On the prevalence and magnitude of resurgence during delay‐and‐denial tolerance teaching
Resurgence hits roughly one-third of transitions during delay or denial lessons—use response-effort tasks, not just waiting, to keep the burst small.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Marshall et al. (2025) looked at every published case where therapists taught kids to wait or accept "no" for items. They pulled out how often old problem behavior popped back up during these lessons.
The team counted resurgence episodes and how strong they were. They also noted if the lesson used time delays or extra work as the roadblock.
What they found
Resurgence showed up in about one of every three switch points. When it did, the behavior rose to only about one-quarter of its old level.
Time-based waits sparked more resurgence than response-effort tasks like touching a card three times.
How this fits with other research
BStagnone et al. (2025) ran a tight lab test and saw the same modest rebound even when kids had many new communication responses. Marshall’s wider scan agrees: extra words help persistence a little, but they do not erase resurgence.
Kimball et al. (2018) first showed that keeping the new communication response available during extinction cuts relapse. Marshall’s review folds that tip into its advice, so the older lab study now guides clinical practice.
Muething et al. (2022) counted renewal instead of resurgence and found a similar 26-36 % relapse rate when contexts changed. The two papers line up: whether you shift place or shift contingency, about a third of cases see a brief return of old behavior.
Why it matters
Expect a small bounce-back in about every third transition while you teach tolerance. Swap pure wait-time for easy effort tasks like tapping a picture or handing over a token to keep the spike low. Keep the functional communication response on board the whole time; it won’t stop resurgence, but it gives the learner something to do while the burst passes.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Resurgence is the recurrence of target behavior (e.g., challenging behavior) during a worsening of reinforcement conditions (e.g., increases in response effort, decreases in alternative reinforcement). Previous studies have examined the prevalence and magnitude of resurgence during functional communication training implemented with discriminative stimuli. We conducted a systematic review of the literature to analyze the magnitude and prevalence of resurgence during delay‐and‐denial tolerance teaching. Similar to previous studies with discriminative stimuli, resurgence occurred for most participants and in about one third of transitions. When resurgence was present, challenging behavior increased to approximately 26% of baseline levels. Resurgence was less likely to occur during response‐effort manipulations (i.e., complexity teaching, tolerance‐response teaching) and was most likely to occur during increases in delays that ended following the passage of time rather than a response criterion. We discuss implications for treatment refinements and future treatment‐relapse research.
Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 2025 · doi:10.1002/jaba.2930