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Group Contingency

Description of the Strategy

A group contingency is a behavior modification strategy wherein consequences for a group are dependent upon the behavior of individuals in that group or the group as a whole. Group contingencies are commonly used when a number of individuals within a group are exhibiting a problem behavior, it is difficult to monitor a behavior either because of limited supervision resources or the behavior is covert, or an individual or group of individuals' problem behavior is wholly or partially maintained by attention or reinforcement from other group members. Group contingencies may be used to increase a desired behavior or decrease an undesired behavior, and they may utilize reward and/or punishment components.

Group contingencies have been generally divided into one of three categories: (1) a dependent group contingency, (2) an independent group contingency, and (3) an interdependent group contingency. In a dependent group contingency, the behavior of one or a few individuals within the group determines a group consequence. For example, if a child with aggression problems has no instances of physical fighting during recess, the entire class receives 5 extra minutes of recess time. In an independent group contingency, behavioral goals are applied to all children in a group, and consequences are applied to all children independent from each other. For instance, every child who has no instances of physical fighting during recess receives 5 extra minutes of recess time. In an interdependent group contingency, behavioral goals are established for the group, and consequences are applied based on the performance of the group as a whole. In this case, 5 extra minutes of recess time would be earned if there were no instances of physical fighting by any child in the class.

The hypothesized mechanism through which group contingencies work is the dependence of group consequences on behavior. By framing consequences in this way, peers within the group are invested in the group meeting the target goal and therefore decrease the frequency of reinforcement for behaviors incompatible with meeting the goal (e.g., laughing at a child disrupting the class) and help to monitor the group's progress toward the goal (e.g., reminding a child to follow rules so that the group meets the goal). In addition, an individual's desire to help a group of peers meet a goal may be an important antecedent to behavior change.

Research Basis

Group contingencies have been studied within the context of regular and special education classrooms, workplaces, and communities. The majority of group contingency studies have been conducted in elementary classroom settings or other school-based settings such as the school cafeteria or recess playground. Group contingencies are also employed as components of more intensive, behavioral treatment packages (e.g., summer treatment programs, residential treatment settings) that have an established research basis, though the incremental benefit of group contingencies in these settings beyond the other behavior modification procedures employed has not been widely investigated.

Some studies have compared the use of group contingencies to individual contingencies and found beneficial effects of group contingencies. Comparisons of dependent, independent, and interdependent group contingencies yield somewhat mixed results, with some studies indicating there is no difference between the types of group contingency programs and others favoring one type over another. These different results likely reflect the heterogeneity in study populations, settings, and methodology employed in investigations of group contingencies. Overall, there is considerable support for group contingencies in the single subject and applied behavior analysis research literature, and most teachers rate group contingencies as acceptable interventions for use in their classrooms.

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