Have you ever thought about ignoring your child? I’m sure there are times when there is an appeal to ignoring their behavior and other times it gets to the point where it’s driving you insane and you feel like you have to intervene.
As far as behavior goes, planned ignoring is a consequence of a behavior that is directly thought out and as it says in the name, planned ahead of time. This can bring anxiety to a lot of parents and therapists alike. Ignoring can be really hard and can take several minutes to several hours. After knowing the basics and understanding that ignoring will lessen a behavior in the future, planned ignoring can become easier and feel like your best friend when unwanted behaviors arise.
What exactly does it mean to ignore? Typically ignoring means avoiding eye contact, avoiding physical touch, avoiding engaging in conversation, avoiding reactions to behaviors, and creating obvious and possibly even exaggerated ignoring so the child gets the idea that the behavior is unwanted.
According to the Rubi Autism Parent Training Network Handbook, there are three types of planned ignoring, all of which have their place in helping manage your child’s behavior:
- Ignoring the behavior but not the child
- For example a child repeating your name, you could still engage with the child and bring up several different conversation starters but ignore the repetitive behavior
- Ignoring the child but not the behavior
- This means that in certain situations you would still need to intervene and help during certain behaviors such as dangerous situations where your child could get hurt, you would still want to remove their bodies from danger but ignore them while doing it so that the behavior decreases in the future and safety is no longer an issue.
- Ignoring both the child and the behavior
- In cases where both the child and the behavior are needing to be ignored would occur when the child is not in danger AND the behavior is disruptive or repetitive. For instance, a child dropping to the floor and tantruming during dinner could be ignored altogether for the behavior to decrease in the future.
While the task to ignore may seem daunting, remember that it will be hard in the beginning but it will be worth it later and you’ll be so happy that you were able to ignore the behavior. Planned ignoring is a powerful consequence that is used in ABA daily because it works wonders and removes small “junk” behavior quickly and tougher behavior in the long term.
Source: Bearss, K., Johnson, C. R., Handen, B. L., Butter, E. M., Lecavalier, L., Smith, T., & Scahill, L. (2018). Parent training for disruptive behavior: the Rubi Autism Network. Oxford University Press.