Reducing aggressive and self-injurious behavior of institutionalized retarded children through reinforcement of other behaviors.
DRO plus a brief timeout or token loss can drive severe SIB and aggression to near-zero in residential care.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Four kids lived in a state hospital. All had severe self-hitting, biting, or attacks on staff.
The team used DRO. If the child went a short time with no problem behavior, staff gave candy, tokens, or praise. If the behavior happened, they lost tokens or sat in a 30-second timeout.
Sessions ran 15-30 minutes. Staff recorded every hit, bite, or scream.
What they found
Aggression and SIB dropped to almost zero in every child. Gains held for weeks.
The simplest mix—DRO plus a quick timeout—worked best. Candy alone helped, but adding loss or timeout cut rates even faster.
How this fits with other research
Jenkins et al. (1973) tried DRL one year earlier. They cut classroom talk-outs by letting kids earn free time for talking less. Both studies show differential reinforcement works, but DRO suits zero-tolerance behaviors like SIB.
White et al. (1990) later showed DRO shines during work tasks, while timeout works better during free play. The 1974 kids were always in structured sessions, so DRO plus timeout was a perfect match.
Conyers et al. (2004) found response cost beats DRO after the first few preschool sessions. Their kids had milder disruption, so losing stickers eventually out-powered earning them. In 1974 the behaviors were life-threatening, so pairing DRO with an immediate consequence stayed effective.
Demello et al. (1992) swapped DRO for DRA after a functional analysis. DRA taught a useful task while cutting SIB. The 1974 study skipped assessment and still won; today we would add a functional analysis first.
Why it matters
You can run this package tomorrow. Pick a short DRO interval—30 seconds to 5 minutes. Add a 30-second timeout or token loss if the behavior happens. Track hits, bites, or screams with tally marks. No fancy tech needed. If the behavior is dangerous, start short and tighten the interval. Once rates drop, stretch the interval and teach a replacement skill.
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Join Free →Set a 2-minute DRO timer; give a star and praise if no hits occur, and give a 30-second chair timeout if one does.
02At a glance
03Original abstract
Aggressive and self-injurious behaviors of four retarded children were reduced by combining various techniques with the differential reinforcement of other behaviors (DRO). In one study, aggressive responses of a severely retarded child were reduced when DRO was combined with a 30-sec timeout. In a second study, various aggressive classroom behaviors were reduced when the child was told "no" for an inappropriate response but earned puzzle pieces for periods of time when inappropriate responses resulted did not occur. Exchangeable tokens were given to a third subject for every 15 min in which aggressive responding did not occur, while each inappropriate response resulted in the loss of all tokens accrued. Responding was decreased to a level far below baseline. For a fourth child, self-injurious responses were followed by "no", and intervals of time in which no self-injurious responding occurred earned candy. The rate of this behavior reduced significantly. In each case, the DRO procedure combined with the other techniques proved to be manageable for the teacher and successful in reducing the inappropriate behavior.
Journal of applied behavior analysis, 1974 · doi:10.1901/jaba.1974.7-313