Which term describes using your body or environmental barriers to stop or interrupt the opportunity for a behavior to occur?

• A. Blocking
• B. Shaping
• C. Modeling
• D. Prompting

Answer: (A)

Blocking is using your body or environmental barriers to stop or interrupt the opportunity for a behavior to occur. It prevents the behavior from happening by physically intervening or rearranging the environment so the learner can’t access the trigger or item that would prompt the response. This is a preventive, interruptive strategy rather than a teaching one. It differs from prompting, which provides cues to elicit a correct response; from shaping, which reinforces closer and closer approximations to a target behavior; and from modeling, which shows the behavior for the learner to imitate. For example, standing between a child and a forbidden item to prevent grabbing keeps the opportunity for that behavior from occurring, allowing redirection to a more appropriate alternative.