Autism and Hitting | Resolving Autism Aggression

If you could wave a magic wand and change a behavior in your young child with autism or signs of autism, what behavior would you change? When people find out that I’m a behavior analyst working with children with autism and toddlers showing signs, the most common question I get is this: How do I stop my child from having a problem behavior like hitting? Very rarely does someone say they want to change a behavior like language, getting dressed in the morning, or going to the doctor’s office without a fuss. But we really need to focus on the positive behaviors that we want to increase, not just the problem behaviors we want to reduce. Since hitting is such a common concern, we’re going to focus on reducing hitting in children—with any kind of disability or even typically developing children. These procedures can work regardless of diagnosis. Hi, I’m Dr. Mary Barbara, and I’ve been in the autism world for over 25 years—first as a very confused and overwhelmed mom when my firstborn son started showing signs of autism a little after the age of one, and was diagnosed the day before he turned three. Later, I became a doctoral-level behavior analyst, best-selling author, and online course creator. Every week I provide insights on turning autism or signs of autism around. If you haven’t joined the almost 200,000 subscribers on my YouTube channel, you can do that now. And please turn on the notification bell so you don’t miss future videos. For over a decade, I’ve been creating video blogs and podcasts with over 11 million video views on YouTube. Today, I’m focusing on one of the biggest issues: aggression, and specifically hitting. Hitting is one of the most common forms of aggression I see in all kids—with and without a diagnosis. It needs to be prevented and responded to correctly. Otherwise, hitting and other problem behaviors will most likely go up instead of down. Teaching a child to answer questions, tie their shoes, or get a haircut doesn’t happen in a vacuum. It’s crucial to assess and address problem behaviors like hitting while also teaching new skills. These have to be done together, not separately. Prevention is really the key. Step 1: Assessment The first step in addressing hitting is to assess—not just the hitting itself, but the whole child. The best way to do this is with the Barbera Early Childhood Assessment (BECA). Since 2022, over 65,000 parents and professionals have completed the BECA. It’s affordable and available at marybarbara.com/assessment. The BECA gives you scores in three crucial areas: Self-care/adaptive skills (like picky eating, sleeping, potty training) Language skills Problem behaviors It’s designed to capture a complete snapshot of the child’s functioning—whether they can sit at a table, use words or phrases, follow directions, or show problem behaviors. No materials are needed, and the child doesn’t even need to be present if you know them well. After completing it, you’ll get a two-page written report with scores. This tool is also great for pre- and post-measurement, to track changes across therapies or interventions. Once the whole child has been assessed, then we look specifically at the hitting behavior: Who are they hitting (siblings, peers, teachers, parents, themselves)? What does the hitting look like (slapping, punching, grabbing, head-banging)? How severe is it? (A punch is more serious than a light slap.) How old is the child? (An 18-month-old vs. a 5-year-old makes a difference.) We need to get hitting to zero levels. No hitting is acceptable, even if it “only” happens with bigger adults or seems mild. We also need to figure out when the hitting occurs. Is it when the child is told “no”? When transitioning off the iPad? When denied a toy? When falling asleep? Understanding the triggers helps us identify the function of the behavior—the “why” behind the hitting. If hitting is causing harm (to the child or others), it may be both a behavioral and medical emergency. In those cases, it’s critical to seek help from a behavior analyst, either in-person or virtually, to ensure safety. Step 2: Prevention After assessment, the next step is prevention. We want to spend 95% of our time preventing hitting. When a child hits, we’re already in a lose-lose situation—it’s hard to come out ahead once the behavior occurs. Prevention means identifying situations where the child does not hit (e.g., when swimming, on the iPad, during meals). We can use these contexts to build more positive engagement and gradually introduce structure. In general: If problem behavior is happening, demands are too high and reinforcement is too low. Prevention means flipping this: keep reinforcement very high and demands very low until problem behaviors fade. Then, gradually fade out reinforcement while fading in demands, so the child stays happy, engaged, and not hitting. Step 3: Make a Plan Once we’ve assessed and started preventing, we need a clear plan. That means: Reviewing what prevention strategies are working. Using BECA results to identify strengths and needs. Ensuring everyone in the child’s life—parents, teachers, therapists—is responding consistently. The plan will always involve more positive reinforcement, more engagement, and fewer chances for hitting. Children, especially those with autism or speech delays, need much more engagement than they usually get—studies show 80–100 hours per week of active engagement. That may mean considering daycare, ABA clinics, home therapy, or additional help from caregivers. A happy, engaged child rarely engages in problem behaviors. Stopping problem behaviors like hitting is complex, but with the right strategies, it’s possible to get hitting and other aggression down to near-zero levels. If you’d like to dive deeper into both preventative and reactive strategies—and also learn ways to increase talking and self-care—I invite you to my free 1-hour workshop. Click the link around this video to attend. And if you found this video helpful, please leave a comment, give it a thumbs up, share it with someone who could benefit, and subscribe so you don’t miss future content. I’ll see you here next time.