Time-Out for Students With Emotional/Behavioral Disorders: A Systematic and Meta-Analytic Review

Abstract

Students with challenging behaviors can put a strain on both teachers and other learners in the classroom. While responding to challenging behavior in an effective and educative manner is critical for successfully teaching school-age children, teachers are often under-trained in evidence-based behavior reduction techniques. Timeout (TO) is defined as a behavior reduction strategy that involves removing access to reinforcement and reinforcers. TO procedures have a long history of research regarding its effectiveness and have been used by teachers and other service providers for decades. Furthermore, TO procedures can be categorized into two broad types (exclusionary and non-exclusionary) with a variety of implementation methods for each. This analysis examined published studies on TO and TO procedures for students identified as needing behavioral support. Along with analyzing the published research, we calculated the effect sizes of the TO procedures used for each study using single case research design methodologies (i.e., within-case standard mean difference and between- case standard mean difference) as appropriate and group design methodology (i.e., standard mean difference). We also evaluated publication bias on TO research for students who need behavioral support and analyzed the quality of each included study. Implications for research and practice are discuss.