A critical feature of extinction is identifying the source of the reinforcement of an undesirable behavior, and then consistently withholding that reinforcement as a means of decreasing or eliminating the undesirable behavior. You may have witnessed a child exhibiting an undesirable behavior and the parent engaging with the child with requests to stop the behavior, explaining why the behavior is not acceptable, showcasing others who do not exhibit the behavior, or trying to redirect the child to a different activity.
What all these parent strategies have in common is they provide the child with attention. If the undesirable behavior has the function of gaining attention from the parent, the parent has participated in reinforcing the relationship between the undesirable behavior and attention. “Extinction terminates the response-reinforcer relations by changing the environment so that the behavior no longer produces the reinforcement” (Cooper et al., 2020, p. 583).
For this Discussion, you analyze a scenario focusing on a particular behavior and explain your rationale for whether you would suggest extinction as an intervention. You also consider how you would communicate features of extinction to a parent.
References:
Cooper, J. O., Heron, T. E., & Heward, W. L. (2020). Applied behavior analysis (3rd ed.). Pearson.
To Prepare
- Review the Learning Resources for this week, including the required weekly media programs, to gain an understanding of extinction and extinction procedures used to decrease the frequency and/or eliminate undesirable behavior.
- Consider the following scenario:
You are working with a parent who has a 7-year-old child, Tim, who has tantrums whenever she takes him to the grocery store. Specifically, Tim cries and yells at the checkout when his mother refuses to buy him a candy bar.
Post an explanation about whether you would suggest extinction as an intervention and why? How would you explain an extinction burst to the mother and what would you suggest when it happens?
Resources
- Cooper, J. O., Heron, T. E., & Heward, W. L. (2020). Applied behavior analysis (3rd ed.). Pearson.
- Chapter 24, “Extinction” (pp. 582–594)
- Wolff, J. J., Hupp, S. C., & Symons, F. J. (2013). Brief report: Avoidance extinction as treatment for compulsive and ritual behavior in autismLinks to an external site.. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 43 (7), 1741–1746. doi:10.1007/s10803-012-1721-7