D. Smith replies to L. Polsgrove's criticisms of Smith's earlier article (EC 133 830) on seclusionary timeout for children with emotional/behavioral problems. Smith suggests that in several studies timeout was seen by the children as a way of relieving the classroom's stimulus overload. (CL)

One current area of dispute in the psychological literature is the inclusion of and proper meta-analytic data analysis procedures for single-subject designs. The current single-subject meta-analysis (N = 25) investigated the effect of time-out for the reduction of disruptive classroom behaviors in nondevelopmentally delayed children. Two separate…

Consistent, unemotional use of timeout, without ancillary punishers, is shown to result in typical extinction curves (rather than the steeper gradient of punishment curves) for both autistic and mentally impaired children with widely different abrasive behaviors. Dangers of punishment and the therapeutic value of reduced environmental stimulation…