ABCs of Behaviour

Danielle
May 7, 2020
3 min read

If you have experience in trying to tackle challenging behaviours in the past with a behaviour consultant, or if you’ve researched this before on different support sites related to behaviour analysis or assessments of behaviour, you’ll no doubt have come across the ABCs of behaviour.

If not, let’s do a quick run-through!

A = Antecedent

Antecedents are events/things that come immediately before a behaviour occurs.

B = Behaviour

Behaviours are just about anything you can do – any verb! Eating, smiling, running, watching Netflix, driving, thinking, talking, playing an instrument, etc. If you can see it and/or you can measure it, it’s behaviour!

(There are some debates about what constitutes behaviour among some professionals and researchers, but for the purposes of the ABCs – if you can see it or measure it, it’s behaviour!)

C = Consequence

We don’t mean “consequence” like spanking or reprimanding, or in the way that many people use it day-to-day. We mean events/things that come immediately after a behaviour occurs – whether these are positive things or negative things!

So yes, a spanking or reprimand would still be a consequence, but so would getting some ice cream, getting a hug, turning the TV on, etc.

Antecedents are the things around us that trigger our behaviours, that tell us when we should or should not do something! When I see a red light, I know I should start to hit the brake in my car; when your child sees a math worksheet on their desk and the teacher says “Do your math”, they know they should start their math work.

Consequences are the things around us that either reinforce or punish our behaviour – which either teaches us that we should do that behaviour again next time the trigger comes up, or that we should do something else or nothing at all next time the trigger comes up.

For example, if the teacher tells your child to do their math and after they’ve done it they are praised and congratulated for doing it well, they are more likely going to do the math worksheet again next time the teacher instructs them too!

But, if instead, when told to do the math worksheet by the teacher, your child starts to goof off or disrupt the class, and the math teacher sends them out into the hallway and to stay there to do the math worksheet until it’s done, next time they might decide to just get the worksheet done in class.

It can be a lot more complex than that sometimes, but these are just quick examples to show different kinds of consequences and their possible effects!

The more we know about the antecedents and consequences surrounding a behaviour, the more we begin to understand the behaviour, and the better equipped we are to begin answering questions like:

Why are they doing that?
Is a time out really going to work to get rid of that behaviour?
What antecedents can I change to prevent the behaviour?
What consequences can I add or remove to prevent the behaviour? (or increase new positive behaviours)

Today, I want you to pick a behaviour that occurs often enough that you can track the ABCs, but not so often that you’re tracking it all day!

In a journal, write down:

1. Antecedents: What happened right before?