Session: Testing the Boundaries of the Good Behavior Game Universal Prevention Program: A Focus on Integration and Context (Society for Prevention Research 25th Annual Meeting)

A series of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) have demonstrated promising effects of a school-based universal preventive intervention called the Good Behavior Game (GBG; Barrish, Saunders, & Wolfe, 1969), a classroom-based behavior management strategy based on social-learning principles which targets aggressive, disruptive, and off-task behavior. GBG helps teachers create a classroom environment conducive to teaching and learning. It also allows teachers to utilize social-learning principles within a team-based, game-like context to reduce aggressive/disruptive and off-task behavior, and consequently, to facilitate instruction. RCTs of the original GBG, tested alone and in combination with other intervention components, have demonstrated reductions in off-task, aggressive, disruptive, and violent behavior, conduct disorder, antisocial personality disorder, drug and alcohol abuse and dependence, tobacco use, and school-based mental health service use. When GBG was combined with instructional components, significant effects were observed on aggressive/disruptive behavior, conduct problems, suspensions, need for mental health and special education services, academic achievement, high school completion, and college attendance. However, there has been less empirical investigation into the combined or possibly synergistic effects of GBG when combined with other models or delivered in different contexts, like after-school settings. This panel leverages data from 3 RCTs to better understand the impact of GBG when combined with other evidence-based programs and when implemented outside of the classroom. The first paper tests the impacts of GBG when combined with a social-emotional learning program (Promoting Alternative Thinking Strategies) in urban elementary schools; this 3-armed trial reports on findings for GBG alone relative to the combination of GBG and PATHS, all compared to a control condition. The second trial tests an integration of GBG and My Teaching Partner, which is a widely-used coaching model; in this trial, the focus is on early career teachers, who are typically lacking in effective classroom management and student engagement strategies. The third paper truly tests the bounds of GBG by examining outcomes when implemented in after-school settings; it reports significant effects of the Pax version of GBG relative to a control condition. Taken together, these 3 papers highlight innovative approaches to leveraging GBG’s synergistic effects when combined with other programs or implemented in after-school settings. A senior leader in the research on GBG will serve as discussant, placing the current findings in a historical context and outlining a series of research questions which lay the foundation for the next stage of research on GBG.