Is your child/student using avoidance behaviours to escape a task?

(Illustration 57520720 © Klara Viskova | Dreamstime.com)

Is your child/student using avoidance behaviours to escape a task?

Some children with additional needs learn behaviours that help them avoid doing activities they don't want to do.

From a young age, they may have learned, for example, that performing "party tricks", shouting, or hiding under the table are useful behaviours when it comes to avoiding doing tabletop activities. 

And we, as parents and educators, might be reinforcing some of these behaviours unknowingly.

The good news is that in the same way they figured out that those behaviours were effective in getting them out of doing a task, we can teach them other more appropriate ways to communicate what they want from us.

In this blog, I will take a deeper look at avoidance behaviours.

Why may children not want to cooperate?

Children may avoid a task because it may seem too tricky, too dull, or it will take too long. 

Sometimes, the child may not cooperate simply because they have not understood the instruction. 

When working with children with autism, we also need to consider sensory issues and that they may refuse an activity because it is unpleasant from a sensory point of view. 

There are many reasons why a child may avoid engaging in a task, whether it is getting in the bath at home or sitting down in class.

How do children learn "avoidance behaviours"?

Often children learn avoidance behaviours from a young age.

For example, imagine that a student walks away from circle time, and then a teacher assistant tries to bring the child back to the circle. The child starts screaming, and the teacher assistant decides to bring the child to a quiet area so as not to disturb circle time.  

Let's look at what happened there. 

The child screamed, and he got to avoid circle time, which he wanted. 

Screaming was helpful to avoid circle time, so "screaming", in this case, is what we call "avoidance behaviour".

The child is likely to repeat that behaviour. And if he is removed from circle time again, guess what? He has now learned that he can scream if he doesn't want to join circle time. 

Why is it so hard to change these behaviours?

We often get too caught up in eliminating challenging behaviours. 

For example, we might focus on the child to stop screaming, stop running away, or stop throwing objects. 

Have you ever heard "what you focus on will grow"? 

We need to change our perspective and stop focusing on just eliminating those behaviours.

So, what should we focus on instead?

First, we should figure out why the child is avoiding the task.

Avoidance behaviours usually happen because the child is either avoiding something or wanting to get something.

What is the child avoiding? For example, circle time could be too long and involve a lot of verbal instruction that the child may not be able to understand at this point. The child may be looking to escape circle time because it's overwhelming.

Or maybe the child is acting out because he wants something; for example, perhaps the child has learned that he will get the TV if he cries.

Once we better understand what is going on for the child, we can start looking for solutions.

In some cases, the solution will be making adaptations to the activities. For example, for the child avoiding circle time because there is too much verbal instruction, we could introduce some visual supports and activities that don't require as much spoken language. Or we could incorporate activities the child likes, like more music and songs.

In other cases, the solution will be teaching "replacement behaviours". For example, if a child is not speaking yet, he may have learned to ask for the TV by crying. When he cries in front of the TV, mum turns the TV on. So he has associated crying with getting the TV. To replace crying with more appropriate behaviour, you could teach the child to point at a TV symbol, and mum will put it on for him. Pointing at the symbol of the TV is the replacement behaviour. 

In summary, avoidance behaviours persist because they are effective for children. They help children escape situations or activities or help them get something they want.

To reduce those avoidance behaviours, we need to stop focusing on the behaviours we want to change and focus on adapting the activities, so the child can participate and replace that avoidance behaviour with a more appropriate one.

Do you want to learn more about how to prevent problem behaviour and how to respond when they occur?

I often teach a Masterclass on preventing and responding to challenging behaviours.
This Masterclass is suitable for parents and educators of children with developmental delays, Down Syndrome, intellectual disabilities, speech and language delays and autistic children from 2 to 6 years of age.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFORMATION

Your turn:

Is your child/student currently using avoidance behaviours? What strategies are you implementing to try to encourage positive behaviours? Let's get chatting.