Bedtime Help

 

Purpose: Extinction is used with children who have a difficult time going to bed on their own. It’s best used with children who do the following things after being put to bed: call out to parents (e.g., “Mom, I love you.” “Can you come back in?”), cry or yell, or actually leave the room. This treatment is not likely to work well with children who have lots of behavior problems at times other than bedtime. For these children, other things are probably needed first, before working on bedtime.

 

Overview: Extinction is a straightforward behavioral approach to address bedtime problems in children. This approach to bedtime problems involves no visits by the parent to the child’s bedroom after the child has gone to bed.  In effect, the parent ignores his/her child’s behavior and the child is left to “cry it out.” Generally, extinction works quickly but you should also anticipate your child to react very strongly to this change in his/her bedtime routine. This handout will provide you an overview of what you should do to begin the program and what you should expect.

 

What you should do:  Maintain your child’s regular bedtime routine. Children benefit from a bedtime routine that is consistent and positive. This means putting your child to bed at the same time every night. Providing a reminder about 20-30 minutes before the bedtime routine begins is also a helpful way to transition from an activity that he/she may be engaged in to his/her bedtime. As you are putting your child to bed, remember to repeat your expectations for his/her behavior after your leave the room. Say something like this, “You are all tucked in now. You need to stay in bed and not get up and not cry out. If you cry out, I will not come in. I want you to stay in bed and not get up and not cry out.”

 

What to expect: Some children will have a hard time with this strategy. Your child may test limits and still cry out. During the first few nights, you may even notice that he/she is crying out even more and for a longer time. He/she is working very hard to get your attention and this behavior is common. This increase in crying is called an “extinction burst.” Most parents want to jump in and sooth or discipline their child during this “extinction burst.” You should not do this, because it will make the problem worse. Ignore your child’s crying out, not matter how sad or loud he/she sound. With time, this behavior will decrease and he/she will learn how to go to sleep on his/her own

 

Keep your child motivated: For many children, simply using extinction will be effective in decreasing bedtime behavior problems. Of course, you will want to verbally praise your child for staying in bed/not crying out and going to bed like a good boy or girl. For some children, the ignoring crying out may result in some improvement, but not as much as you’d hoped for. In this situation, you may also need to add an extra incentive for using extinction. Examples might include:

 

• Letting your child pick his or her breakfast (within reason, of course) on mornings after not having any bedtime behavior problems.

• Offering an afternoon/after school treat when your child didn’t call out or leave the room at all.

• Providing an opportunity to reach into a grab bag with small treats each morning that there was no resistance.

 

Remember, if you are offering incentives, make sure that your child only gets them when there is no bedtime resistance. Also, think about providing more rewards at first, and then decreasing the rewards over time.