Attention, Meet Motivation: Why Your Learner's Programs Aren't Making Progress
Planning and troubleshooting are important parts of being a BCBA. It’s rare to sit in a consultation with an RBT and/or learner and NOT find a program that is stagnant. Some of your other programs might be flying along, which is amazing. But, it’s likely that a few others aren’t seeing the same success. It’s something that you have to get used to as a BCBA. Where do you start when you aren’t seeing progress with a program? What do you try to figure out first?
A knee jerk reaction that plagues many BCBAs is to adjust the prompt level. It happens all too often, without rhyme or reason sometimes. For example, if a learner is struggling to match pictures in an array of three, some BCBAs instinctively fade in a gesture or partial physical prompt. It might be the right thing to do in some occasions, but it’s not where you should start.
If you’ve been reading my newsletters, you might try assessing a few pre-requisite, component skills to make sure a key skill isn’t missing. Astute, but also not the right place to start in troubleshooting this program.
The first thing you want to measure, before you make any knee jerk changes, is motivation and attention. Motivation being when a learner wants something or finds something reinforcing—we’re pretty familiar with this concept. Attention being when one thing clearly stands out them over the other things in their environment (like a loud noise). More specifically, you want to ensure the RBT has the motivation and attention of the learner when the programming is carried out.
This might seem elementary. After all, the fundamentals of behavior analysis hinge so much on the concept of motivation. However, we often fail to assess the motivation of the learner when we’re troubleshooting a program. Let’s say that—in looking at your learner’s data on matching in an array of three—you notice that their scores are low and are not improving. Does this mean that the learner isn’t grasping the concept?Not necessarily. Does it mean that you need to change the way the program is conducted? Not necessarily. Low scores do not automatically indicate low comprehension. That’s because low scores can mean something else: low motivation.
You see, if a learner isn’t motivated and attending, they’ll perform poorly regardless of how easy or hard the task is. Makes sense, right?
It’s necessary to preface that motivation and attention are important concepts that go hand-in-hand with each other. To properly assess motivation, we need to understand this important relationship between motivation and attention. There are two central ideas to this that I think are important to grasp.
First, if you want to know what your learner is motivated for, look at what they are attending to.
Second, if you want them to attend to you, become the gatekeeper to what they are motivated for.
That means there are two questions that we need to answer when we’re trying to assess whether or not we’re motivating our learner correctly.
Question 1: Is the RBT accurately identifying what the learner is attending to during programs?
To set up the troubleshooting process, quietly observe as the RBT is running programs with the learner.
We want to not only make sure that the RBT has the learner’s attention, but we also want to ensure that they are accurately identifying what the learner is attending to. You’ll see why both aspects are important in a minute.
Like we discussed, attention and motivation are crucially linked. If a learner is engaging with something, it is likely that they are motivated for it. If your learner is attending to the program that the RBT is running, it’s likely that the RBT has the learner’s motivation. If the learner is looking out the window, for example, it’s likely that the learner finds whatever is outside more motivating than the task.
In assessing attention, it’s important to understand that attention consists of a few specific, observable behaviors. I like to use a procedure I call the Eyes-Hands-Feet test to help me hone in on what the learner is attending to and—in turn—motivated for.
Eyes. Look at where they’re directing their eyes. What are they looking at? What are they looking for? What are they turning their head and orienting towards? This indicates attention. They might say they want the Legos, but their eyes might be looking at their peers. Are they looking at something else while the RBT runs the program? What is it exactly that they are looking at?
Hands. Pay attention to where their hands are going. What are they reaching for? What are they holding? What are they grabbing? Are they already engaging with the reinforcer? Are they squeezing another reinforcer while the RBT is delivering the program? Are they reaching for the thing that they are working for?
Feet. Finally, pay attention to where their feet are taking them. What are they running toward? What are they running away from (negative reinforcement)? Are they moving away from the RBT as he or she runs the program?
These behaviors—looking, reaching, grabbing, running toward, etc.—are behaviors that indicate that they are attending to something, and likely motivated for that thing, too.
Question 2: Is the RBT making themselves the access point to those items or activities?
If you want to gain the attention (and therefore the motivation) of you learner, you’ll need to become the threshold to something they are motivated for. Want a learner’s attention? Become the avenue—the mediator—for getting your learner to the thing they are currently attending to.
In your observation, after establishing a list of the items and activities the learner is attending to and therefore motivated for, ask yourself if the RBT made themselves the gatekeeper to those things.
For example, did the RBT notice that they were attending to the TV that was on in the background? Did they offer TV time as a reinforcer? Or did they continue to assume that the learner wanted to play with Play-Doh and continue to offer Play Doh contingent on a correct response. You see, we’re not simply looking to see if the learner wasn’t attending. We’re also looking to see if the RBT recognized what they were attending to and used it as a motivator.
If either of the answers to the above questions is “no”, then it’s likely you have a motivation concern and a quick refresher on how to gauge the learner’s attention and contrive motivation is in order.
One last point:
The best ABA staff are those that are most sensitive to the attention and motivation of their learner.
Seriously, the best RBTs seem to be able to know what a learner is attending to (and—consequently—motivated for) before the learner actually does. And it’s the secret to GREAT ABA therapy.
So how do we get them there? How can we help our staff with something so complicated?
Well, I have an exercise that works. And I’ll share it with you…
Next week!
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