Ep. 50: What to Do When You Don’t Know the Function of a Behavior

Struggling to address aggression in non-vocal learners? In this episode, Audra and Caitlin dive into practical strategies for managing sudden, seemingly random aggressive behaviors. They explore why behaviors might spike, the importance of consistent reinforcement, and how taking a step back can be the key to moving forward.

✨ Key Takeaways
🔄 When to Reset: If a learner’s aggressive behavior escalates, revisit earlier interventions, even if it feels like “going backwards.”
⭐ Know Your Learner: Conduct informal preference assessments regularly to keep reinforcers fresh and effective.
🧩 Consistency is Key: Ensure all team members are aligned on reinforcement strategies and behavior plans.
🎯 Dense Reinforcement Schedules: When needed, reintroduce primary reinforcers on a dense schedule to regain stability.
🌱 Progress Takes Time: Behavior change is a systematic process—don’t rush the fading of reinforcers or supports.

📚 Resources and Ideas
✔️ Caitlin's FREE guide on Function-Based interventions
✔️ Caitlin's resource for functions of behaviors
✔️ Audra's preference assessment and Caitlin's preference assessment
📘 Journal Articles – Some useful articles to check out:
     "Aggression in Autism Spectrum Disorder: Presentation and Treatment Options" (examines the prevalence and characteristics of aggression in individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder)
     "Communication Interventions for Autism Spectrum Disorder in Minimally Verbal Children" (evaluates the effectiveness of communication interventions for minimally verbal children with ASD)
📘 Cooper, Heron, & Heward (2020): Applied Behavior Analysis (3rd Edition) for reinforcement and preference assessment strategies.
📝 The Essentials of ABA: Reinforcement schedules and managing satiation.

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Transcript

Ep. 50: Managing Aggression in Non-Vocal Learners

Caitlin: [00:00:00] my first thought was, let's just go all the way back. Yes, it feels like we're going backwards, she didn't need this yesterday But it's not working right now, right, so let's go back to see if we can get to a place that is working, and then kind of systematically weed out those variables

Intro: Welcome to the Misfit Behaviorist podcast. Join your hosts, Audra Jensen and Caitlin Beltran, here to bring you evidence based strategies with a student centered focus. Let's get started. 

Caitlin: Hey everybody. Welcome back to the Misfit Behaviorist podcast. This week we are addressing a question that popped up in our Facebook group about how to work with learners who are displaying aggression. This particular example was a non vocal learner and their behavior is seemingly random, kind of coming out of nowhere, haven't displayed it in the past, and making it very hard to identify that function. So kind of where to go from there in those scenarios. And I feel like that's a place we've all been in at some point or another. Audra, is that true for you? [00:01:00] 

Audra: Every other day. 

Caitlin: Every day that ends in Y. It definitely reminded me like a lot of different specific scenarios in my past experiences, but I think we've all been there in the sense of like, as much as we we've either done an FBA and it hasn't yielded good results, or we just haven't done the FBA yet, or it's really happening too quickly. You know, the learners just displaying these behaviors and they didn't display them last week and we don't work in a vacuum where we can drop everything and go to our assessments the second we walk in that day or have the tools or support to do so. So I kind of jotted down some reference points that I learned early on that kind of helped me from the beginning.

And the 1st was just knowing your learners preferences. So hopefully you do know them already. But again, this could be a brand new learner, or if their behaviors are changing that quickly. The preferences could be changing as well, and it could be that vicious cycle where they're just not interested in the things that used to motivate them anymore. And so, of course, they're not motivating them to display those appropriate behaviors, [00:02:00] so I thought of just those informal preference assessments. I mean, we used to start every day with some of my learners who were more prone to those larger scale behaviors with like an informal preference assessment of like their top three or five items.

Using picture cues and then we knew for that day and we might repeat that every hour or after lunch or something like that. Have you done things like that before? 

Audra: Yeah, when I think about preferences and preference assessments and reinforcers and stuff, especially primary reinforcers, that to always keep in mind the idea of satiation. So you may find something that when you do that assessment or you know the student really well and you know they really love a thing. If you keep giving him that thing, that may not become such a wonderful thing. So it's just always be aware that even though you figure something out, that could change over time, and it actually can change really quickly. So I think your point of just doing that regularly, even if it's very informal, and that's why choice is such a powerful tool of providing choice for reinforcers or what they're working for [00:03:00] or what they're doing next, as much choice as possible, then gives them that control. And it gives them that powerful reinforcer as well.

Caitlin: And if you do have an idea of what's motivating to your learner, and then maybe a couple of ideas to avoid that satiation, I kind of think of it as tightening the reins again amongst you and your staff. Like, really making sure, are we doing everything consistently? Maybe we didn't change anything, but maybe we do need to change something. And the best way to do that sometimes is taking a step back to go forward. And what I mean by that is, I'm thinking of a learner who this year, I've had her for about 2 years now, and when she first came to us, she had very severe frequent aggression. And so we started from the ground up. It was primary reinforcement and a very dense schedule. I mean, flash forward two years later, this was such a slow and systematic process, but we were able to really fade that into a nice little token board, spaced out over time. Aggression decreased a lot over the past two years, [00:04:00] but we're seeing her kind of spike up again, and really don't know why. Is it the age? Is it transitions that are happening? But my first thought was, let's just go all the way back. Yes, it feels like we're going backwards, she didn't need this yesterday, because that's sometimes the pushback I get from staff, right, like, Oh, no, no, she's been using this token board forever, we don't need to go back to direct reinforcement. But it's not working right now, right, so let's go back to see if we can get to a place that is working, and then kind of systematically weed out those variables to like, what can we continue to fade, and what really she just needs to be met with right now for success. 

Audra: We talked about a little bit last week, but things like puberty changes or family and home changes, those type of internal events that might be happening or happening outside of their environment or internally, that can all have manifestations and behavior. So you may have a non vocal student that's coming in with either trauma or something's changed at home or puberty, something's changing in their bodies and you may not be able to pinpoint what's going [00:05:00] on, but you see these behaviors that are changing, which does have an impact. And so just being aware that there are internal events that we always need to be mindful of, including physical changes.

Caitlin: I'm glad you brought that up because I was thinking of that too. It's tough, like, to get to the original listener's point of, if this is a student, who can't speak to you and tell you what's going on, and I've had parents even say, and it's heartbreaking, that I think they're just displaying signs of anxiety, I think they're upset about this change, but if they were another student or another child, I would take them to a therapist and talk about it, or I could ask them, or I could teach them this skill and we could have a conversation about it. And we just can't with some of these learners and some of them too, even as they grow older, it would be nice to say, well, when they get older, they'll have that conversation, but some of them never will. Like that's the harsh reality of autism as we know it. But it did make me think of some of those coping skills we can still try to teach.

So even if I don't know what's causing this pain or this anxiety or discomfort in the learner, [00:06:00] of course, obviously ruling out anything medical would be step zero. But after that trying to teach some of those replacement skills and without even knowing the function, right? Like, you're only going to pick from so many in the world. There's a couple of broad skills that can always be taught, like we can always teach a learner how to take a deep breath, or maybe how to do some type of rhythmic, even if it's not counting, like, calming strategy, or how to squeeze a ball, and I've had a lot of staff tell me, Oh, I gave him the stress ball. They threw it. Or, I tried to give them this counting visual. They wanted nothing to do with it. And kind of like, of course, they want nothing to do with it, right? Because we haven't taught it yet. So what I mean by the coping strategy or that replacement skill, it's not a magic wand that we're going to say, like, I built you this nice calm corner. It's got a rainbow on the ceiling, they're not going to go there and magically go ahhhh. We have to teach them that even more so than we would teach ourselves or another child that age who is typically developing. But really, when you think about a typically developing child who's, like, [00:07:00] 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, it's still a skill that has to be taught, right? Like, we don't ever go to someone like, calm down, and they're like, oh, okay. 

Audra: Oh, now that you said that. 

Caitlin: I did not know that was available. I will do that. So trying to think of it as just the same way you would react toward a typically developing learner, but knowing the process is going to take so much longer than that, but being okay with that. I had a weighted plushie that I thought maybe this learner would like to squeeze as like a coping skill. Yes, I'd put it right next to them. They don't want anything to do with it. They don't understand its value. And this is just one example. Teaching them to, when they're calm, go over and touch it or petting it. Teaching them when they're calm, 10 times a day, put it in their lap, squeeze. This is what squeeze means. Eventually they may decide, after just exposure to something, not only do I like this, but it could be calming in that moment. But until they're learning to even tolerate it or learning to be exposed to it, you're never going to even have that as an option in your [00:08:00] wheelhouse of coping strategies.

Just the same as counting or taking a breath or something like that. Like I've had a lot of verbal learners tell me too " I don't want to take a deep breath. It never helps". It's like just that one breath is not the end all be all, but packaging it in some sort of like common coping strategy, like squeezing the ball, taking a breath, doing that five times. Really, if you've done like that in your normal life, it's just a physiological response. Like it physically, Will most likely calm someone if done repeatedly. So if we can teach a learner to do that, just to take in any kind of action that will slow them down can really help in the long run.

Audra: I think about the many, many learners that I've seen over the years, and there's one coping strategy that I think is consistently the most successful with across vocal abilities and everything. And that's basically time, just time away from a situation. A quiet space for them to go to and just not trying to talk to them in the [00:09:00] moment or whatever. That's like been the thing that's for everybody. I've seen to be the most effective. 

Caitlin: I was having this conversation with another teacher actually recently and we were saying like, and sometimes like, as long as the student isn't doing anything unsafe, we can pause what we're doing just like we would if it was another student or an adult who was uncomfortable with the situation. And we were saying interesting how sometimes with our non verbal or learners with autism, we don't want to give them that space because maybe we feel like we're not helping them. Like instead our go to is to like, but what about this? But also don't think about that. But also do you want to try this calming corner? 

The other thing I thought about in relation in particular to this question is especially our non vocal students. So those who can't communicate is the most important thing when you have a behavior, especially if it's 

Audra: destructive or something is always just thinking about safety. So their environment, preventatively keeping their environment very sterile, if possible, or safe, or, you know, if there's somebody that that takes things apart, can it be a beanbag in the area instead of [00:10:00] nuts and bolts, just always thinking about keeping things safe in the environment before behavior might be happening, because then it doesn't matter what the function of the behavior is, because if you have a destructive behavior, if you're in a safe environment, well, go at it, you know, that's fine.

Caitlin: Yeah, what does unsafe mean if they're punching that beanbag or throwing that mat on the floor, maybe that's okay. And we just ride that out for a little while. Either nothing else is working anyway, or need to get that out of their body, you know?

Kind of coming back to the idea of those replacement skills. Sometimes looking at, okay, if a scenario happened where there was a behavior episode, and eventually, you know what, this happened, and we had to leave the classroom for gym, so they got out of work by this, even if it was like by accident, if you realized something that turned that behavior off, the demand had to be paused because there was a fire drill. So then they were great because they got to go for a walk, whatever that is. A lot of times I'm having a conversation with staff and I'm like, wait, wait, hold on. So you're saying that worked and they're like, well, yeah, but then it didn't really work because they got out of it or they didn't have to [00:11:00] do it. Okay, but stop right there. Think about what got them out of it, and how can we teach them to ask for that? How can we teach them a better way to get out of it, quote unquote, If they need a break from the situation, like we were just saying, if we teach them that request of asking for it before the behavior even happens, or even during the behavior, who cares in the moment that they got the break, as long as they were learning to use their words, that functional communication, the idea of that being such a greater skill than whatever demand they were doing in the first place is so much more important to them in their daily life. 

Audra: We touched on something there that is a key, a clue that I've taught my staff over the years is that, is there one thing that when a behavior is happening that you can do that stops the behavior, that's your indication of what the function is. If they are engaged in a behavior and you have to go somewhere and it stops, well, that tells you they're trying to escape that demand cause it stopped. And so if you do have a student, and you can't figure out what the function is, just think, what is something I can [00:12:00] do in this situation specifically that would stop that behavior? Cause that may give you that indication of what the function is. And then you can, like you talk about giving them that functional communication to access that exactly. 

Caitlin: Right. That's funny. I've had a lot of people say things like, like, oh, my gosh, they have behaviors all day, every day. Like, it's just all the time. And I'm like, wow, really? Or even during recess? Like, no, not during recess. That's all fun and games. Okay, well, right there, it didn't turn the behavior off in that example, but you just identified a setting where it doesn't happen. How can we replicate that, and again, in an appropriate way, teach them to ask for it, have them earn it, figure out the sweet spot of the schedule, whatever it might be, but just like you were going to use maybe like an M& M or an iPad for a reinforcer anyway, maybe that can be the reinforcer.

Audra: Well, there you have, in ABA terms, you know, your examples and non examples and that helps you figure out what's going on. 

Caitlin: So yeah, just thinking about, what turns that behavior on and off and how can we teach first our job to figure out the schedule of [00:13:00] reinforcement, I guess, and linking it, I'll use the contingency fancy ABA term, and then going a step further and teaching that learner how to advocate for that and how to ask for that. And that can be such a powerful tool in teaching them communication. 

Audra: Back to the, the asker of the question, and he's an AAC user, barely, with one word, maybe that's something, really bring your speech therapist in is, let's talk about specifically, this behavior's happening, we need to be able to teach him some communication, whether we're doing break or his favorite thing, let's find one or two words to really focus on and not do it in the moment of crisis, but constantly throughout the day going, "Oh, yeah. Break. All right. Yeah. Let's get a cracker for a break" or whatever it is, so you can start expanding those words on his device so that in the moment, eventually he will be able to use it. 

Caitlin: Exactly. And I think taking that shaping approach is huge. Instead of waiting for the behavior to happen and then being like, "Oh, well, let's teach him that break cause he probably wants it." Of course his motivation's highest, but also he's not in the right headspace to learn at that point. [00:14:00] No one would be. Taking the opposite and completely scaling back on demands or schedule, logistics and things like that and keeping it a very light day and constantly with the one goal of just being that request, right? I've had learners who had an AAC and they really didn't have much knowledge of how to use it at all. We would start with a very opposite approach of putting the basic wants and needs, maybe one button that's all done or something. I'm sure other people in settings have done similar things where we just may, "okay, here, like, come take this block or have this bear and I'm about to introduce a task and prompting them to hit that all done button. Oh, you're saying all done. You don't want to work. Sounds great. Let's take a break." 

Audra: Yeah, I love it. 

Caitlin: It's later I go back and I'll say, "okay, hey, can you stack these blocks? But remember, if you want to hit all done", I'll just back away and I'll do that. Like you may not have to do that a hundred times over the first couple of weeks, but eventually maybe you'll start to see that learner, "so, oh, wait, hold on a second. All done. You leave? Oh, I got it now." And then you'll start to see like a really rapid increase in that [00:15:00] communication and only then can you really expand to more nuanced, like break versus walk versus attention and things like that. 

Teaching the learner who doesn't have vocal words 1st what those pictures or that communication system or whatever, then that's something that they can use to control their environment is huge, it'll take you the longest to get to that first step, but after that, some of those other pivotal steps will fall in. 

Audra: And that brings you back to, if you don't know the function, there's something you can always work on, and that's communication. I mean, it doesn't matter what the function is, you can always work on communication.

Caitlin: You do have a learner who has an augmentative or has the knowledge base to pick up on discriminating between some picture cues and things like that, I've done where we would just teach them, walk, break, water, like, maybe 4 or 5 things that I know they probably are going to want, even if it's so hard for me to understand their preferences at this moment, because who wouldn't want things like that? I mean, obviously, if they push something away, I wouldn't choose that one. But then just on a rotating basis, start teaching those 4 or 5 [00:16:00] things, again, when they're calm, there's no other demands. They're not heightened. And hopefully work on that muscle memory to where they can generalize that to a situation eventually where they are heightened and they are frustrated.

Well, definitely, this is a good exercise, I think, in seeing what you guys want to talk about and what, you know, what we can do to make that happen. So, if you do have an idea for us to chat about something next, drop it in the Facebook group or on our Instagram, Misfit Behaviorists podcast. And otherwise, we'll see you next week. 

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