Four Functions of Behavior (Part 4/4)

Do you ever see someone doing something odd and wonder, “why in the hell are they doing that?”  Well, according to behaviorists, it’s for one of four possible reasons. In fact, ALL human behavior is possibly broken down into one of four possible reasons.  An easy acronym to remember them by is “everybody EATS.” E is for escape, A is for attention, T is for tangibles, and S is for sensory. I’ll go over each on in a separate blog post so it doesn’t become too overwhelming, but I highly suggest reading all four posts.

The fourth and final behavior we’re going to discuss is sensory.  We do these things for no other reason than the fact that it feels good.  When people think of sensory seeking behavior, they may think of a child with autism spinning around or making noises to themselves.  While yes, that is most likely sensory seeking behavior, neurotypical people do sensory seeking behavior all the time too. If you click your pen incessantly, that’s sensory.  If you bounce you leg or foot up and down, that’s sensory. If you twirl your hair or stroke your beard, that’s sensory. It serves no other purpose than for whatever reason it satisfies us.

So why would we need to even worry about it if it’s not hurting anyone?  Well, typically sensory seeking behaviors need to be shaped if they are socially inappropriate or prevent us from engaging in other activities.  Example: if we are so busy brushing our hair because it feels good that we don’t go to work and lose our job…. that’s a problem. 

A colleague of mine once had a high functioning 17 year old boy on the autism spectrum have a socially inappropriate sensory seeking behavior: he always wanted to carry around a naked Barbie doll with him and stroke her hair.  You can see how this might be construed as odd in public places. She brilliantly realized it actually had nothing to do with Barbie – he just wanted to feel the nylon hair with his finger tips. So she tied off Barbie’s hair in a ponytail, cut it off the doll’s head, and taught him to keep it in his pocket.  Because having your hands in your pocket is a socially acceptable behavior, no one thought it was odd when he had his hands in this pockets just to feel the strands of doll hair. So he was able to continue the sensory seeking behavior, which ultimately helped keep him calm in social situations, without being ostracized for it.  Brilliant.

Sensory seeking behavior can be very distruptive.  Think of the child in class who constantly wants to get up to sharpen his already sharp pencil.  Or the person who can’t sit still in a meeting. They are having some sensory regulating problems, so they need to move.  The thing is not to force them to necessarily ignore those urges, but find more appropriate ways to get the sensory input they’re needing.  So this may be allowing the child to get up and pace in the back of the room during the lesson. Or for the person in the meeting, he may need to make sure he takes a 10 minute walk prior to the meeting start.  By addressing these behaviors with a thought out plan, everyone can still get the input their body is needing while still being able to exist cohesively.

What sensory seeking behaviors do you engage in?  Do you feel like they’re a distruption to your life?  Let me know, and we can work on them together.