The technique of shaping begins with identifying behavior that the student needs to learn or change. The target behavior should be clearly identified so that as the shaping technique is implemented only the desired behavior is reinforced. Each step of the shaping technique should bring the student closer to the final desired behavior. All adults who are involved in shaping should be clearly trained on which behavior to reinforce and which behaviors to ignore. As the small steps are shaped and reinforced, the student behavior will change or become what was identified as the original desired behavior.

Paul likes to greet people when he sees them at school and in the community. His current method of greeting is to reach out his hands and then grab the other person and give him or her a large bear hug. His greeting style is not appropriate to use when meeting strangers. Paul’s family is also not comfortable with always having him hug them. Both the school staff and Paul’s parents feel that he needs to learn a more appropriate style of greeting that could be used across settings and people.

Shaping Technique

1. Choose the final behavior that the student should demonstrate.
2. Identify any small approximations of the desired behavior that the student currently demonstrates.
3. Select the reinforcement(s) to be used.
4. Make sure that everyone working with the student knows which behavior to reinforce, when to reinforce and how to reinforce.
5. If the student currently demonstrates an approximation, begin the process of reinforcing each time the student demonstrates the desired behavior.
6. Collect data about the behavior.
7. Communicate with the team to discuss what the data are indicating about the behavior to be changed. If the data indicate that the shaping technique is working, the team would decide to begin to reinforce a closer approximation of the final behavior. If the data indicate that the behavior is not changing, the team would analyze what they are doing and make changes in the program.
8. Continue the program until the student demonstrates the appropriate behavior.

Paul exhibits an initial desired behavior by extending his arms and hands prior to hugging the other person. The teams decided that they could shape the arm’s extension behavior to make it become the more desirable behavior of shaking hands. They identified a point in Paul’s greeting process when adults needed to intervene between another adult and Paul to initiate a handshake instead of a hug. The team also identified that Paul desires the sensory contact of a hug. They felt that he could be seeking physical contact as a sensory issue. In order to provide Paul with that sensory input, they decided that when Paul demonstrated the hand shaking behavior without a hug, they would provide him with a tight handhold and a large motor shake between themselves and Paul.

The program began with the school staff initiating greetings many times during the school day. Each time they greeted Paul, they would extend their hand and grab his hand before he could hug them. As they grabbed Paul’s hand, they said “hello,” held tightly to his hand and gave his arm a large shake for 10 seconds. This began the process of shaping Paul’s behavior so that he would extend his arms and initiate a handshake. Paul’s initial reaction to the shaping technique was to smile and try to hug the other person. If the hug was initiated, the hand was immediately dropped, the person looked away and as soon as the hug was over walked away without a greeting. If Paul stopped at the hand shaking interaction, he was reinforced by continuation of the handshake and conversation. Initial data were collected for hugging or hand shaking. The team found that Paul was successful in learning to limit his hugging behavior. As the procedure continued, the team generalized to handshaking in other environments with other team and family members. Paul successfully demonstrated a change in his hugging behavior. He not only began to initiate an appropriate handshake so that he did not need adults to interrupt the hugging behavior, but the intensity and duration of the handshake also decreased.