Functional analysis and treatment of aggression maintained by preferred conversational topics.

The team ran a modified functional analysis on one adult who hit caregivers. Standard attention conditions gave generic praise. The modified test gave the person their favorite topics—sports and movies—only after aggression.

When hits produced football talk, aggression soared. That told the team the real reinforcer was the content of the chat, not just any attention.

Next they taught a simple card touch that got three minutes of the preferred talk. They tracked hits and card touches across sessions.

Aggression dropped to near zero once the card produced the exact conversation the person wanted. Appropriate requests rose and stayed high.

Follow-up probes showed the gains held without extra cues or treats.

Konstantareas et al. (1999) first showed that swapping generic attention for the exact kind seen at home (soothing vs scolding) clears up muddy FAs. The 2010 paper extends that idea—content now includes specific subjects like baseball stats.

Fernand et al. (2023) later added schedule thinning after FCT for aggression. They proved you can fade the talk time and still keep zero hits. You can bolt their thinning steps onto the 2010 protocol.

Sumter et al. (2020) gave kids alternative reinforcers during post-FCT delays. Their tactic could prevent resurgence here if you must wait before starting the next sports chat.

Leung et al. (1998) warned that extinction alone sometimes fails with severe behavior. The 2010 case succeeded without punishment, showing content-matched FCT can be powerful enough even for aggression.

If your FA attention condition is flat or confusing, interview caregivers about what the client loves to discuss. Build one condition that delivers that exact topic after problem behavior. Then teach a simple request for the same talk. You may get large, rapid drops in aggression without adding punishment or extra staff.