Mini Video Training Series Ep 10 How to identify a reinforcer

Hi, this is Sasha from The Autism Helper, and in this episode of the mini video training series, I'm going to talk about what reinforcement is and how to identify reinforcers with your students or children. So reinforcement is something that occurs after a behavior that causes an increase in that behavior in the future under similar circumstances. Because remember, all behavior serves a purpose, and that purpose is to achieve that same result that it got before. So think about when you see an ATM. When you see an ATM, you walk over, you put your debit card in, you punch in your code, and you get cash. Pretty great result, right? So the next time you see an ATM, because you got money last time, you're more likely to put your card in, punch the numbers in, and get cash again. So all of our behavior really works this way, even for behaviors we want to avoid. Think about when someone calls you that you don't really want to talk to. Let's say— sorry, Mom— when my mom calls and I'm in the middle of doing something, I don't want to answer, I press decline, and when I press decline, I don't have to answer the phone call. I avoid talking to her. So the next time my mom's name pops up, I can press decline and the call goes away. So when I did it that first time, that behavior of pressing decline was reinforced, and in the future when I saw that call that I didn't want to come up, I pressed decline and I was able to avoid it. So that's the basic concept of reinforcement. It's something that comes after a behavior that causes that behavior to increase in the future. A question that I get sometimes is, "Hey Sasha, do you have any good ideas for some new reinforcers?" And my answer to that is no, I don't, because there are not things that are just reinforcers. I know what things are reinforcing for my behavior, and for some of my students or my kids, I know some things that are likely to reinforce their behavior. But there are not things that are just reinforcers that they're innately reinforcing. iPad, Cheetos, gummy candies, Slinkies— yes, those are things that many kids like and might be reinforcing to many kids' behaviors, but they're not just innately a reinforcer. The iPad doesn't have a magic quality of getting people to do what you want. Reinforcement is individual to each person. What's a reinforcer to you is going to be different from what's a reinforcer to me, and that's going to be the same with the students in your class. What is reinforcing to each of their behavior is going to be different, and this can get tricky pretty quickly because reinforcement changes. What's reinforcing throughout one school day or one school year is going to change somewhat frequently. Because what we want will change, and what we are willing to work for will change. So think about it. Right before lunch, you're starving. The idea of cheese fries or a big burger sounds amazing. But right after you've eaten at an all-you-can-eat buffet, you can't even think about eating anything else. Think about the last time you had a really big meal at a restaurant and the waiter brought over the dessert menu and you couldn't even look at it because you were so full. Because what you wanted has changed. So with our kids, it's important to think about reinforcement as this fluid thing because it's going to change throughout maybe the day or the school year. So we might want to have a bank of commonly used preferred items that sometimes work as a reinforcement, but beware that that's going to be constantly changing, and we want to be flexible with that and approach reinforcement as something that is individual for each student. So when we think about reinforcers changing, I kind of like to call this the Taylor Swift effect. When the new Taylor Swift song comes out, we're all obsessed. You download it, you're listening to it at the gym, every time it's on in the car you turn it on, you love it. And then after 2 weeks you're like, "Oh my gosh, if I hear Bad Blood again, I'm going to lose my mind," because you get sick of it. That happens with our kids too. Think about a student that you've had that was maybe a little bit tricky to find a reinforcer for, and maybe one day he showed a little bit of interest in a Slinky, and you thought that you had solved this unsolvable puzzle. You were like, "Yes, it's Slinkies! That's what it is! That's the missing piece here!" And you went out that night and you spent $65 on Slinkies and bought every Slinky that was in your area. And you were like, "Yes, this is gonna be it. He's gonna want to work for Slinkys all the time. This is gonna be so awesome." And then what happened? 2 days later, he has no interest in Slinkys. This happens all the time. We get sick of things, especially get sick of things that are offered to us too much. So it's important to think about that when we think about how we utilize things that are reinforcing for our kids' behaviors. So how do we identify reinforcers for our kids? So some things you can do is: 1. Observe. This seems obvious, but as teachers and parents, it's something we really don't do enough. If you are a teacher in a busy classroom, it seems kind of ludicrous to just sit at your desk and watch your students. Not do anything, not do paperwork, not eat your lunch. I'm sure you want to, but just watch your kids. Take notes. What do they gravitate towards? What do they spend the most time doing? Which peers do they go by? You can learn so much about your kids' interests and possible reinforcers by just watching them. Same as a parent. Again, it seems silly to just sit and watch your kids when you have a million things to do, but you can notice what toys they play with the most in their bedroom or where in the house they spend the most time. Again, that will give you some leads on potential possible reinforcers. Some other things you can do are trial and error, error and taking data. So really taking data on which items potentially cause increases in behavior and which don't. For busy teachers and busy parents, we can't just rely on our memory to remember what happened at 10 a.m. today when you were utilizing a potential reinforcer to know if it worked or not. So take data, write it down, and make sure you're keeping track of what things are working when. Another thing you can do is conduct preference assessments. So offer students 4 or 5 commonly preferred items, things that they tend to like a lot, and see which they ask for first or which they take first. Then remove that item and present the rest of them. Okay, which do you like second? And this will kind of give you a pretty cool ranking scale of commonly preferred items. This is the first one they took, this is second, this is third, and and which things are most likely to be reinforcing for your child's behavior. For teachers, another way that you can find potential reinforcers for your students is talking to the parents and the caregivers. And I don't mean ask mom and dad, "Hey, what's Johnny's reinforcers?" because mom and dad might not know. But ask open-ended questions such as, "What are you packing for an airplane ride or a 5-hour car trip?" What things are in your child's room? What does Johnny go and do right when he gets off the bus from school? Are you considering calling 911 if the Wi-Fi goes out? So ask some questions that will give you more information about your student that you don't already know. Parent is an expert in their child, so they're going to be a valuable source of information. And above all, when you're looking at identifying potential reinforcers, you want to avoid those all and those should statements. And I kind of want to haunt your brain when you think these because they pop in your head and you might accidentally say them. We all do. But there are times when we overgeneralize. So we say, oh, all kids want to work for the iPad, or all kids want to work for this, when remember reinforcement is individual to each child or each student. Also, the should. Should gets you off the hook. When you say, "Well, Johnny should know how to walk in the hallway without needing any help," or "Johnny should just get started on doing his work." Cool, I agree with you. He should just get started doing his work. He should walk nicely down the hallway, but he's not. Your job is not over. "Should" takes that onus away from you when really it's your job to teach Johnny how to walk in the hallway and how to get started on his work. And reinforcement is going to play an important role in teaching him to do that. Just like we would never walk into our principal's office and be like, "Hey, this 3rd grader should be reading on the 3rd grade level and he's only reading on the 1st grade level, so I'm not teaching him how to read." We would never do that. That's crazy. We're special ed teachers. We have to differentiate. Of course, that's part of our job, but we're gonna have to differentiate in all areas of our classroom. So avoid those "should" statements as well because reinforcement is going to be really key in switching the way that that you think about those behaviors. So at this point, there's always a kid in our heads that maybe it's a little bit tricky to find a reinforcer for. You've tried a bunch of things and just, it's not working. You cannot figure out what items or activities are reinforcing for this child's behavior. A lot of times these kids are my King of the Castle kids. At home, life is awesome. They have 2 iPads, one for playing games, one for watching YouTube. Mom and Dad bought stock in Capri Sun, so they're just drinking Capri Suns and gummy bears all day, and life's great. So when he's at school and you're asking him to do 10 minutes of work for 1 gummy bear, he's like, "Child, please. I'll wait till I get home. I'll eat 25 gummy bears. I'm not gonna do it for 1 gummy bear." Because he knows there's unlimited access to everything awesome when he gets off the bus. So if you have a child like that in your classroom, really work with mom and dad on restricting access. To those preferred activities. Things are more exciting and potentially more reinforcing when you restrict access to them. You only get them at certain times and makes it more special. Think about things in your life like maybe the pumpkin spice latte. People freak out over the pumpkin spice latte. It comes out in August for some reason when no one's remotely ready for fall. But everyone wants it because it's only available at a limited time. So it makes it more special or more exciting. Similar to the McRib. People get really excited about the McRib, even though it's kind of gross, because it's only available during a certain time period, right? So you want to make sure that you can get it. Speaking of McDonald's, I used to be all about trying to get McDonald's breakfast when I was in college and slept in. I would always try to make sure I could wake up in time to go get McDonald's breakfast because it was only available until 10:30. And now that McDonald's serves breakfast all day, I don't really care about it as much. So things become more powerful and potentially more reinforcing when you restrict access to them. So think about those preferred activities or preferred items that your child has free access to at school. How can you restrict access to them? You only get something awesome when you do something awesome. And work with mom and dad on that as well. They're probably not realizing the effect that's having at school. So say, hey, how can we set up some systems at home where Johnny comes home, does some chores or homework, then he gets free access to all those awesome things? But he first has to do something for you. So you're gonna have to do something to get that great item there. So some of the examples that I've talked about in this video so far have been things like Cheetos or gummy bears or juice, things that are food, or contrived items like the iPad or a specific toy. So these are things that we're adding, right? Typically when you walk into a room and say hi and put your backpack away, someone doesn't give you a sweet treat. But for some of our kids, we need to meet them where they're at. Some kids, things like edibles and things like toys or technology is going to be what's reinforcing for their behaviors now. Things like praise and work completion and peer acceptance and grades might not be reinforcing for that student's behavior, and that's okay. You're gonna work towards that, but right now, in order to build up new positive behaviors, you want to meet them with where they're at. So don't be afraid of edibles, don't be afraid of toys. You can think about approaching food for reinforcement as kind of like a snack. I like to take whatever snack, if mom and dad sending one, out of their backpack in the morning. They send in some chips or some cookies, cool, this is what we're working for during our morning session. And breaking up cookies and gummy bears into small pieces. So we're not advocating giving large bags of sweet treats or junk food, but breaking things up into small pieces and incorporating that to try to increase positive behaviors. We're gonna work towards more naturally occurring reinforcement like praise and work completion, but to start off, you really want to meet the student with where they're at. So all in all, there is no one item that's a reinforcer. Reinforcement is individual to each person. Reinforcement is something that happens after a behavior that causes that behavior to increase in the future under the same circumstances. So when looking at identifying reinforcers for your kids, your kids will be telling you what is reinforcing to their behavior because they will be engaging in those behaviors more likely in the future after they get that reinforcement. So make sure to observe your child's behavior, take data, and avoid those all and should statements. Not all kids like the iPad. And you want to meet your kids with where they're at. Work with them with what's reinforcing for their behavior now and slowly start working towards naturally occurring reinforcement. I hope you enjoyed this episode of our mini video training series. Please check out the other episodes in the series and let us know if you have any suggestions for future episode topics.