Positive Behavior Support, Part 1: an Introduction

Positive Behavior Support (PBS) - the Basics (Behavior Series Part 1)

Over the past three decades Positive Behavior Support (PBS) has become the gold standard for school-based behavior prevention and intervention.

 It is based on the ethical and moral recognition that aversive responses to problematic behaviors are no longer viable.

 PBS emphasizes and reinforces behaviors that are pro-social and does it in a way that recognizes the need to teach, not punish.

 The host of this program was deeply involved in the implementation and expansion of PBS programs in the school districts he served throughout his professional career. He continues to place an emphasis of the importance of PBS in trainings for parents.

I've included a transcript of this episode.  And here are a few helpful links to expand your knowledge of https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ80580

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_behavior_support
 https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5048254/
 
 

Thanks to soundimage.org for the free access to the AI generated music used in this podcast (https://soundimage.org/) 

Transcript

Today I'd like to talk about positive behavior support which we know by the acronym PBS. PBS is considered by the U.S. Department of Education to be the gold standard for both behavior interventions and prevention. 

PBS has been used in schools since the early 1980s and has proven to be the most effective way of not only intervening to interrupt and stop problem behaviors, but it also provides a way of teaching replacement behaviors that can eliminate the original problem behavior. 

Convincingly, literally hundreds of academic studies have been conducted to gather data on the effectiveness of interventions like PBS. 

Overwhelmingly, they've confirmed that the use of positive response methods is effective in changing problematic behaviors without coercion. In fact, these methods are the only ways that work consistently to change behaviors. 

Let's talk briefly about the history of PBS. Ivar Lovaas was a psychology professor at UCLA where he founded something called the Young Autism Project started in the 1960s. Lovas developed what today is called applied behavior analysis or ABA to teach children with autism using prompts, modeling and positive reinforcement. 

Starting in the 1980s, the ideas and methods used in ABA started to be used in other environments like we talked about. It was applied and modified to be implemented in schools rather than in clinical environments.

And around the turn of the century, PBS started to break away from ABA as a separate discipline. Today, PBS is a related but standalone field that encompasses not only individual interventions but now it's part of school, district and even statewide programs. 

Now, let's get a bit more into the detail about individual PBS. I'm not going to provide a short and concise definition because I've never found one that's accurate enough to adequately explain PBS. But luckily it can be described. 

So let's look at an example. Envision that third grade student will call him John, one or two or three kids possibly in the classroom who is constantly in motion. Maybe he has trouble concentrating for age-appropriate lengths of time. Maybe just doesn't look comfortable in his own skin. John possibly disruptive. He's going to have trouble concentrating. Maybe he's the class clown can't seem to help himself. What's going on? Is he spoiled? Is he a brat? Does he have bad training at home? Does he need a good you guys fill in the blank? 

The answer to all of these options is a resounding no. Research shows that behaviors don't occur in a vacuum. They reflect a deep seated and legitimate need. What John is doing is expressing that need in the only way he knows how. His behaviors are an external visible manifestation of his need. 

Some children learn how to behave in socially acceptable ways by observing what others around them are doing. However, a lot of kids with neuro divergent issues such as kids with autism or ADHD, a lot of times they don't have the ability to learn by observing. They need to be taught. These children need explicit teaching, not a label or good, you know what. 

So the job of the PBS trained professionals at John's school is to figure out what that need is that John is trying to express. And then what they do is follow a set of research and time proven steps that will result in John's behaving in a much more positive way, but still getting his needs met. 

The need that John feels in response to stimulus in his environment leads to his acting in a particular way. Let's look at it through the use of an analogy. Think of John's need as a psychological itch. You know the ones where you have the need, not just the desire, but the intense need to scratch. You know how incredibly frustrating it is. Even though the itch will get worse, if we do scratch, that's not often enough to avoid doing so, but it gets too much to avoid doing it. 

This is something like what John may be feeling. He's not in control of how he reacts to his itch. He just reacts to a very strong stimulus.

Okay, so let's talk about punishment as a response to John's behaviors and just keep the itch analogy going for a minute. Would having someone punish you for scratching an itch would that be enough to stop itching? Maybe for a while, and if the punishment were severe enough, maybe even a long while. But the itch does not go away because of the threat of punishment. It's still there. 

That's why punishment doesn't work. It doesn't address the underlying need. It just forces a behavior based on the punishers' need for compliance, not the needs of the person being punished. In fact, punishment often makes problem behaviors worse because the punisher is inadvertently reinforcing the very behavior they're trying to control. 

Think of John again. Maybe he gets yelled at by a staff member and maybe gets sent out of the room and to the office. If his underlying need is to get attention, getting yelled at and going to the office is about as good as being complimented both satisfy the need for attention. 

I previously mentioned a set of research and time proven steps that school professionals take when responding to the problematic and persistent maladaptive behaviors that some students display. I'll briefly describe the steps and then we'll go a bit deeper. 

Okay, so the following eight steps are the standard for providing effective behavior interventions. These steps are the practical basis of PBS. They define what we do to implement a behavior intervention plan. So let's take a look at the steps. 

First, we need to describe the behavior, so we know what we're looking for specifically and it's not enough to describe the behavior with a label. 

Secondly, we need to accurately identify the reason for the behavior. What's the itch? And we'll talk about those reasons in a minute. 

Third, we need to identify a replacement behavior that meets the same need and scratches the itch, but a way that won't get John in constant trouble. 

Fourth, we must plan how to teach John how to use the new behavior. I mentioned before that this is something that has to be taught. It's not something that a child can be told. The child needs to feel this behavior at a deep level and that that takes direct instruction and practice. 

Fifth, we need to know how to plan to reinforce the behavior's use. That's the new behavior, the behavior we're trying to teach. To me, reinforcement is the most important part of a behavior plan and it's the one part that's most frequently ignored. 

Sixth, how do we plan? How do we ignore? How do we minimize the old behavior? What are we going to do when the old behavior pops up? 

The seventh step is that we need to have a plan when the old behavior reaches that intensity level that it becomes very interfering in the child's environment. So it's not just ignoring at this point. We have to do something that reacts to that. 

And finally, the eighth step is that we need to collect accurate data on how it's all working. 

Now, like I mentioned, let's go back to the eighth steps and go just a bit deeper. 

The first step we talked about is the need to describe the behavior, so we know what we are looking at specifically. What does it look like is a term that I use. 

What I like to know is when I walk into a classroom and I have this behavior described to me, I can clearly see what it is based on that description. 

What about the reason for what John does at school? This is the second step. PBS posits that there are four or five reasons for almost all behaviors. They are attention, escape, sensory issues, a need for something tangible, and the fifth one is sometimes used, and I like it because I think it's descriptive. It's called power and control.

So remember that John's needs don't go away when the teacher tells him to be quiet or behave or when the principal tells him or his parents. It certainly appears that what John is doing is trying to get attention. So we're going to go with that as our assumption for what John's reason for his behavior is. 

But I just want to put a note of warning here. Determining the reason or reasons for a behavior is often not nearly as easy as it seems. There's a lot of factors that go into it. It often takes careful data analysis to get it right. 

Now let's look at the third step, which consists of deciding on a replacement behavior that will meet the same need as the problem behavior. The new behavior will have the benefit of getting an attention in a way that's appreciated by everyone, including John. So he's not getting in trouble. The adults are happier as peers are happier and certainly John is. 

It's important to note that these will be age and grade appropriate behaviors. These are not something that we're expecting John to be three years ahead of his classmates in terms of behavior compliance. And that's what sometimes happens with these behavior plans when there is an overemphasis on it and the child is actually punished for something that's age appropriate. 

The fourth step is to teach John how and when to use the behaviors. But not all teaching is the same. I mentioned that explicit teaching is critical. Without explicit teaching of the behaviors that we want to see, there's not going to be a change. 

A child needs to feel what that new behavior is and feel it in a deep psychological and sometimes even at a physical level. This will allow John to integrate the new behavior into his repertoire of responses. Part of that ability is to feel it at a deep level and the way to get that is to provide consistent reinforcement. 

And the fifth step is reinforcement, which again I feel is the most important step. And it's the one that's most important to do correctly. Reinforcement consists of anything in the environment that can be used to increase the chance of the child using the new replacement behavior. Reinforcement can consist of verbal feedback. In John's case, this would be to recognize when he appropriately seeks attention, even partially. 

For other students, it could involve something like a token economy where a student earns tokens to later trade in on free time or tangible items, for instance. The ways to reinforce are limitless, but they are best when they occur naturally in the environment. 

Let's talk about reinforcement and the fact that it's often mistaken for bribery. Many people think that giving a child something for behaving is bribing them into performing the behavior. And without the bribe, the child wouldn't quote perform. 

The difference between reinforcement and bribery depends completely on the timing. Reinforcement is a planned response to a specific behavior. For example, when John raises his hand to ask a question instead of calling out, he has five minutes of time with a favorite staff member at a predetermined time. In addition, reinforcement shapes the behavior we want to see by focusing on it when it occurs. 

We celebrate success, even partial success. And most importantly, it happens while the child is still in an emotional state to be able to understand the positive nature of the reinforcement. 

Bribery, on the other hand, occurs in the middle of a behavior incident. The importance of this distinction is that by the time a bribe is offered, it's often too late to help the child deescalate. So consequently, the child may not have the emotional bandwidth to comply even if they wanted to. 

Think of this as yourself in a car on the freeway, and your car just dangerously cut off by someone else. Think of what that feeling is like. Think of that state you're in and how well you're able to think clearly. And you'll get an idea of where the child may be emotionally. They're just not thinking in that clear state to be able to respond to the bribery at that point in a positive way. 

Reinforcement could look like all the things I mentioned, but again, more naturally, it fits into the existing environment the better. An example of reinforcement, as I mentioned, that John can hang out with a favorite staff member when he's compliant. So the reinforcement satisfies the need for intention and its attention that's appropriately sought. 

The next step, the sixth, is how to plan, how to ignore or minimize the old problem behavior. This is an important piece because we don't want to unintentionally reinforce the old behavior by bringing attention to it. Particularly in a case like John's where attention is the motivator. 

A good example of ignoring or minimizing John's old behaviors when they occur would be to use something called planned ignoring. This gets a bit complicated, but basically it means to identify a specific behavior to ignore and planning how to do it. It can include turning away, removing eye contact from the student, continuing instruction, calling on another student, and so on. 

On the reverse side, we want to make sure we provide positive attention to the student when they are exhibiting the behaviors that we want to see. 

The seventh step is when a major escalation occurs, and it is going to happen. The period of time between the implementation of the behavior plan and the major escalation is called the honeymoon, and then there's that period of escalation. It's called an extinction burst, but we're not going to go into a full definition today. 

But what happens when this extinction bursts occur? What are we going to do? What happens a lot of times with staff is that there's the honeymoon period, things are going along well, and then John becomes agitated and then starts escalating, and then it becomes a pattern for a while. 

Staffs tend to give up at this point. They often report that the behavior plan is not working. The behavior is worse than it was. That's true because it's part of the extinction burst. Eventually, that does end, and then the behaviors do start to deescalate, but it's important to have that strategy when the major behavior occurs. 

The occurrence of an extinction burst is actually an indication the plan that we have made is the correct reason. As contrary as that sounds, staff needs to be patient at this point and let that period pass by. The long-term results are worth it. 

And the last piece is a provision to take data. This is number eight, and we need to know how everything is working out. As a BIP is a plan based on initial data collected to create it, its progress and issues with the plan need to be course corrected and modified, as we need to do with anything that is based on data when things change. 

But what success comes down to at the end is that the adults in John's life need to commit to the idea that behaviors are communication and depersonalize them by recognizing them for what they are. 

The most interfering issue with the implementation of a behavior plan is often the ignorance and the unwillingness of someone in the child's school environment to accept and adopt the mindset needed. This is incredibly important with positive behavior support because it has to do, attitudinally, with people providing those supports for the child, and it has to be legitimate. It has to be genuine.