Common Myths About Behavioral Interventions
Have you heard that you should never reward your child for eating? Were you told that rewarding your child will reduce his or her motivation to eat? MYTHS BUSTED! Many clinical studies have actually demonstrated that the use of rewards and incentives for eating are a necessary, effective, and important component to any successful intervention. Let’s take a look at some of these common myths, and figure out the truth.
Myth #1: Never reward a child for eating
If your child has a feeding problem, and refuses to eat, then he or she is not motivated to eat by the same factors as we are. Hunger and the enjoyment of the taste of food are not motivating enough; something else is needed. Rewards are a tool that you can use to achieve your initial goal of motivating your child to eat. Once you’ve gotten your child to start tasting new foods, you can begin to work on your end goal, which is to have your child eat foods because he or she likes them. Remember, it can take 10-20 tastes of a food for your child to develop a preference for it. Using rewards will greatly increase the odds that your child will take all those tastes!
Myth #2: Rewards are a form of bribery
Rewards are often confused with bribery. If you want to get technical, “bribery” is typically defined as giving a person something that will induce him or her to do something illegal, immoral, or unethical. Obviously, this is not what we’re doing here. Rather, we’re trying to help children improve their nutrient intake while also helping them develop skills that will help them socially. Not to mention saving their parents’ sanity by helping them make a single meal for mealtime and to stop getting into power struggles with their children over food. One thing to note, is that parents should present the reward before the new food. For example, don’t get into a power struggle, and THEN offer a reward. Start out by offering the reward, along with expectation that your child must taste the new food if he or she wants to earn the reward.
Myth #3: It’s a sensory problem
Many children with special needs are diagnosed with “sensory deficits” related to eating, because of their reluctance or refusal to try foods that are of a different taste, texture, type, or temperature than foods that they already eat. In some of these cases, professionals will recommend nonnutritive or nonbehavioral therapy such as brushing the body, listening to special music, or having the child play with (not eat) the food. However, there is little to no empirical evidence supporting these methods. Instead, behavioral interventions, such as texture fading, temperature fading, and gradually increasing the bite size are empirically supported. We recommend them because they work.
Myth #4: I’m going to have to “starve” my child
No way. Starvation implies that you are not feeding your child. To the contrary, children are typically given multiple opportunities to eat throughout the day, and are highly motivated to so by the reward systems that have been created. Parents are often concerned that their child will starve if they attempt to change his or her diet. They are told that their child will eat when he or she is hungry, and to continue to offer the child whatever the family is eating. This may work for some children, but for others, a more intensive intervention may be necessary. If you are truly concerned that your child will starve, and are unwilling to to allow your child to go without eating for 1 or 2 days, you should enlist the support of a feeding clinic or behavior analyst who treats eating problems.
Source:
Williams, Keith E., and Richard M. Foxx. Treating Eating Problems of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders and Developmental Disabilities: Interventions for Professionals and Parents. PRO-ED, 2007.