During the past two decades, scholars, educators, and special interest organizations, including advocacy groups, have critically examined and debated the ethical and legal use of aversive interventions with individuals with disabilities. These interventions comprise a broad spectrum of behavior management techniques including but not at all…

Undergraduates participating in experiments late in the semester generally perform more poorly on demanding tasks and withdraw more often than those participating early. To investigate effects of task aversiveness, some participants were instructed to choose brief cartoon reinforcement with a long time-out while others were instructed to choose…

Few studies have evaluated ways to thin punishment schedules. The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of using variable ratio (VR) schedules to thin the time-out schedule gradually. Warnings were used in some conditions to assist potentially with schedule thinning, but this analysis was limited. Participants were 3 young students who…

Results of a functional analysis indicated that a man diagnosed with autism engaged in bizarre sexual behavior in the presence of women wearing sandals. Several treatments proved to be ineffective or impractical. By contrast, a response-interruption/time-out procedure quickly eliminated the problem behavior in multiple settings. (Contains 1…

Students repeatedly chose between brief reinforcement (cartoon viewing) followed by a long time-out and extended reinforcement followed by a brief time-out. They infrequently chose the former schedule, which they rated as "unpleasant." Then they were instructed to choose only this subjectively aversive schedule. When participants were informed…

The current data-based review encompasses 30 years of research involving parental use of time-out (TO). Although extensively researched for decades, parental usage of TO continues to vary widely across a number of procedural variables. As such, the current review provides descriptive data for 40 articles published between 1977 and 2007 along both…

Overall, pretest-posttest results indicated statistically significant pretest beginning program compared to posttest ending program percentage of behavioral improvement for on task, following directions, and positive interactions outcomes improvement for individual students who completed the elementary grades pro-social cognitive behavioral skills…

Is it appropriate to implement punishment strategies in the home and school settings when children display disrespectful and inappropriate behaviors? This article depicts the advantages and disadvantages of teachers and parents utilizing an array of punishment strategies including: (a) reprimands, (b) response cost, (c) timeout, and (d) corporal…

A common recommendation for implementing time-out procedures is to include a release contingency such that the individual is not allowed to leave time-out until no problem behavior has occurred for a specific amount of time (e.g, 30 s). We compared a fixed duration time-out procedure to a release contingency time-out procedure with 4 young…

We examined cultural differences in mothers' acceptance of and intent to use behavioral parenting techniques for managing disruptive child behavior, and the possible roles of parenting styles and implicit theories in explaining these cultural differences. A community sample of 117 Euro-Canadian and Chinese-immigrant mothers of boys aged 4- to…

Context: Standardized patients are widely used in health care programs to both teach and evaluate the communication and clinical skills of students. Although athletic training education programs (ATEPs) commonly use simulations, little information exists related to the use and implementation of standardized patients (SPs). Objective: To provide…

Background: Intrusive interventions, once implemented, may remain in place longer than necessary unless their continued effectiveness is evaluated. Method: We conducted a phased timeout-evaluation for 34 individuals with developmental disabilities who received services from the same agency and whose treatment programmes contained timeout for…

This study examined the associations of 11 discipline techniques with children's aggressive and anxious behaviors in an international sample of mothers and children from 6 countries and determined whether any significant associations were moderated by mothers' and children's perceived normativeness of the techniques. Participants included 292…

Researchers and practitioners often employ timeout procedures to manage inappropriate classroom behavior. When implemented inappropriately, however, timeout can result in dangerous situations and have received increased scrutiny (i.e., seclusion). The timeout ribbon procedure can prevent some of the dangerous situations associated with other forms…

In three experiments, a rat's lever presses could postpone timeouts from food pellets delivered on response-independent schedules. In Experiment 1, the pellets were delivered at variable-time (VT) rates ranging from VT 0.5 to VT 8 min. Experiment 2 replicated the VT 1 min and VT 8 min conditions of Experiment 1 with new subjects. Finally, subjects…