An empirical analysis of two forms of extinction to treat aggression.

The team compared two ways to stop attention-maintained aggression. One way was plain extinction: adults ignored every hit or kick. The other way was noncontingent reinforcement: adults gave the child a quick, friendly comment every few minutes no matter what.

They used an alternating-treatments design. Sessions swapped between the two rules so each child served as their own control.

Aggression stopped faster when attention came on a fixed-time schedule. Parents learned the procedure and kept the gains for five weeks.

Ignoring alone also worked, but it took longer and showed more small spikes.

Fisher et al. (2004) extends this idea. They paired extinction with either noncontingent attention or noncontingent toys chosen from a quick assessment. Both mixes beat extinction alone, giving you a back-up plan when free attention is hard to deliver.

Hatton et al. (1999) sounds like a contradiction at first. They saw extinction bursts or new aggression in almost half of 41 self-injury cases. The key difference is procedure purity: C used extinction solo, while M et al. buffered it with steady attention. The burst risk is real, but adding NCR keeps the peace.

Migan-Gandonou Horr et al. (2021) pushed the same NCR-plus-extinction package further. An 11-year-old with autism lost 98.5 % of his perseverative speech for 28 months, showing parents can run this combo for tough topographies and long stretches.

If a child hits to get you to talk, do not just turn away. Set a timer and give a brief, neutral comment every 30 s while withholding reaction to the aggression. Start thick, then stretch the interval. You will cut the hitting faster, side-step bursts, and parents can keep it going at home.