Time out from positive reinforcement was examined over a long period of time in a severely autistic child. The child was exposed to three different durations of time out, i.e., 3 min., 1 hr., and 15 min. This child's behavior was best suppressed with the variable 15-min. duration. However, the pitfalls of arbitrarily setting a duration of time out for a child without assessing the effect on him are examined. In addition, the uselessness of group experiments and the problems inherent in long durations of time out are discussed.
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