Ebanks, M. E., & Fisher, W. W. (2003). Altering the timing of academic prompts to treat destructive behavior maintained by escape. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 36, 355-359.

Following a functional analysis showing that destructive behavior was reinforced by escape, we altered the aversiveness of task demands by interspersing easy and difficult tasks and by presenting a corrective prompt as an antecedent event the next time a previously failed item was presented; this procedure was compared with one in which the corrective prompt was provided as an immediate consequence. Results of a reversal design showed that the antecedent prompt acted as an establishing operation and reduced destructive behavior to zero.

DESCRIPTORS: _academic instruction, antecedent intervention, destructive behavior, escape, establishing operation, feedback, functional analysis