DELAYED TIMEOUT AS A PROCEDURE FOR REDUCING DISRUPTIVE CLASSROOM BEHAVIOR: A CASE STUDY 1

Time‐out is a common negative punishment procedure in home and school settings. Although prior studies have shown time‐out is effective, more research is needed on its effects when implementation is imperfect. We evaluated delays to time‐out with 4 preschool children who engaged in some combination of aggression, property destruction, and rule breaking. Target behavior decreased for all subjects exposed to delayed time‐out, with 3 of 4 subjects displaying low levels of target behavior even when time‐out was delayed by 90‐120 s. These data suggest delayed time‐out might be effective in situations in which a caregiver or teacher cannot implement time‐out immediately.

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, few applied studies have examined the effects of delayed time-out (Lerman & Vorndran, 2002). Ramp, Ulrich, and Dulaney (1971) implemented delayed time-out for a 9-year-old's disruptive classroom behavior. Each instance of leaving seat or talking resulted in the loss of 5 min of recess later in the day.…”

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confidence: 99%

Effects of delayed time‐out on problem behavior of preschool children

Slocum

Vollmer

Donaldson

2019

“…DESCRIPTORS: disruptive behavior, punishment, reinforcement, timeout, timeout ribbons, stimulus, social validation, followup measures, teacher attention, retarded children A number of researchers have demonstrated the efficacy of timeout across a variety of populations: delinquents (Tyler and Brown, 1967 retarded individuals (Clark, Rowbury, Baer, and Baer, 1973); autistic children (Wolf, Risley, and Mees, 1964); school children (Ramp, Ulrich, and Dulaney, 1971); emotionally disturbed children (Drabman and Spitalnik, 1973) and normal children in the home (O'Leary, O'Leary, and Becker, 1967 (Foxx, 1976a, b). Building on the work and suggestions of other investigators such as Glavin (1974), Husted, Hall, and Agin (1971), LeBlanc, Busby, and Thomson (1974), Porterfield, Herbert-Jackson, and Risley (1976), and Spitalnik and Drabman (1976), the present research sought to develop a nonexclusionary timeout procedure that would be effective, humane, and acceptable for use in most applied programs, thereby overcoming the above concerns.…”

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confidence: 99%

“…Marsha Adler, Woodhaven Center, Philadelphia, Pennslyvania, was the teacher in the replication. We gratefully acknowledge the exceptional editorial efforts of Emily Herbert-Jackson and the excellent feedback we received from Reviewer B. Reprints may be obtained from R. M. Foxx, Department of Psychology, University of Maryland Baltimore County, 5401 Wilkens Avenue, Baltimore, Maryland 21228. retarded individuals (Clark, Rowbury, Baer, and Baer, 1973); autistic children (Wolf, Risley, and Mees, 1964); school children (Ramp, Ulrich, and Dulaney, 1971); emotionally disturbed children (Drabman and Spitalnik, 1973) and normal children in the home (O'Leary, O'Leary, and Becker, 1967). All of these studies involved excluding or isolating the misbehaver from the reinforcement area or activity.…”

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confidence: 99%

THE TIMEOUT RIBBON: A NONEXCLUSIONARY TIMEOUT PROCEDURE¹

Foxx

Shapiro

1978

112

Recently, the use of timeout rooms has been questioned by various agencies, and some have adopted policies that prohibit or greatly restrict exclusionary timeout. The present study developed a timeout procedure that did not require removal of the misbehaver from the learning environment. The procedure was applied to the disruptive behaviors of five severely retarded children in an institutional special-education classroom. An observer prompted all teacher behaviors related to the procedures to assure their precise implementation. After baseline, a reinforcement-only condition was implemented. Each child was given a different colored ribbon to wear as a tie and received edibles and praise every few minutes for good behavior and for wearing the ribbon. When timeout was added, a child's ribbon was removed for any instance of misbehavior and teacher attention and participation in activities ceased for three minutes or until the misbehavior stopped. Reinforcement continued at other times for appropriate behavior. An ABCBC reversal design was used to demonstrate control of the behavior by the conditions applied. On average, the children misbehaved 42% and 32% of the time during the baseline and reinforcement conditions respectively but only 6% of the time during the timeout conditions. A followup probe during the new school year revealed that the teacher was able to conduct the procedure independently and that the children's disruptive behaviors were maintained at low levels. The practicality and acceptability of the procedure were supported further by the successful implementation of the procedure by a teacher in another state and by responses to a questionnaire given to 40 mental health professionals. The ribbon procedure appears to be a viable form of timeout, provided that disruptive behaviors during timeout can be tolerated within the setting, or a backup procedure such as exclusionary timeout is available when needed.

“…Procedural timeout has been used, with some success, to manage a variety of behaviors in applied environments: toileting (Azrin and Fox, 1971; Giles and Wolf, 1966), assaults by delinquent youths (Burchard and Tyler, 1965;Tyler and Brown, 1967), autistic behavior (Risley and Wolf, 1967), aggression (Clark, Rowbury, Baer, and Baer, 1973;Hamilton, Stephens, and Allen, 1967;LeBlanc, Busby, and Thomson, 1973;Sloane, Johnston, and Bijou, 1967;Vukelich and Hake, 1971), inappropriate speech (Hewett, 1965;Lahey, McNees, and McNees, 1973;McReynolds, 1969), oppositional and inappropriate social behaviors (Birnbrauer, Wolf, Kidder, and Tague, 1965;Nordquist, 1971;Pendergrass, 1972;Ramp, Ulrich, and Dulaney, 1971;Sajwaj, Twardosz, and Burke, 1972;Wahler, 1969), elective mutism (Wulbert, Nyman, Snow, and Owen, 1973), and unattractive eating (Barton, Guess, Garcia, and Baer, 1970).…”

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confidence: 99%

FUNCTIONAL CONSIDERATIONS IN THE USE OF PROCEDURAL TIMEOUT AND AN EFFECTIVE ALTERNATIVE¹

Plummer

Baer

LeBlanc

1977

Two single-subject experiments were conducted with students in special preschool classes. In Experiment I, the subject's disruptive, appropriate, and inappropriate play behaviors were measured as a function of three independent variables: reinforcement, a typical timeout procedure, and regularly paced teacher instructions. In an ABA reversal within a multiple baseline across two teachers, all three independent variables comprised the A conditions and procedural timeout was omitted in B. Experiment II examined a second subject's appropriate and inappropriate eating as a function of the same three variables. Two teachers conducted baseline and paced instruction-plus-reinforcement conditions in multiple baseline across teachers. Subsequently, one teacher performed a series of reversals and replications with various combinations of a typical timeout procedure and reinforcement mixed with paced instructions. The results of both experiments suggest that timeout did not produce response decrement in a punishment paradigm, but rather produced response increment in a negative reinforcement paradigm. These results prevailed, even though a reinforcer was operating in the environment before introducing timeout. Paced instructions (delivering instructions to the child at a set pace regardless of the child's behavior) appears to be an alternative when timeout is not effective and, in conjunction with reinforcement, was demonstrated to reduce inappropriate behavior to near zero.