FUNCTIONAL COMMUNICATION TRAINING WITH AND WITHOUT EXTINCTION AND PUNISHMENT

TLDR

Functional communication training is a promising treatment for severe behavior problems. The study evaluated functional communication training alone and combined with extinction and/or punishment in four clients with severe retardation, behavior problems, and communication deficits. Participants, inpatients on a hospital unit for severe behavior disorders, received individualized interventions based on functional assessment that reinforced a communication response matching the function of their destructive behavior. Results indicated that functional communication training alone was insufficient for some patients, whereas adding punishment produced the largest and most consistent reductions in destructive behavior.

Abstract

Functional communication training has been reported to be a promising treatment for severe behavior problems. In this study, functional communication training alone and combined with extinction and/or punishment was evaluated for 4 clients with severe retardation, behavior problems, and communication deficits. The participants were inpatients on a hospital unit for treatment of severe behavior disorders. They received individualized interventions based on functional assessment that included reinforcement of a communication response with the same function as their destructive behavior. Results showed that for some patients, functional communication training was not sufficient to produce clinically significant reductions in destructive behavior, and the combination of training plus punishment produced the largest and most consistent reductions.