Sometimes bribery is necessary

My doctor friends call it Pavlov. Most would think it’s bribery. I prefer the politically correct term – positive reinforcement.

The idea is simple. You reinforce the desired/good behaviour. Therefore, the likelihood of getting the desired behaviour will increase.

I have a 10-year girl who has hearing impairment. She has only started wearing hearing aids last year. However, when I tested her, her listening and language skills appear to be good. That is because she has only mild to moderate loss in the low frequency sounds and the profound loss is in the high frequency sounds. So, she still is able to hear a lot of speech sounds, despite not having hearing aids previously. However, she will still encounter problem. She’s finding it difficult to understand long instructions and understand text given orally. Therefore, she still needs to wear hearing aids. And, she needs to be trained how to listen and focus on another person’s speech.

The problem is…..she doesn’t like to wear hearing aids. She only wears them when she’s in school and during mengaji. No one likes to wear hearing aids initially. It amplify all surrounding sounds, and can be uncomfortable. One has to wear them often enough to get used to them.

The child and her mother comes all the way from Pantai Remis by bus. I only see her once a month. I need her to wear her hearing aids often enough.

So, I told her, if she wore her hearing aids for a minimal of 8 hours a day for the next month, I will give her a present. She can choose to have a book, a bottle of bubbles or a box of magic colour. She chose bubbles.

She has to chart how many hours she wears her hearing aids in a day (with her mother’s supervision). I have to get ready a bottle of bubbles. Hopefully, she will take the ‘bribe’.

~ by enniey on January 24, 2008.