The effects of child behavior problems on the maintenance of intervention fidelity.
Escape extinction can crash teacher fidelity when student problem behavior soars—use FCT or its low-cost variants to keep everyone on track.
01Research in Context
What this study did
One teacher worked with two elementary students who hit or screamed to escape work.
The team compared two plans: escape extinction (make the child stay and work) and functional communication training (let the child ask for a short break).
Researchers counted how often the teacher followed each plan and how much problem behavior happened.
What they found
During escape extinction, problem behavior stayed high. The teacher soon skipped the plan and let the kids leave.
During FCT, problem behavior dropped fast. The teacher kept using the plan every day.
High student disruption punished the teacher’s own behavior and killed fidelity.
How this fits with other research
Al-Jawahiri et al. (2019) pooled 28 studies and showed FCT plus schedule thinning still works years later.
Boyle et al. (2021) added an activity schedule while thinning FCT and kept problem behavior low, giving teachers an easy add-on.
Sumter et al. (2020) skipped thinning altogether; they gave alternative reinforcers during delays and still saw low problem behavior.
Together the four papers say the same thing: pick low-cost, low-disruption versions of FCT and fidelity will last.
Why it matters
If you run escape extinction and the student screams for 20 minutes, you will probably quit. Switch to FCT, teach a simple break card, and you are more likely to stick with it. Add an activity schedule or alternative reinforcers if you need to thin breaks later. Your integrity stays high and the student still learns.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Maintenance of behavior change has been considered a crucial, through largely unrealized, goal of behavioral interventions. One often overlooked factor is that before interventions can be successful and durable, the intervention protocol must be implemented as planned. This study investigated the effects of child behavior problems on the maintenance of intervention fidelity by teachers across two intervention protocols: escape extinction and functional communication training. A high rate of behavior problems during escape extinction appeared to punish teachers' efforts, and fidelity deteriorated. In contrast, there was a low rate of behavior problems during functional communication training. Teachers maintained high protocol fidelity and those sessions were less stressful and more productive. We propose that intervention protocols can be differentiated by the costs associated with implementing them faithfully. Protocols designed to be user friendly will be more likely to produce high fidelity, and therefore, durable intervention gains.
Behavior modification, 1997 · doi:10.1177/01454455970212001