Extinction Bursts: Why Your Child’s Behavior Gets Worse Before It Gets Better in ABA Therapy

By Jessica Lentz, LBA, BCBA — Clinical Director, Sunshine Advantage Clinically reviewed by Shani Slater, LBA, BCBA

Last updated: May 28, 2026

If your child’s tantrums, hitting, or aggression got worse in the first weeks of ABA therapy for children — louder, longer, more intense — you are seeing what behavior analysts call an extinction burst. It is predictable, temporary, and a sign that the ABA therapy plan is working, not failing. The behavior gets bigger before it gets smaller. Knowing this in advance is the difference between staying the course and quitting ABA therapy two weeks before the breakthrough.

In our experience, this is the single most common phone call we receive from parents in week two or three of an ABA therapy program. The child whose tantrum used to last five minutes is now in a forty-minute meltdown. The hitting that used to happen twice a day now happens twelve times. The parent feels gaslit by the data, exhausted by the disruption, and seriously considering whether to stop ABA therapy altogether.

Here is what we need every parent to know before that phone call happens, not after: this surge is not a sign that ABA therapy is failing. It is a sign that ABA therapy is working. And it has a name.

In Applied Behavior Analysis, extinction has a specific technical meaning: it is the procedure of withholding the reinforcer that has been maintaining a behavior, so that the behavior — over time — decreases in frequency and eventually stops.

If a child has been throwing toys to get parent attention, and we stop providing attention contingent on toy-throwing, that behavior is now “on extinction” for attention. If a child has been hitting to escape a homework demand, and we stop allowing the demand to be terminated by hitting, hitting is on extinction for escape.

Extinction is a clinical procedure, not a punishment. We are not ignoring the child — we are precisely not delivering the specific reinforcer that has kept the specific behavior alive. Other reinforcers, including praise, affection, attention, and support for appropriate replacement behaviors, are usually being delivered more, not less.

Now here is the part that surprises parents.

When a child’s behavior has worked for them — when crying has reliably ended demands, when hitting has reliably produced the iPad — and that reinforcer suddenly stops being delivered, the child does what any of us would do when something that used to work stops working: they try harder.

Louder. Longer. More intense. Sometimes with new, more extreme topographies. This is the extinction burst.

A few research-backed facts about extinction bursts:

• They are predictable. They occur in the majority of extinction procedures and are well-documented in the behavioral literature (Lerman & Iwata, 1995).
• They are temporary. Bursts typically peak within the first few sessions of extinction and decline thereafter — when the procedure is implemented correctly.
• They are a sign of accurate function identification. If you see a burst, it means we correctly identified the reinforcer maintaining the behavior. (No burst sometimes means we got the function wrong.)
• They are often accompanied by “extinction-induced variability” — new behaviors emerging that have not been seen before. This is the brain searching for what will work now that the old thing stopped.
• There is also “spontaneous recovery” — even after the burst has subsided, the original behavior can briefly reappear weeks or months later. This is normal and resolves with consistent extinction.

This is the part of the ABA therapy story that responsible BCBAs will not skip past: extinction alone — taking the reinforcer away without giving the child a better way to get it — is harsh, slow, and sometimes ethically questionable.

That is why credible modern ABA therapy programs almost never run extinction by itself. We pair it with differential reinforcement of an alternative or incompatible behavior (DRA or DRI). Translation: while we are no longer reinforcing the problem behavior, we are heavily reinforcing a new, appropriate behavior that gets the child the same thing in a better way.

A child who used to scream to get a break gets a break the instant they sign “break.” A child who used to grab the iPad without asking gets the iPad the instant they tap a “request” card.

This is what makes the burst tolerable and ethical, especially when families receive consistent parent training and coaching. We are not just saying “no” — we are saying “yes, but this way.”

We want to be honest about this part. In the trenches, especially during in-home ABA therapy, an extinction burst can look like:

• Crying that used to last five minutes lasting forty
• Hitting that used to be open-handed becoming closed-fist
• Property destruction that escalates from throwing toys to overturning furniture
• A child trying brand-new behaviors they have never done before — scratching, biting, eloping
• Multiple bursts per day for several days running

The instinct of every loving parent in this moment is to make it stop. The way to make it stop, in the short term, is to deliver the old reinforcer — give in. Hand over the iPad. End the demand. Pick the child up.

And here is the crux: if we give in during the burst, we have not just paused the extinction. We have made the behavior worse than it was before, because we have now taught the child that this new, larger version of the behavior is what works.

This is why staying the course during a burst is one of the most important things parents do.

We worked with the family of a four-year-old we will call S. — a child whose tantrums had been escape-maintained for nearly two years. Every time his parents asked him to clean up, brush his teeth, or come to the table, he dropped to the floor and screamed. Every time, the demand was eventually withdrawn or delayed.

Our ABA therapy team did three things, in this order: 1. Identified escape as the function (with ABC data over ten days). 2. Built a DRA program: when S. complied with a small, manageable version of the demand, he immediately earned a preferred item and a brief break. 3. Implemented extinction on the screaming: the demand stayed put. The break came after compliance, not before.

Day one of the new plan: S. screamed for forty-three minutes during a clean-up routine that used to evoke a six-minute tantrum.

Day three: thirty-one minutes. Day five: nineteen. Day eight: nine. Day twelve: forty seconds, then a deep breath, then he started picking up blocks.

His mother told us later that day five was the day she nearly called to cancel ABA therapy. She did not. The breakthrough came on day twelve. He is now seven, in a typical classroom, and clean-up takes him about two minutes with one reminder.

If you are mid-burst right now, here is what to do:

1. Stay calm and quiet. Less talking is better than more. The burst is searching for a reinforcer. Do not be one.
2. Stay physically present and safe. You are not abandoning your child. You are sitting nearby, watching for safety, ready to deliver heavy reinforcement the moment the replacement behavior occurs.
3. Reinforce the replacement the instant it happens. When your child signs “break,” takes a breath, or makes any attempt at the new skill — deliver the reinforcer immediately. Timing is everything.
4. Do not negotiate during the peak. Negotiation in the middle of a burst is reinforcement of the burst. Wait for any small movement toward calm or compliance.
5. Debrief later, not now. Lectures, conversations, and explanations belong in calm moments — not during the storm.
6. Tell your BCBA the same day. Burst data is gold. Your BCBA will adjust the plan if the burst is too intense or lasts too long.

Most extinction bursts resolve within five to ten sessions. Call your BCBA the same day if:

• The burst includes new, dangerous behavior (significant aggression, self-injury, elopement to unsafe areas)
• The burst has lasted longer than two weeks without any decrease
• You cannot safely maintain the plan in your home
• You and your partner or other caregivers are no longer on the same page

A responsible ABA therapy team has plans for all of these — including stepping down to a less aggressive procedure, adjusting the DRA, or adding parent coaching in the home during the burst window.

• Lerman, D. C., & Iwata, B. A. (1995). Prevalence of the extinction burst and its attenuation during treatment. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 28(1), 93–94.
• Lerman, D. C., Iwata, B. A., & Wallace, M. D. (1999). Side effects of extinction: Prevalence of bursting and aggression during the treatment of self-injurious behavior. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 32(1), 1–8.
• Cooper, J. O., Heron, T. E., & Heward, W. L. (2020). Applied Behavior Analysis (3rd ed.). Pearson.
• Behavior Analyst Certification Board. (2022). BCBA Task List (5th ed.). Littleton, CO: Author.