Further analysis of antecedent interventions on preschoolers' compliance.

Three preschoolers who ignored adult requests took part.

The team tried a high-probability instructional sequence first.

That means giving three quick, easy instructions before the hard one.

If the child still refused, the adults switched to extinction.

Extinction is simply withholding all rewards until the child follows through.

Only one child started complying after the high-p warm-up.

The other two kept saying no until extinction kicked in.

Once attention and toys stayed put until they obeyed, those two finally listened.

The study shows the high-p trick is hit-or-miss with very young kids.

Boudreau et al. (2015) later showed the high-p sequence only works when the easy tasks earn real treats like candy, not just praise.

That finding helps explain why two kids here still refused—no edible payoff followed their cooperation.

Lipschultz et al. (2017) found zero benefit from high-p unless adults also used contingent reinforcement, matching the need-to-pivot pattern seen here.

Bullock et al. (2006) got good results with high-p alone, but their children were typically developing, hinting that the tactic may falter when stronger escape behavior is present.

Start your session with two or three high-p requests if you like, but watch the data minute-by-minute.

If compliance does not jump after two cycles, move straight to extinction or differential reinforcement instead of burning valuable therapy time.

Pair any high-p sequence with edible or toy payoffs for the easy tasks, as later studies recommend, and you will raise your hit rate.