If students at your school are not attending classes or coming to school at all, they may be engaging in school refusal. Understanding what school refusal is, as well as the functions behind it, is key to evaluation and a collaborative school-home approach to intervention.

The function of any behavior (or chain of behaviors) can only be determined by identifying the prevailing antecedent motivating condition (Cipani & Cipani, 2019). The author dubs this antecedent condition the driving force of behavior. What you desire at a particular point in time, if such desire is at a sufficient level, executes two effects.…

According to coercion theory (Patterson, 1982, 2016), children's aggression is developed and maintained through transactional processes between parents and their children that unfold over time. The theory provides a model of the behavioral contingencies that explain how parents and children mutually "train" each other to behave in ways…

Research and practice in applied behavior analysis (ABA) have contributed to the education of students with autism and other intellectual or developmental disabilities in school settings across a wide variety of efforts, including but not limited to, academic instruction (Delano, 2007), addressing behaviors restricting a student's environments and…

The purpose of this article is to lay out how physical education teachers can implement a token economy in their lessons. Following an introductory vignette, five steps to guide teachers on how to implement a token economy are described, namely (1) selection and definition of target behaviors, (2) selection of tokens, (3) selection of backup…

Research has suggested that students from underserved and underrepresented backgrounds (e.g., students of color and those with disabilities) have received higher rates of exclusionary discipline (e.g., suspensions and expulsions) than their peers who are White and without disability. Various interventions have been implemented to address this…

Despite the prevalence of students with learning disabilities (LD), athletic coaches face challenges in recognizing and effectively supporting the needs of athletes with LD due to lack of professional development in this area. Sometimes referred to as a "hidden disability", LD is not easily perceived by teachers and coaches. Students…

In the context of problem behavior, treatment integrity refers to the extent to which a behavioral intervention is implemented as intended. Treatment-integrity errors may lead to relapse of problem behavior. For example, omitting reinforcers can lead to increases in problem behavior called resurgence. Researchers have previously described the…

The aim of this article is to provide a concise overview of the theoretical assumptions of behaviorism, which generally informs "traditional" approaches to sport coaching. B.F. Skinner's (1904--1990) theory of operant conditioning is discussed, alongside considerations for sport coaching practice. For coaches who draw upon the principles…

Students sometimes engage in challenging behaviors that require teachers to select and design appropriate behavior management interventions. Teachers may choose from various evidence-based intervention strategies when addressing students' challenging behaviors. Reinforcement-based strategies are preferred due to their desirable long-term outcomes.…

Class-wide academic performance can be increased by overlaying existing instructional and classroom management procedures with supplemental interdependent group-oriented bonus rewards. The bonus reward strategies may be particularly effective for under-motivated, low-performing students. When applying supplemental interdependent group-oriented…

Hazing prevention and education efforts continue to evolve in response to changing student behavior. The organic and anomic nature of hazing is deeply embedded in higher education, permeating across campus reinforced by cultural norms and institutional practices. While numerous approaches attempt to disrupt hazing, public health approaches,…

Strategies for preventing the escalation of problematic student behavior in inclusive school settings are detailed. These strategies include utilizing proactive behavioral interventions, implementing function-based behavioral interventions that address root causes of escalated student behaviors, and teaching and reinforcing socially acceptable…

Leaf and colleagues (2016) provided a definition and description of progressive applied behavior analysis (ABA) in the context of autism treatment in which a behavior analyst takes a structured, yet flexible, approach to treatment that is responsive to the learner and includes on-going, in-the-moment analysis of teaching. Since Leaf and…

In this article, we introduce behavior-specific praise as a portable, feasible strategy for teachers and families to increase student engagement as well as to decrease off-task and disruptive behaviors in a variety of environments. We provide step-by-step guidance to illustrate how behavior-specific praise can be used by teachers during in-person…