Ready to increase desired behaviors in your child, and take some of the emotional struggles out of parenting a child with special needs? A token economy, also known as token reinforcement, is easy to set up and implement. What is a token economy? Remember that gold star you coveted on your homework in elementary school?…
Here’s the scene: I’m sitting in an airport with two grandfatherly gentlemen, one of whom had never had children, I might add, and polite chit chat leads to the inevitable place where I divulge that my day job is all about behavior modification. We talked a bit, not too deeply and seemingly safely, but there…
When most of us think of the word ‘behavior’, we think of good behavior. “Behave!” we command an unruly child. Or, we comment ruefully, “Don’t they know how to behave?” when we witness poor actions. But behavior is not just being good or bad. Behavior, at least for the purposes of the science of applied…
When you are raised in the South, there are a few things that you can expect with certainty: plenty of fried chicken, church on Sunday, and a spanking if you ever sassed your mama. Spanking was a regular part of my childhood, and I certainly don’t think I was emotionally or physically scarred by that…
One of the major side-eyes given to behavioralism is that it does not consider emotions when dealing with people and their behavior. While this is mostly true, it is not a cold, rigid, or unfeeling practice, as most detractors would propose. The focus of Applied Behavioral Analysis (ABA) is on the environment and what can…
The breaking point for me was 24.8 weeks pregnant. I’m not sure why the .8 even matters, except for that I know I was counting the hours until I had to actually be responsible for the person growing inside me, so I was a little obsessed with the passage of time. Plus, I’ve always liked…