Distal Setting Events in the Classroom: A Teacher's Guide

When student behavior problems persist despite effective classroom management and vary in intensity depending on factors outside of teacher control, teachers are often left feeling discouraged and ineffective (Clunies-Ross et al., 2008). Teachers may know how to handle behavior problems associated with classroom-based antecedents (i.e., events that occur immediately before, or “trigger,” challenging behavior) and consequences (i.e., events that occur immediately after, and reinforce, challenging behavior; Borgmeier et al., 2017), but not those impacted by events that took place hours before the student came to school. In these cases, understanding and intervening on behavior problems solely based on their immediate antecedents and consequences may be less effective. One productive way of addressing these out-of-school factors, and returning a sense of control over student behavior, is to view them as distal setting events (Alberto & Troutman, 2013).

A setting event is a circumstance or occasion that makes an antecedent more likely to trigger problem behavior (Dunlap et al., 2009) and changes the value or effectiveness of consequences to problem behavior (Laraway et al., 2003). For example, when a student is in pain (e.g., headache), work and other demands may become more aversive, which makes avoiding such demands more reinforcing (Carr et al., 2003). If a student engages in problem behavior in order to escape or avoid demands, the presence of a headache may increase the frequency or severity of those escape behaviors. In this case, having a headache could be considered a setting event that makes it more likely that a student will respond to teacher demands with problem behavior to escape or avoid work. Alternatively, receiving low levels of attention may increase the value of attention as a reinforcer (O’Reilly et al., 2008). If a student engages in problem behavior in order to obtain peer or teacher attention, problem behavior may increase in frequency or intensity after periods of time in which the student has received little attention (McGinnis et al., 2010). Distal setting events, or setting events that are not observable and measurable by the classroom teacher (Alberto & Troutman, 2013), may occur outside of school, making them more challenging to address. In these cases, being able to identify that the distal setting event has occurred, how the setting event may affect student behavior, and what strategies will be most effective in response to the setting event can help a classroom team improve student behavior even when factors outside of teacher control are contributing to the problem.

6 Steps to Addressing Distal Setting Events in the Classroom

1. Identify and define relevant distal setting events

The first step is to identify and define distal setting events hypothesized to impact the student’s behavior. Potentially relevant distal setting events can be identified by interviewing those who regularly interact with the student in and out of the classroom, such as parents and other caregivers, general educators, special educators, paraeducators, related service professionals, bus drivers, cafeteria staff, and other school staff. Standardized behavioral interviews are available (e.g., Functional Assessment Checklist for Teachers and Staff; Anderson & Borgmeier, 2007, March et al., 1999).

2. Collect data on distal setting events and student behavior

The next step is to collect data on the presence of the events and their association with changes in student challenging behavior. These data can be collected by adding a column for setting events to a traditional Antecedent-Behavior-Consequence (ABC) data collection form in which observers record events that occurred immediately prior to and immediately after problem behavior to develop hypotheses regarding the function of problem behavior (Borgmeier et al., 2017).

3. Analyze distal setting event data for patterns

The classroom team should analyze the collected data for patterns that may indicate whether and how particular distal setting events may influence a student’s behavior (Lewis, Hatton, Jorgensen, & Maynard, 2017). To conduct this analysis, a teacher should look for differences in student behavior on days when the setting event has occurred versus days when it has not. When a different data pattern is associated with a specific setting event, the classroom team has evidence that the setting event is associated with increased challenging behavior. The team can then develop a hypothesis for how the setting event may influence the student’s challenging behavior, which will assist the team in selecting intervention strategies.

4. Use the data to select setting event intervention strategies

The classroom team can now begin to identify hypothesis-based intervention strategies to use when the setting event has occurred. It is important to remember that a setting event does not imply a specific behavioral function and an individualized assessment must occur to understand how a given setting event may influence an individual student’s behavior. Similarly, the same setting event may affect behavior differently in different students (Luiselli, 2006). Effective strategies for addressing a distal setting event include counteracting the effects of the setting event, as well as taking a function-based approach to changing antecedents and consequences for problem behavior and teaching replacement behaviors.

5. Implement distal setting event strategies with fidelity

Research highlights the importance of the teaching teams’ plan for implementation (Hagermoser Sanetti et al., 2017; Hirsch et al., 2017). Effective strategies for improving implementation include: (a) sharing information with all relevant staff members; (b) listening to and incorporating others’ input into the behavior plan; (c) deciding on a plan for implementation including who will be responsible for implementing which aspects of the plan; (d) collecting data on implementation; and (e) creating strategy “cheat sheets,” or a breakdown of the plan into simple steps and providing them to team members.

6. Monitor progress

The final step in the process of addressing distal setting events in the classroom is to monitor student progress and make data-based decisions on whether to continue the new strategies as they are, modify them to increase effectiveness, or try something different. Classroom teams can accomplish this step by continuing to collect the data described in Step 2 and reviewing the data from before and after implementation of the setting event-based strategies to determine whether plan implementation is associated with improvements in student behavior. Additionally, data should be collected on the degree to which these strategies are being implemented as planned, also known as the fidelity of implementation (Hirsh et al., 2017). If fidelity data show that the plan is not being consistently implemented, the team should discuss what changes can be made to improve implementation. The plan must be consistently implemented to allow for an analysis of whether it is helping the student and should be continued or changed.

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