Transfer of behavioral function as a contributing factor in treatment relapse.
Relapse often means the pay-off changed—rerun the FA to spot the new game.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Jarrold et al. (1994) watched four clients whose problem behavior had come back after treatment.
The team ran a fresh functional analysis each time behavior returned.
They wanted to see if the original pay-off for the behavior had changed.
What they found
One client relapsed with the same old function.
Three clients showed brand-new or extra functions.
Changed pay-offs, not sloppy care, drove most come-backs.
How this fits with other research
Austin et al. (2015) later showed that simply returning to the first room can bring behavior back.
Their work extends C et al. by proving place-change alone can undo gains.
Rodriguez-Seijas et al. (2020) give a fix: let the client taste the old reinforcer during treatment.
This cuts later renewal and pairs well with C et al.’s advice to re-test.
Podlesnik et al. (2025) add that the exact reinforcer you pick also shapes future relapse.
Why it matters
When behavior returns, rerun the FA before you blame staff or tweak skills.
A new function means you need a new plan, not more of the old one.
Pair this habit with context-fade procedures from Craig et al. to guard against both place-shift and function-shift relapse.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
When relapse occurs following successful treatment to reduce problem behavior, it is often attributed to inconsistent implementation of maintenance programs. Although less likely, another potential cause for relapse is a change in the behavior's maintaining contingency over time. To examine this possibility, additional assessment was conducted with 4 individuals who were rereferred to a day-treatment program due to recurrence of their self-injurious behavior (SIB) 2 months to 2 years following successful treatment. In each case, the original treatment had been developed and implemented based on the outcome of functional analysis assessments. For 1 subject, results of a second functional analysis were consistent with those from the original assessment, indicating that the function of her SIB had remained unchanged. For the other 3 subjects, results of the second assessment suggested that their SIB had acquired new or additional functions. These findings indicate that factors other than program inconsistency can lead to relapse, and that clinical reevaluation for such cases should include a current functional analysis to determine if new treatment components are needed.
Journal of applied behavior analysis, 1994 · doi:10.1901/jaba.1994.27-357