Understanding Elopement

Elopement, also known as running away or escaping behavior in Korean, is a behavior that is particularly common in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD).

Children who engage in this type of runaway behavior leave designated areas without permission, putting themselves and others at risk. This can expose them to a variety of dangers, including traffic accidents, water-related accidents, or accidents while running around school.

Today, we're going to look at some papers on various intervention methods for this type of escape behavior.

 

Implementing an Escape Behavior Assessment

Of course, intervention is necessary to ensure the child's safety, but before implementing intervention, it is important to understand the cause of the escape behavior.

This is usually done through a functional behavioral assessment (FBA) or functional analysis (FA), which helps identify factors that contribute to the persistence of escape behavior:

- Positive reinforcement : attention or access to preferred objects/activities

- Negative reinforcement : avoidance of demands

- Automatic reinforcement : sensory stimulation

Looking at the paper by Phillips et al (2018), it is said that when children exhibited such escape behavior, schools naturally took safety measures, but that was not enough.

"Understanding how escape behavior persists through FBA and FA helps school teachers develop strategies and interventions to help the child."

 

Developing an intervention strategy

How would adults react if children suddenly got up and tried to run away instead of being in their designated places?

Most adults would physically block a child from running into danger. However , this continuous physical blocking is not very effective in reducing escape behavior.

So, here are a few interventions that have proven effective in reducing escape behavior:

Differential reinforcement :

Differential reinforcement of other behavior (DRO) is a method of providing reinforcement to a child if the escape behavior is not emitted within a set time frame (Call et al., 2011). For example, if a child remains calm and sits in a chair for three minutes, the behavior is reinforced with a reward they like.

- Differential reinforcement of alternative behaviors (DRA) (Eluri et al, 2024) where the child receives a reward instead of the escape behavior. For example, by reinforcing behaviors such as raising a hand and saying “I want to rest” instead of running away, the escape behavior can be gradually reduced.

Functional Communication Training (FCT) :

- This is a way to teach your child to "communicate" what he or she wants to do instead of running away. As mentioned above, teach him or her to ask permission by saying, "I need to take a break."

Non-contingent reinforcement (NCR) :

This method of providing reinforcement at a set time, regardless of the behavior, is known to be the most effective method for reducing challenging behavior. Philips et al. (2017) and Eluri et al. (2024) explained that this method satisfies children's needs by providing sufficient reinforcement, eliminating the need for challenging behavior to obtain something.

 

Individualized approach

Interventions must be tailored to the individual child and their escape behavior. Some children may require interventions that utilize a variety of strategies, rather than a single approach, depending on the situation.

When implementing these interventions in a school setting:

- Clearly define escape behavior in observable terms .

- Perform FBA or FA .

- Create an individualized behavior intervention plan (BIP) .

- Set specific and measurable goals .

- Regularly review and adjust the plan as needed.

 

To ensure that the intervention remains effective, please do the following:

- Implement the selected intervention consistently .

- Involve all relevant staff and guardians .

- Regularly monitor progress and adjust strategies as needed .

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Today, we looked at various papers on "elopement." This challenging behavior may seem like it will never improve, but as numerous studies have shown, with appropriate interventions tailored to the child, it can definitely improve.

Please remember that it is most important to identify your child's behavioral function through FBA and FA and find an intervention method that is right for your child!!

 

References:

Phillips, C. L., Iannaccone, J. A., Rooker, G. W., & Hagopian, L. P. (2017). Noncontingent reinforcement for the treatment of severe problem behavior: An analysis of 27 consecutive applications. Journal of applied behavior analysis , 50 (2), 357–376. https://doi.org/10.1002/jaba.376

Phillips, L. A., Briggs, A. M., Fisher, WW, & Greer, B. D. (2018). Assessing and Treating Elopement in a School Setting. Teaching exceptional children , 50 (6), 333–342. https://doi.org/10.1177/0040059918770663

Call, N. A., Pabico, R. S., Findley, A. J., & Valentino, A. L. (2011). Differential reinforcement with and without blocking as treatment for elopement. Journal of applied behavior analysis , 44 (4), 903–907. https://doi.org/10.1901/jaba.2011.44-903

Eluri, Z., Zoder-Martell, K. A., Andrade, I., & Trevino, N. (2024). Reduction of Elopement Using a Multicomponent Treatment in Young Children with ASD. Perspectives on Early Childhood Psychology and Education .

Lang, R., Davis, T., O'Reilly, M., Machalicek, W., Rispoli, M., Sigafoos, J., Lancioni, G., & Regester, A. (2010). Functional analysis and treatment of elopement across two school settings. Journal of applied behavior analysis , 43 (1), 113–118. https://doi.org/10.1901/jaba.2010.43-113