Time Out

Cooper, Heron, and Heward (2007) defined time out as “the contingent withdrawal of the opportunity to earn access to positive reinforcement or the loss of access to positive reinforcers for a specified time.” Time out is temporarily removing the child from the room or a situation where the behavior occurs and placing him/her in a different room where there is no distraction and is quiet - a boring room. When a child is on time-out, the child receives little to no interaction from anyone and is away from toys and other possible distractions for a period of time, the longest time for time-out is 5 minutes. This gives parents a chance to relax in order to handle the behavior in a proper way rather than shouting and punishing the child. It is how time out should be used. However, what others use time out for is placing the child in a room, sometimes a corner, and ignoring them without following up an explanation.

In time out children learn, in the long run, self-control and self-discipline, it helps the child to control his behavior when he/she wants to be with others. Time out allows both the child and parent to calm themselves and their emotions. Then later on both can have a talk on what had happened - helping the child understand the situation more. However not all behavior needs a time out, parents should be able to identify the behaviors that call for time out and behaviors that don’t.

There are two types of time out: non-exclusion and exclusion. Non-exclusion time out is when the child is put into time out but is not physically removed from the room. Exclusion time out is when the child is fully removed from the room and is transferred to another room. Either of the two, parents should only limit time out for 5 minutes to 30 minutes and to have a talk time with the child to discuss what happened and why it led to time out.

Time out is indeed a negative reinforcement when behavior arises when used properly, time out can be an effective tool to reduce the behavior. Use time out when needed and the child’s behavior persists, you can distract or redirect the child’s attention.