I get a lot of emails and questions about reducing sensory behaviors. Decreasing this types of behaviors that are occurring to satisfy some internal sensation can be challenging because we can’t control the reinforcer and the behavior can likely occur anytime or any where. It’s important to think about reducing sensory behaviors in terms of social significance and overall child or individual goals. Behaviors that are self-injurious and potentially dangerous are obviously going to be significant and impactful to decrease. But what about other behaviors? What about self-stimulatory behaviors that aren’t dangerous? I encourage you to think critically about these behaviors. Don’t assume that all sensory behaviors need to be reduced. We all engage in sensory behaviors. Sensory behaviors can be soothing, relieve anxiety, and aide in cooping skills (for all people). Some self-stimultaroy behaviors may get in the way of learning functional, academic, and communicative skills. These behaviors may be at such high rates or high frequencies, that the student now has more limited opportunities for inclusion. You can work on helping your student decrease these behaviors during instructional time but be sure to allow for an outlet or appropriate time for these responses later. For sensory behaviors that are dangerous or behaviors that prohibit learning, you may want to explore the evidence based intervention response interruption and redirection (RIRD).
This intervention consists of interrupting the response. So if it is a verbal stereotypy behavior, you would verbal interrupt the response. For a motor movement, you would block the response. Next, the teacher redirects the behavior to a more appropriate, alternative response.
When thinking about selecting an appropriate alternative response, you want to make sure it is function based. This response should target the same function (or as close as possible) that the sensory behavior was getting. This response could be handing a tactile sensory toy, teaching the student to say “I don’t know” in response to the question, or chewing gum.
I’ll let the research do the talking. Check out these links for more in-depth details for this procedure:
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13 Responses
My 7 y/o son (“high-functioning” ASD, in a first grade general ed classroom) makes noises with his mouth, almost a beat-box kind of rhythmic tune, that serves some sort of sensory need. The school OT, SLP and his para think it’s a way to deal with sensory input, or even stimulation; they observe that it increases as a) the noise/activity around him increases and b) as he gets tired (I.e. increases in the PM). I appreciate their current approach, which is twofold: redirect him if it interferes with the teacher’s instruction and respect the requests of peers if they ask him to stop. (In his IEP review, his para spoke of one instance where another student seemed annoyed by the noises, so she gently encourage them to speak up. My son said “oh, sorry!” and stopped. Both the OT and the SLP added to the para’s story, saying they’ve noticed my son will stop his noises for longer periods of time, and also has a more positive response, to the requests of peers than of adults!) If his noises are not interrupting anything, they see it as a coping tool to adapt to his environment. I am so grateful he’s in a supportive environment!
I wanted to ask a separate question, about something in your post. Regarding one possible response, you said “teaching the student to say “I don’t know” in response to the question,”. This is something that still confounds me with my son. Have you written about this elsewhere on your blog? It is fascinating to me but I have a hard time finding (useful) information about why this occurs and how to help him make sense of it. It’s really difficult at school, because it can appear that he’s willfully not following instructions, for example, when really he just doesn’t know how to say “I don’t know how to answer this”.
That is so great to hear that he is in such a supportive environment with people who understand him!
Great question! I will do some research and put together a post on this. It’s a tricky skill!
Thank you, Sasha! That means so much to me!
What about inappropriate sensory behaviors that affect social acceptance? (….nose picking…). I have a child that is obsessed with picking his nose. We are trying to teach him to use a tissue (Which results in him carrying around a tissue box everywhere). He also loves playing with his boogers after he sneezes. The other kids think its gross. Any suggestions??????
I think that can be one that is targeted for decreasing. It all depends on the child, the situation, and the behavior!
I have a student that keeps pulling down his pull up and pants. I pull them up and he does it again. I have tried ignoring, putting jeans on him, and even put on frequent trips to toilet. Any suggestions.
He also pulls on people and things or chews on them. I gave a chewy tube to him.
Do you think the pant behavior could be attention maintained? Does he do it if he is alone?
Following… I have a student who just started doing the same thing. He is one who cycles through what I perceive as attention seeking behaviors. I ignore those I can, and use non-verbal redirection when able. In this case, it requires immediate attention as he is in a classroom with other students. We have tried taking him right into the restroom, and though he may have a success on the toilet. As soon as he is back in the classroom, he does it again and when redirecting him to the restroom, he refuses and drops to the floor. Possible cause could be boredom, or not knowing what to do with his free time, even though he has access to a variety of activities (swings, rocking chair, toys, etc) and demonstrates that we respond to him retrieving pictures from a choice board for activities outside the classroom (always chooses bike, from choice of 6 other things). He not only cycles through preferred activities, but it is apparent that he cycles through preferred ways of communicating as well. Very difficult to stay on top of! Any advice!
I recently started working with a child who does this behavior also. It seems to be attention maintained. As the pulling pants down is usually accompanied with him saying “pull pants up” and looking at and laughing at me (or the therapist he is with). He is also a child who cycles through behaviors; if one thing doesn’t work with me, he will try more things and continue to cycle through problem behaviors. Any suggestions or advice??
Looking for information regarding when a child constantly has the urge to go pee and leaves his bed to go to the washroom at bedtime multiple times. This is only at bed time when he does not want to go to sleep. Looking for ways to redirect.
I would check out Mary Barbera’s sleep book – https://marybarbera.com/sleep