcing my behavior of giving presentations. It could be escape, so function could be escape from demands or adverse situations. You might see this when you do have students in a classroom and one student causes an issue in the class every single time that they are going to take a math test. And so every time they’re going to take a math test, they’re being really disruptive or sent out of the classroom to the principal’s office. Now they’ve essentially escaped taking that math tests. 18:20 It could be tangible. Function is access to tangible or preferred items. 18:25 So, I engage, I, you know, sometimes when you take your child to the grocery store, and they start crying for the candy that’s in the checkout line, and then you give them the candy to get them to stop crying when you’re paying. 18:38 That is tangible. 18:41 The function is they wanted that item and then it could be automatic. So the function is sensory, which basically means that it’s not socially mediated. 18:50 So I’m sure you cannot see, maybe can see? I move my hands a lot when I’m talking. That is just sensory input for me, It’s not socially mediated. I just move my hands around when I’m talking, or I might be tapping my foot, or oftentimes you see people playing with their hair. All of those things are not socially mediated, which means that it doesn’t matter if a person is near you, or not near you, just internally, somehow it feels good. 19:21 So here I have some examples of the different functions. So the child yells, while dad is on the phone to get down to come back to him in the room to play with him. This is a tension, behavior occurs to get attention from someone. And I, myself, I have three kids who are pretty young, the oldest as four and every, single time, there’ll be playing by themselves. And then, I’ll be like, kind of close to them. And if I take a phone call, it’s like, oh, now we want mom to come into this room and talk to us or, or like, play with us or interact with us. I’m like, what when? I wasn’t on the phone, You didn’t even care what I was doing. But now that my attention is diverted you want my attention back so that behavioral episode is occurring. 20:11 Because there is a lack of attention or because the child wants your attention. 20:17 Child tantrums at the grocery store, I kind of already gave this example. 20:20 But because he wants chips and the parents said no, after tantrums for 15 minutes, the parent Gibson and gets the child a bag of chips, that would be tangible. So the behavior occurs to get access to something. 20:35 And then there’s the student who struggles in math class doesn’t study for their task than on the day of their math test. Student pretends to be sick to get out of going to school. 20:45 So the behavior of interest is maintained by delay or avoidance of some aversive stimuli. So sometimes it might just be, you are delaying that stimuli. So, like, if you are kind of scared of the dentist, but you know, you have to go this year, you have an appointment, but then you cancel, you reschedule it for later, it’s, like, you know, you will eventually go to the dentist, but you just want to delay as long as you possibly can. 21:12 And then, here’s another example of automatics. You get bit by a mosquito then, five minutes later, you start scratching the spot where you are a bit when you scratch a mosquito bite. You are scratching to gain access to the relief thought in the moment, Therefore, you are mediating your own reinforcement, so it’s not socially mediated. This would be automatic. The behavior of interest is maintained by access to some form of self stimulates stimulation, or sensory input reinforcement is not socially mediated, so it’s not provided by somebody else. 21:46 And how do we get more information about why and when a behavior happens? 21:50 How do we get that information of the function of the behavior? What we do as … is we track ABC Data, Antecedent Behavior Consequence, so antecedent is what happens before the behavior occurs. The behavior, of course, is what the person does. What does the beat your look like? 22:12 And the consequences. What happens immediately after the behavior? So, when you’re looking at the antecedent, all of these things are essentially like the antecedent, is what causes the behavior to happen. and the consequences. What causes the behavior to happen again. So, if you think about the antecedent, what happens before the behavior begins? If you have a child who maybe is not getting a lot of attention, they are a little bit bored. 22:40 So then as a behavior, they start throwing all the toys around the room, and as a consequence, you, as the parent go in and you provide attention, you play with them. So the antecedent that boredom is what caused the behavior to occur. 22:57 But your attention, after the fact, after the behavior occurred, is what causes the behavior to occur again in the future, because however, we provide a consequence to the behavior, that’s going to cause it to happen again and again, and again, if we provide reinforcement. 23:18 So, here are some additional examples. 23:22 The setting is over there on the left, so if the setting is recess, the antecedent Lizzie loses a game as the behavior she yells, cries, and falls to the ground. And as a consequence, peers try to calm her down and ask her to play again. 23:37 The function in that situation would be attention because lizhi wanted to continue to play. 23:44 That’s why she’s yelling, crying and falling to the ground, and then the peers attend to her a lot and ask her to play again. 23:52 So, then, that behavior, that crying and yelling that behavior received a lot of attention. So then she will engage in that behavior again to get that attention again. If you look at the second example, language arts, Jason is asked to write a character response. He argues he refuses to work. He uses profanity, so he engages in those disruptive, challenging behaviors, and as a consequence, he sent to the principal and that functioned as escape so he didn’t want to do that work, and then he got out of doing that work. 24:33 Then the last example, unstructured class, So Johnny is seated next to peers. He tears up paper and speed and as a consequence, his peers laugh at him and he smiles, and the function was attention. So it’s just, it’s so easy to see when you break it down like this. Oh, why might they be engaging and our behavior? And what consequence can I provide in the future? So, that way, we can teach new skills to get that behavior, or to get that consequence. Because, if, let’s take the last example for Johnny. If Johnny doesn’t know how to get his peers attention appropriately, or how to make them laugh at appropriate times, and he’s gonna continue to engage in that behavior so that we keep continues to get that attention from his peers. 25:26 So, how does this apply to my life? I know, you might be thinking, like, oh, you know what? This applies to students, and I’m still not convinced that it doesn’t only apply to kids, but it can apply to your life as well. So, behavior analysis is applicable to all people in various situations, because it’s the science of behavior. It’s essentially how behaviors continue, and how behaviors develop, if we want to increase the behavior, such as exercise. So, we want to can we want to increase exercise in our own lives, we want to reinforce ourselves for engaging in that behavior, if we’re not engaging in the behavior of exercise, using the ABC chart for ourselves, can help us figure out why. 26:12 So, I wrote up this. What’s the function ABC Chart for that example. So, if the setting is, I’m at Home after work. 26:20 The antecedent is I want to watch a TV show. 26:24 As a, as the behavior, I cancel my gym session, and as a consequence, I get to watch the TV show now, that functions as escape, I did not have to go to the gym, and access to tangible, I got to watch my TV show. Now, what can you do to change this? If you know, this is your usual schedule. What can you do to change this for yourself? Provide yourself some reinforcement for going to the gym. 26:49 Whatever that reinforcer would be for yourself. Maybe you go to the gym and on the way home, you get a Starbucks coffee. 26:57 Maybe you go to the gym, and then you can like, Buy yourself something. Whatever is a reinforcer for yourself. Plan another time to watch your TV show, so if that television show that access to that tangible is really delaying you going to the gym, maybe just plan to watch that show before you go to bed. Plan another time to go exercise. So it’s like, you can only watch that show when you get home from work and you find that like, I just don’t have the energy to go to the gym at that time. 27:29 Plan another time to exercise that fits more into your schedule, or find exorcized you enjoy doing. 27:36 I feel like that’s one of those things that, you know, sometimes people will be like, oh, I have to go for a run. And then I look into it and I’m like, Do you enjoy that activity? Do you find the action of running, reinforcing? Do you find that you have the internal motivation or intrinsic motivation to go and do running? And they say like, No, I really hate running, I just really want to do cardio. It’s like, OK. Let’s explore what else you can do. That’s going to be more naturally reinforcing two that you actually enjoy, because there are many other options. So finding an exercise you enjoy doing might be helpful. 28:21 Alright, so general good practices, this is for clients that we work with, students, or really even for yourself. Greet your client every morning or every time you work with them. Engage in conversation at appropriate times. Remember that it’s nicer to work with people that we like and enjoy, so you want to pair yourself with your clients. 28:45 Find out what’s important to them and incorporate their interests. Use humor when appropriate. 28:50 Collaborate with your clients, and use positive reinforcement. So, like, high fives praise and so on. Just like what I was saying with the exercise, like, find things that the client enjoys, and if you are trying to help yourself, learn a new skill, find things that you enjoy too. 29:08 Preferential seating, so close to the instructor, or close to the parent, and away from other triggers. Like for myself, I always want my kids to come and eat dinner with us at the table my, my husband and I So, you know, sometimes they’ll say like, Oh, but only if I sit next to you, it’s like, OK, come on over. You sit right next to me when we eat dinner at home. That doesn’t bother me at all. I actually really enjoy it, but if that preferential seating is going to help them engage in that behavior, that’s going to reinforce that behavior. 29:40 Then, I want to participate in that minimal distractions. So like, the iPad off, or the laptop close, unless it’s in use, and only necessary materials materials out on the desk, to just re-iterate my eating dinner example, It’s like I have to move every single thing off the table. My kids are four, and I have three year old twins, so I need to get every single thing off the table. The TV is off, that computers are away. The phones are away and no markers or crayons or anything out on the table that they can also draw with. There’ll be super distracted. Use, visuals as reminders like session rules or a schedule. And keep in mind. like not all prompts to have to be have to be faded. Think about yourself. Do you have a calendar that you follow? Do you have a task or to-do list? 30:32 Myself, I have a calendar for work and a calendar for home and then I also have a to-do list for home and I have a to-do list for work as well. And for my kids at home, I also have a schedule of how we’re gonna get ready in the morning. I have a schedule of what they’re going to eat every day at lunch, so that way it changes. Nobody is asking me to fade those schedules away. 30:59 So find what works for you, Find what works, works for your clients, or for the students that you’re working with, and keep in mind, like, you can always change it. 31:10 You can always make it less, you know, like, less obvious, or you can transfer it to a phone, or something like that. 31:18 But you want to make sure that you are giving your clients or your students a place to be independent, manage their own schedules. 31:27 I, for positive reinforcement, it’s a 5 to 1 ratio of praise to criticism or correction. So oftentimes, especially as a parent, or sometimes as a teacher, too, it’s so easy to shout out when a person or student, a client is doing something that you want them to stop. 31:46 But we have to remember that we have to say, five times as much, the things that they’re doing, great. So you want to use specific praise like, I like the way you took out your notebook, I love the way you’re sitting at your desk, I like the way that you came over to the table, I like how you cleaned up so nicely, versus just like a general, good job, because we want to call out the things that we want to continue to see. Reinforcement can take many forms, like verbal visual, tangible should be based on the preference of the learner. So if you have a learner that you’re working with, that really doesn’t like to be touched, then pats on the back may not be a good fit for them. Or high fives may not even be a good fit. Or, you know, I’ve worked with clients before that like they don’t like when you shout out like, Hey, love how you’re doing a really nice job. 32:37 You cleaned everything up, they, they get kind of like embarrassed by that, so maybe just like a simple thumbs up or something else might work for that type of learner. Praise the smallest efforts. And every instance, a positive behavior initially. So if you’re teaching a new skill, you want to praise even the smallest efforts. And if we think back to the example of you’re trying to get yourself to go to the gym more, sometimes I will work with people who want to increase their gym frequency like, that. I want to go five days a week for an hour each time. It’s like, OK, well, you go zero times right now. So, let’s start in a place where you could be successful. You can access the reinforcement after one session of 30 minutes, and you’re going to praise even the smallest efforts. So let’s say, I’ve worked with people before. We say, like, I want to run a marathon. It’s like, OK, we have to start really small. 33:34 Let’s see if you could take a 30 minute walk a couple of days a week, and then increase from there, so you can always increase from there. 33:43 But don’t, um, don’t get discouraged because the person is taking the smallest efforts. You want to provide reinforcement to even just the smallest bit of effort, and every instance of positive behavior initially. 34:01 Additional good practices, state, the positive state expectations using positive language, So I always call these, like, do behaviors, not that don’t behaviors, walk in the hallway versus stop running. Even for my own kids, I say things like, OK, let’s clean up nicely, Versus stop throwing your toys all over the house. 34:24 So, trying to phrase it in a positive way, use clear and concise language, sit with your feet on the floor, versus just sit nicely. 34:35 So you want to make sure that you are being really clear, provide choices. My favorite is to provide two choices, And I don’t care which one they choose. Both choices are good. 34:47 So, if I’m working with a client, and we’re going to do either math, or we’re going to do reading, It’s like, hey, do you want to do math, or do you want to do reading? But either option is, OK, it doesn’t matter which one to choose. First, providing choices can give a lot of the ownership back to the clients that you work with. 35:08 Use a common, consistent tone of voice. Use language like first, then. First, you clean up, and then we play an iPad. Breakdowns, goes into manageable chunks and provide breaks in between. Think about, even for yourself, the way that you work during the day, or the way that we do different things. You’re not working for 1, 8 hour stretch and never, ever taking a break or walking around or eating a snack or eating lunch. Maybe you are, but you should also break your skin tone it to manageable chunks, and provide some breaks for yourself and between. You want to just make it so your clients, or your children, the people that you work with, are able to be successful. 35:53 Teach and reinforce the behavior that you want to see instead of the challenging behaviors. So we call these replacement behaviors, teach, change. 36:00 Teach the child to raise their hand Instead of calling out, teach your child to tap you on the shoulder to get your attention versus throwing a toy at you. You want to provide reinforcement to the behaviors that you want to see more often. Don’t take it personal and be consistent. Behavior change, takes time. Don’t take it personal. Don’t think that because they didn’t change their behavior. It’s like, it’s something against me. Sometimes, I even think of that, like with my own kids. Like, oh, gosh. Like, why is it always with me? It’s like, no, don’t take it personal. They’re just learning these new behaviors. 36:43 Here are some potential interventions by function for attention. 36:47 So catch them being good, tell them what they did to catch your attention. Hey, love how nicely cleaned up that work. I loved how you took out your materials. I just like to see that you are nice to your friends. I increase opportunities for appropriate social interaction. So, if they are trying to get your attention, then give them your attention for things that you want to see. More reactive strategies, reward students when they raise their hand. If you’re in a classroom, Minimize Attention when they do call out. So when they engage in problematic behaviors, minimize your attention to those behaviors. It would not be effective if the client was engaging in some behavior for attention to engage in reprimands or yelling behavior. And I’m not saying anybody does that. 37:31 But it does good to keep in mind that that would not be effective for an individual who wanted your attention. 37:39 Because even if you don’t like to be yelled at or you don’t want to be reprimanded, that’s still a form of attention for this, the individuals that we work with, Interventions by function for tangible. Proactive strategies, free access to things they like. 37:57 Being the attendance or calendar help, right? If you’re in school, or just free access to, and availability to things that they like. Functional communication training. So, the ability to ask for things that they want, versus engaging in a challenging behavior to get the things that they want. Reactive strategies were word appropriate requests or a task completion. So, you want to make sure that you are providing those tangible items, like the iPad, snacks, stickers, as a reward for doing the things that you ask them to. 38:31 And strategies that are not effective free access after problem behavior has occurred essentially like giving in with the chip’s example. Or the candy example, like, where your child is crying in the grocery store, and then you give them the candy. You would like to use one of these proactive strategies for them, like proactively. We’re gonna have some chips before we go. So you’re not hungry and then reactively if you get through the line Nicely when we’re leaving. I will give you a little piece of candy after we leave. 39:07 Interventions by function escape provide frequent breaks throughout the day. 39:12 Like I mentioned already, you could do that for yourself as well. Provide breaks, so that way you can take a break, or your clients can take a break. Integrate easy tasks with new work. Remember, nobody wants to be working on the most difficult thing all the time. Sometimes, when I’m going about my day, I might even incorporate some easier tasks. Some things, like checking my e-mail or something that’s a little bit easier. 39:40 Versus sometimes focusing on harder or newer tasks like creating trainings. or something that I might find that takes up a lot more time, or a lot more energy provider combinations and other supports. So, if you have like that student that always is yelling or creating a disruption to get out of the math test, what else can you do first for that students? So? that way, they feel successful taking the math test, Because if we can’t make them successful in taking the math test, then, they’re gonna continue to, tried to escape from that tests. And reactive strategies, reward appropriate request to leave the class, or leave the area with the intention that they will return to work at a later time. We often do break cards. So I’m requesting a break to get out of math class, but I will come back, and I will finish working on this task. 40:36 Strategies that are not effective, sending them out of the room, or going to the office, it’s done quite often. When we see, you know, school behavior plans like that, they’re being sent to the principal’s office, it’s like, well, then we let them escape from that task. 40:55 Automatic, this would be kind of those non socially mediated tasks or behaviors. Provide non contingent access, just allow them to engage in that behavior. Introduce items that compete with the behavior or provide competing items on a schedule. Something like fidget spinners. If a person is engaging in a lot of stereotypical behavior with their hands, you could do response blocking or differential reinforcement for reactive strategies. But things that are not effective, like assuming there’s nothing that can be done, or that medication is the only thing that can be done. 41:33 So, what else can be done? We’re going to talk about prompts. 41:36 Verbal modeling, verbal modeling, gesture, physical and visual. And we’re gonna talk some more about reinforcement. 41:45 All right. prompts. 41:47 So prompts are specific form of assistance given by an adult before or as the student attempts to use the skill. They may be additional instruction, gestures, demonstrations, touches, or other things that we arrange to do to increase the likelihood that people will make the correct response. 42:06 A prompt is basically anything that you do to get yourself or your client to achieve this skill. 42:16 When done correctly, this increases the rate of responding. 42:19 It lowers frustration. It helps students learn more efficiently. 42:23 Effective prompts are delivered once an occasion the target response how many times am I just thinking in my own head of me telling my kids like OK, clean up your room. 42:34 OK, clean up your plates from dinner, OK. Clean up your plates, is not an effective prompt if you have to say it more than once. So you want to be able to deliver an effective prompt. It can be verbal with you telling them. It could be modeling with you, showing them. Could be physical, so like I am hand over hand helping them pick up their plate and bring it into the sink. 42:59 For giving effective prompts for new skills, you are going to use the most hands-on prompt possible and shift to the least. So the most hands-on prompt would be like a hand over hand. 43:11 I’m gonna take your hands and I’m going to help you complete this task, and I’m going to fade to the least intrusive prompt which might be like a gesture, or just pointing to it. So that way, you know to take your plate to this thing. 43:27 For known skills, once they already know the task, I’m going to use the least intrusive prompt, So I’m gonna just point to it first and I’m gonna go up to the most intrusive prompt if they don’t start doing it. 43:39 So I might help them do hand over hand prompting your location in relation to the student, or the child matters. 43:47 if you’re doing classwork or transition in the hall. Whatever your location is definitely matters on how close your, how close you are when you’re providing those prompts. Keep the end goal in mind, which is independence, You eventually want your children, your clients, yourself, to be able to do the prompts, or to do the task independently, Especially for the younger the learner is, but really, no age limit on that. 44:15 But especially if the client is younger, you want them to gain independence as quickly as possible, as long as it’s age appropriate. 44:25 The goal is to use prompts to teach skills and then fade them as soon as possible so the student can be independent. 44:32 We don’t want our students or our clients to develop prompt dependency. It’s a problem prompt, dependency is when a client cannot do the ask without your prompt and it’s a problem when they start waiting for your prompt to do the task. If you don’t tell them to do the task, They don’t do it at all. And key indicators of this passive, responding, like, they’re not engaged or attending. They just ask what’s next Or they’re waiting for you to tell them like, yep, that’s going to go put your plan The saying they’re looking for the prompt from the instructor. So, we want to avoid prompt dependency because if we develop prompt dependency in our clients and in the people that we work with, it’s essentially making us always have to be there. That’s why we want our clients to be able to reach independence. 45:24 Key indicators from staff of prompt dependency, Sometimes we create prompt dependency on our clients and we don’t even realize it. Prompting skills that you know, your student or your child knows how to do. 45:37 Repeating instructions without providing a more appropriate prompt, answering for the student, or for the client, using multiple prompts together at once, like verbal prompt and a physical prompt or you’re hovering around them. Try to always shift to independence. 45:53 All right, we’re gonna go through reinforcement. 45:58 So reinforcement strengthens the behavior. 46:01 Reinforcement always causes the behavior to increase in the future. It increases the likelihood of that behavior occurring. 46:10 So If you think you’re using a reinforcer for your client, but the behavior is not, increasing the behavior is not continuing to occur, then you are not using something that is a reinforcer for that client. 46:24 So when we hear that language of like, oh, reinforcement doesn’t work, then probably you’re not using an item or an activity that is a reinforcer for that behavior. And think about it in the sense of a preferred item versus a reinforcer. I really, really, really like coffee. I love Starbucks, but I’m not coming to work at the end of the week. 46:49 Forest Starbuck’s, I really like it. That’s a preferred item But it’s not a reinforcer for my full workday or for my full workweek. 46:59 What the reinforcer is is my paycheck. 47:02 And even if there’s things that I really love about my job, ultimately, those are all things that are preferred. 47:09 I’m not coming to work without my ultimate reinforcer, which is my pay. And I think many people would agree with that. So remember, we enforcers. And this will differ amongst any person. Behavior specific, praise, a high five, providing stickers, providing extra break time, even tangible things. Even special snags or candy, anything that the client likes. But you have to make sure that it is the scale, that the scale of the task matches the scale of the reinforcement. 47:48 How to use reinforcement effectively. 47:51 Use it for behaviors you want to see happen more often, like the client raising their hand, as opposed to calling out. You want to make sure that you are using it for things that you want to see happen again, and again, more often. 48:07 Use it for learning new skills. When learning a new skill, your child should receive lots of reinforcement at first. 48:14 I always say you cannot provide too much reinforcement, but you can provide two little reinforcement. So you want to make sure that you are providing as much reinforcement as possible, especially in the beginning of learning a new skill. And don’t worry. It will be faded out after your child show success, or after your client show success. But you want to make sure that you are providing enough reinforcement in the beginning for it to become successful. 48:42 Use it right away as soon as the behavior happens. This will make it clear to the learner as to why they received something good. 48:48 If you wait, you might accidentally reinforce an inappropriate behavior, like stereotype … or non compliance. If you wait, you might miss your opportunity to even provide a reinforcer at all or you might reinforce the incorrect behavior so they might have done a couple of great things, but you’re only reinforcing the most recent behavior that they’ve done. 49:09 Pair was behavior specific. Praise like, great job making your bed rather than just great job, and behavior specific Praise allows you to tell them, specifically what they did that you are providing the reinforcer for. 49:25 What does it look like when an individual is not motivated, they have a lack of responding or they’re incorrect? They walk away, they just are not attending to you? They increase in problem or off task behavior or they don’t consume or interact with the item that you’ve given them. Sometimes I give my kids, and I say, like, oh, you know what you did so great cleaning up. You girls can watch TV. 49:47 And if they’re not really interacting with the TV show, I’m like, OK, That’s They’re not really motivated to watch this. They’re not, That’s not functioning as a reinforcer, so maybe we have to just do something else. 50:00 What are some of the things that staff might do that may affect motivation assuming that the reinforcer from the other day is the motivating motivator? Now? We’re using something of interest to the child and assuming the item will be reinforcing. It’s kind of like the example that I gave about paycheck. 50:17 Something that they like will not automatically be a reinforcer, especially if the task is really difficult. Making a reinforcer available all day for all behaviors or requiring more response effort than it’s worth So you want to make sure that you’re matching the reinforcer to the difficulty of the task. 50:35 Why is this important? No one works for free without reinforced when you are unable to give feedback to your learner to strengthen or increase appropriate behaviors in the future. The rate of skill acquisition will be slower. 50:47 You can often see an increase in problematic or interfering behaviors without a proper reinforcer. 50:53 And where can ABA be applied? schools, group homes, home programs, communities? All of these areas, acceptance and commitment training, is a form of mental health counseling that ABA applies to organizational behavior management, like working with corporations, addiction, animal behavior, a sub, sustainable society, supports, and fitness. 51:16 You know, all of these different areas, ABA can be applied. 51:20 So, poll number three, this is our final poll. What do you think is the most interesting additional advocation of applied behavior analysis? So, go ahead and participate in that poll. 51:34 We will see what people think I put on here. Acceptance and commitment therapy, organizational behavior management, animal behavior, sports and fitness, and social change, and public policy. 51:48 I see a couple of people participating in this. 51:59 Let’s see what people think social change and public policy looks like. It’s getting a lot. 52:06 Yeah, that’s great. 52:10 Sports and fitness? 52:12 I would say, most, it looks like social change and public policy got about 55%. 52:20 So Yeah, I feel like that’s a really great place to be looking, you know, for a different application of ADA And this is how you can connect with us. This is myself, Jillian de Tiberius. And this is the company that I work for a grand behavioral services. 52:37 And if you really enjoyed us today, please connect with us on one or all of our social media accounts. 52:48 And then, I guess we can open up for questions. 52:53 Yes, Perfect. Thank you so, so much. So I am, so we already have one question that was submitted. So I’m going to ask this question real fast, and then I’m going to open it up so that everybody else can ask any questions that they have. So this individual said that they have a teenager that has …, has a complex diagnoses, one of which is D, M D D He has a lot of anger an outburst when he doesn’t get what he wants. They do not feel that they’re reinforcing any behaviors. They said they don’t give in and ignore his behavior. So no attention reinforcement, and they were asking, can AI be used to health and access the coping skills he knows but does not use? She said that he’s 14 has learned all the coping skills and knows them well. 53:42 Just doesn’t see, just does not access them in the moment, and feels bad after, and feels bad about it, after saying, he didn’t have control in the moment. Not sure if ABA would be right for this or not. 53:54 Yeah, definitely. So I think a couple of things that we talked about today could really be helpful with that. 54:01 And if you think about like, OK, you’re not reinforcing the behaviors, you’re not kind of, like giving in to those challenging behaviors. But you want to provide a lot of reinforcement to use of the coping strategies. So are those behaviors getting enough reinforcement? And I think that that could be the area in which ABA would fit in into that. 54:24 OK, so right now, I’d just like everyone to speak, if they would like, I’m going to stop the recording, and feel free to jump in.