Pairing

In applied behavior analysis (ABA), pairing usually means a therapist spends time becoming someone your child enjoys. Before teaching starts, the therapist joins your child's play, copies what they do and offers favorite toys and activities. They ask little or nothing of your child during this time. The aim is for therapy to feel like things getting better for your child, not worse. The idea is that something neutral, like a new person or praise, gains value when paired with things your child already likes.

Pairing is often recommended, but it has less research behind it than you might guess. Lugo and colleagues found no step-by-step definition to copy. Fanning Tacoaman and colleagues report few studies on how staff learn to do it. The word has a second meaning, too. Stimulus-stimulus pairing is a separate method that aims to encourage early speech sounds.

In your child's first ABA sessions, it may look like the therapist is just playing, but that play is on purpose. The goal is for your child to be happy to come to sessions and see their therapist. You can help by telling the team about favorite toys, shows, songs and snacks. ABA teams also run formal preference assessments to find what your child likes.

• How often it happens: Ask your Board Certified Behavior Analyst (BCBA) whether pairing happens before every session or mostly early on.
• When teaching begins: Ask when teaching will start and how pairing fits into the first months of therapy.
• What your child loves: Ask how you can share your child's favorite things, and how the team will use them.